We’ve been languishing in Arçais for a few days catching up with our friend that we last saw at a remembrance gathering for her husband last year. We’ve had a good time catching up.

I’ve also had to catch up with a hangover from last year’s trip to Spain when, for what seem like complex reasons, I’d ended up with the wrong inner tube in my bike’s front wheel. It’s wrong on two counts. Firstly, the valve is wrong – it’s one of those horrible Presta (high pressure) valves instead of a car-type Schrader valve (unavailable in Spain for my size of wheel). Secondly, the tube is narrower than the tyre really requires but it seems to expand to fill the tyre well enough. Oh, my incorrect inner tube is supposedly also one filled with goo designed to plug small punctures.

My bike hasn’t been used much over winter but the Marais Poitevin is decidedly cycling country so we’ve been out pedalling.

This morning I clambered back on my trusty steed to discover a flat front tyre. “Bother”, said Pooh, politely. I spun about, returned to the welcoming back-end of Frodo and dug out my puncture repair stuff. I removed the front wheel from an upended bike and set about removing both tyre and inner tube.

‘T was a messy business; the tyre casing was filled with lurid green goo which had leaked out of the punctured tube. Naturally, the outside of the tube itself was also covered in green goo. It seems that the goo had failed to plug what looked like a pretty small pin-prick of a puncture. What it did do was act as a great indicator of where the puncture actually was – spot the bubble of green goo.

I cleaned up the inside of the tyre and the outside of the tube, though I was concerned that remnants of the goo might stop a patch adhering to the tube. Nonetheless I had no option but for go for it.

It did seem to work but I had another concern: being technically too narrow for the tyre, the tube would have to expand considerably to take up the slack. I wondered if the rubber patch could cope with such expansion and remain fixed.

The proof of the pudding was in the riding and we went back out for another pedal. With not a little relief, both I and the bike seemed to survive.

When we get back home I really must get the correct inner tube for my front wheel, both valve type and thickness, along with a spare or two. I’m also considering getting different tyres since the ones I have are a “sloppy” fit to the rims – no tyre levers needed. Once deflated they more or less fall off the rim and tend to blow off in random places around the rim while you are trying to inflate them.

Last year at about this time we were at Arçais for our friend’s celebration of life, a friend who had sadly passed away from Covid early in 2024. Now being on the west coast of France in the vicinity, it seemed a good idea to call in and visit the family home again. Besides, there are a couple of campsites in France that feel a bit like home to us and the one at Arçais is one such.

Before leaving our serpentine site in the late morning, we walked along the coastal promenade in the opposite direction. Here, there were a couple of items of interest. First, there were concrete coastal defence bunkers, one of which was being restored. I’m familiar with the Atlantic Wall developed by one A. Hitler in WWII but I was completely surprised to learn that some of these defences dated from the Napoleonic war around 1810. Others were from around 1900, the only timely reference to which that I could find was the Franco-Prussian war. (Don’t quote me, though.)

More interesting to me and certainly much more photogenic was one of a series of fishing shacks scattered along this coast which would lower large, square nets into the water when the tide was at a suitable height to catch fish, possibly the flat fish that bury themselves in the sandy bottom.

Having had enough of being blown about by the onshore wind, we retired to Frodo to hit the road and make for Arçais about 195kms distant, where our friends lived.

Most of the journey was plain sailing on an autoroute and we made it to nearby Magné by about 13:30 to refuel and fill the fridge with a few days worth of food at a Super-U.

Restocked, we headed the last 10kms or so to Arçais where we reacquainted ourselves with Dom, le guardian, selected a pitch (the same one we’d had last year) and got Frodo settled.

With the sun shining, we sauntered along one of the marais poitevin’s many canals to our friend’s house, hoping that she’d be in. I saw not a single dragonfly – two damselflies but not one dragonfly. In the past, this stretch of water had been richly populated. I’d noticed a seriously reduced population last year but now it seemed non-existent. Our friend, who was in, reinforced our impression by noting that she hadn’t seen any, either.

The catastrophic drop off in dragonfly population has me very confused. This marsh is called the Venice Verte, “Green Venice”, because the water used to be covered in green duck weed. That was when the local sewage system apparently discharged into the various canals. At that time, the area was richly populated by dragonflies. We understand that a “proper” sewage system was relatively recently installed and the waterways consequently cleaned up. The green duck weed has totally disappeared and there is now nothing green about green Venice. Neither is there a strong population of any dragonflies. Now, I’d have thought that cleaning up the water would have improved the situation for wildlife but the opposite seems to have been the case. The insect population has crashed. Consequently, the birdlife which relies on insects for food has also taken a noticeable hit. It’s bizarre.

Our next planned hop was a short one, a journey of some 40kms were we to go straight there. Of course, we didn’t. We would be passing the southern edge of the marais that had drawn our attention on the way to Piriac-sur-mer and a road cut up through the marais so it seemed a good opportunity to investigate a bit further.

The idea was fine in principle but a road closure at the beginning of our diversion sent us around a tortuous diversion of its own on twisting, relatively narrow roads through the backstreets of a small town. Eventually we regained the road that we had intended to be on beyond the road closure. I was not looking forward to returning on the same route.

The view from the Frodo’s cab gave no hints about a marsh, that we could see. In the village of Rozé we spotted an impressively tall belvedere structure, about four storeys high, clearly intended for views of the surrounding flat countryside. Furthermore, there was a handy-dandy car park near its base which – take note other authorities – had two specific motorhome parking areas which permitted a 24-hour stop.

The weather was dry but mainly overcast. I checked the nearby river for signs of life and found nothing, so we clambered up the stairs to the top of the belvedere. Sure enough, we now saw the marsh stretching out before us. In better conditions and with more time, it would have been an interesting place to dally further.

This wasn’t the day, though, so we continued to Francine’s first chosen port of call on the Île de Fédrun, one of seven islands of Saint Joachim. We made it to another car park which, sleepy though the area appeared, was big enough to take school buses so space was not a problem.

We went for a wander, rather longer than intended. We did find one stretch of water but not with anything resembling access. We did find a chocolate box village with largely thatched buildings, some of which were in need of maintenance but others of which looked spick and span and achingly attractive..

Lunch beckoned and Francine had spotted a creperie beside a bridge that we had crossed on the way in. There is supposedly a Michelin starred restaurant here but a creperie would suffice and help the bank balance. It proved to be a fortunate choice because on offer was Persillade d’Anguilles, eels dressed in garlic and parsley. Francine is not a fan of eels but I am; she went for a ham, egg and goat cheese galette. We washed our lunch down with a bottle of cider served with the traditional bolée, a glazed pottery cup.

Time to return to our original trajectory and find the campsite close to our intended attraction. With much relief, Francine found a route back which circumvented the serpentine twists of our inbound journey. We crossed the Saint Nazaire bridge and arrived at Camping La Dune de Jade at St. Brévin Les Pins, which is now less of a campsite and more of a mobile homes village. It’s a common but somewhat sad development of some campsites and at €200 a night for a cabin, you can see the attraction, especially if more and more motorhomers shun campsites to stop on free/cheap aires. There were still a few touring pitches, though, and we found one that suited Frodo.

And so [lose 100 points] to the reason that we are camped opposite a rather industrial-looking Loire estuary: the Serpent d’Océan,  a giant skeleton sculpture shaped like a slithering serpent. It is by Chinese-French artist Huang Yong Ping [so there]. He has clearly been to the same school of artist bull as Anthony Gormley because the twisting serpent is supposed to “reflect the twists of the Saint Nazaire bridge” before which it sits. Right.

The sculpture is positioned on the beach of the estuary so is partially covered at high tide and completely revealed, supports included, at low tide. I haven’t had a chance to play with my Big Stopper ND filter since a trip to Greece in 2022 and was keen to have a go at this subject. Wanting to blur the water movement, I needed the tide to be in.

After getting Frodo settled and working out how to carry my tripod whilst cycling, we climbed on our bikes to pedal the 4 kms or so up to the sculpture. Tide tables suggested the tide would be largely in and so it proved to be. Now to try to capture the beast whilst avoiding the irritating drone that was being flown at the same subject. I started with a rather obvious side-on shot which included the distracting opposite shore but then Francine found me a much cleaner head-on aspect. The day and subject were largely monochrome, so monochrome it is, then.

Reasonably satisfied; time to return for a pre-prandial and dinner.

… wind and more wind, and salt.

We’d spent a pleasant enough Friday night at Camping Mon Calme and Saturday dawned bright. Saturday in Piriac-sur-mer is also market day so guess where we were going? We walked the 1km out of the back of the campsite down to the town where pretty much the first thing we saw were market stalls and boy, were they good.

We had already visited a modest market in the modest village of St. Aubin du Cormier but, pleasant enough though it was, there were a few stalls that we look for missing. Piriac-sur-mer made up for those shortfalls. Here we found not just one “spinning chicken” stall [we call the rotisserie chicken stalls spinning chickens] but three – spoilt for choice. With no local knowledge we selected one based largely on what it looked like, There was also an olive stall with a very pleasant lady offering tastings of her wares.

“Pas nécessaire, ils sont trés bon je suis sûr”, I ventured, and bought 200gr of picholines in garlic.

On our last Australian trip, Francine’s brother and sister-in-law presented us with a boxed seafood eating set, including an oyster shucking knife which was now in Frodo’s batterie de cuisine. Lo, there was a stall selling a whole range of graded oysters. We opted for a dozen #2s, which are quite large. The vendor also had a plastic hand protector which he also threw in for free.

Our plan, such as it was, was to have the spinning chicken for lunch and the oysters for a modest evening meal followed by cheese. Excellent.

Last year, a friendly French man who was our neighbour on the Arçais campsite kindly presented us with 10 oysters from La Rochelle. I was not equipped but managed to shuck those with the foil cutter on our corkscrew. They were smaller, I think, and our dozen #2s proved a tougher proposition even with the correct equipment. Nonetheless, gastronauts that we are, I eventually managed to open the beasts and very good they were, too.

Sunday was apparently the French version of Mothers’ Day over here, the Fête des Mères. It began with some light rain overnight which relented and gave way to overcast. A meteorological disturbance was moving through and quite rapidly, at that. Accompanied by quite strong winds gusting to 40 kph or so, the overcast was replaced by mostly blue skies in the late morning.

Not wishing to waste a blue sky, we braved the wind and tried a bike ride down to Guérande, 6 or 7 kilometres away. Guérande is famous for its salt harvesting and we were keen to have a look. We didn’t have to work much on the way ‘cos we were wind assisted; coming back would be a different matter.

We are familiar with the salt pans at Gruissan down in the south on the Mediterranean coast, where the water tends to show a fabulous pink colour. It may be that were at a different juncture in the salt harvesting process, here, but there were no interesting colours. It is, however, a very extensive area.

Beginning our return the wind, as expected, began to get very irritating. Cycling into a strong headwind certainly needed some electric assistance. It was still a bit unpleasant, though.

Under a continuing blue sky but still in a strong wind, in the evening we tried sitting outside Frodo with a pastis and some of our olives. We braved it for 10 minutes or so but it really wasn’t pleasant enough, so we wimped out and went inside. Happily, the wind is forecast to abate tomorrow.

We did our housekeeping on Frodo, filling up the fresh water etc. and prepared to head for La Turballe, which is in the southern extreme of Brittany, a spit west of St. Nazaire. Our route would take us tantalizingly close to a large wetland/marais, apparently the second largest in France after the Camargue. This was Parc naturel regional de Brière. It seemed rude not to have a look on our way (almost) past.

The part we chose to stop at seemed to be more picnic area than wildlife marais. Still, in keeping with not being rude we disembarked and had a short squint at a couple of lakes close to the parking area. Action was very slow, to be honest, but just as I was thinking of giving it up as a bad job, I spotted a Dainty Damselfly (Coenagrion scitulum) mostly hiding behind a reed. These have something of a celebrity status in the UK, being restricted to parts of Kent. I’m not a fan of damselflies in flight but that’s about all I could manage of this one. It made the stop worthwhile.

We continued the last half hour to La Turballe but our first chosen campsite proved to be full for Friday night, though Saturday and Sunday were available. I’m used to the “coastal effect” being meteorological but there’s another coastal effect which is touristic: full campsites. In September, 2023 we had tried visiting the Basin d’Arcachon  when we suffered four full sites before eventually finding a fifth that did have a pitch for us. So, with slight misgivings, this time around we moved a little further west to another campsite at Piriac-sur-mer where we were relieved to find free pitches.

We’re at Domaine Mon Calme which seems to be a bit of a Brit stronghold, though it’s pleasant enough. I’d describe the pitches as adequate but the facilities are exceptional; they include something we have never before seen on any campsite: a Bac a Poisson – a dedicated, large fish preparation sink. That’s an indication of the sort of area we are in.

We had a wonderfully clear evening and Francine had a hankering for a paddle so she took herself off to the local beach, about 500m away. The water was very calm and it all looked quite restful. Walking back across the pebbles barefoot after paddling was a little less than restful but Francine says it was worth it.

… rain, rain and more rain.

The inclement weather had been forecast for 21st. We had planned to drive to St. Aubin du Cormier, a journey just shy of 300kms, so why did it feel so long? It took us five hours. The weather was foul so maybe the arduous feeling was in some part due to the conditions. We briefly considered driving further but further would have been quite a lot further. I’m glad we stopped ‘cos we’re on a quite delightful small camping municipal of just 25 or so pitches beside a lake. The rain eventually stopped and the next two days are supposedly clement.

As is often the case with camping municipals reception was not open in the afternoon; pitch up and pay up in the evening when someone turns up. Someone did turn up and we paid for two nights, basically €19 per night including electricity. We got Frodo settled in a nice secluded corner, which needed some levelling ramps.

After a very quiet night, the following day was market day in St. Aubin, which we were looking forward to. It did not disappoint, though there might have been an olive stall for an aperitif. Neither was there a spinning chicken machine for dinner. We needed food for a couple of days, though, so we bought some rabbit and prune “pillows” for one night and crepinettes [faggots] for a second evening. We had some veggies that needed using that would accompany these.

After the market we repaired to Frodo for lunch, which was leftover paupiettes from a day or so ago.

The early morning murk had by now dissipated and I was keen to see what our lake had to offer. Actually, there were two adjacent lakes, the smaller of the two with many lilypads. Things were a bit slow to begin with but, in the enjoyable afternoon sunshine, we eventually racked up a list of 11 species of dragonfly and damselfly. There was a twelfth, a demoiselle, but I didn’t see it and Francine didn’t see it well enough to identify. Not a bad haul, though.

Perhaps the larger lake’s most curious inhabitant was a strikingly handsome Bar-headed Goose, more usually famed for its high altitude migration flights across the Himalayas. It is not native to Europe. This particular individual eventually left the water and stretched its wings, one of which was obviously clipped. So, it’s a captive bird but what is a captive bird doing swimming on a municipal lake, I wonder?

Having arrived at Honfleur yesterday afternoon, the sunny weather continued and today we wandered into town to the honeypot harbour. We’d actually been here many years ago with American friends but I’m darned if I can remember anything about that except, of course, the American friends. It would’ve been around New Year and the temperature now was much more amenable.

A while ago I bought a new camera body, an Olympus OM-D mk 2, and I was keen to try it’s built-in neutral density filters going up to ND64, equivalent to 6 stops of light reduction. It’s an in-camera simulation so not quite the same as using a real ND filter. Maybe the harbour would give me the opportunity to play.

While I was staring at my camera’s menu system trying to figure things out, some guy waved a phone camera and asked if I’d take their picture.

“Sorry, I’m busy trying to do something”.

Mr. Grumpy didn’t want to be disturbed from sorting out his technology. What is it with these people?

After a while I thought I’d figured out what I needed to do and then set about trying various line ups and shots with some of the harbour buildings, boats and water. Busy though this shot is, I think it’s about my favourite. I’m fairly sure a tripod-mounted ND Big Stopper would’ve done better but this was a whole lot easier being hand held with no tripod needed.

Naturally, all these colourful  reflections were absolute manna for Francine and her multiple exposure bent. I think her hardest job was figuring out which way to point her camera; that and avoiding yet more boats intruding into the foreground. Whilst my Olympus is great for wildlife, it’s complete rubbish at multiple exposures so it’s not an area I feel comfortable playing in. I’m happy to leave it to the expert. Here’s a couple of Francine’s that I really like.

Honfleur apparently attracted artists because of its light and we’d both spent a happy hour or two doing what we could with it. It’s also a place for good seafood and we thought a lunch of Moule et frîtes would be appealing. We chose one of the many restaurants littering the harbour side – choice is the biggest problem – and settled down for a steaming bowl of mussels. We washed them down with a pichet of vin blanc.

After lunch, as we wandered back towards our campsite, I couldn’t help but be taken with a van bearing the slogan, “Franco Solutions”. Well, I just had to have a snap of that. The van was parked in the street making a big deal of Maisons de Satie, properties of the composer Erik Satie, the walkway outside being appropriately decorated.

Not just painting artists, then.

Francine had set a 05:00 alarm so we could leave at 05:45-ish and head for Le Shuttle. We found the correct route and way in and hit the self check-in gates. We were early so it offered us a train one hour before our booking. Well, OK. A boarding mirror hanger was spat out at us and we were let in.

Our boarding group, V3 , was soon called and we headed off to the next stage: passport control and security. Passport control, leaving the UK – no problem. Security – problem. We were funnelled off behind other campers where we sat waiting for someone to ask if our gas was off.

“Yes, do you want to see it?”

“No, I just want to know that it’s off. When the guys in front move, follow them.”

The guys in front didn’t move; they couldn’t. The security lanes are cunningly situated next to the main lanes which they have to filter (read “barge”) their way into but by now there is a solid queue of other vehicles, all trying to get through the same two French passport immigration checks.

Long story short: we sat like lemons for 30+ minutes, made necessary by a single unchecked question, by which time our allotted train had gone. We finally boarded the next train, 30 minutes later but still earlier than our booked crossing, and sat behind a pretentious McLaren exotic sports car which for some reason had been loaded into the tall vehicles carriage despite being little more than two feet tall. We couldn’t help but notice that all the surrounding vehicles were boarding group W3. Hey ho.

Everything else was smooth and about 35 minutes later we disembarked on the French side.  We stopped for coffee after being passed by a couple more pretentious McLaren sports cars – clearly something had been organized –  before stopping again for shopping at Leclerc in Neufchâtel-en-Bray, near our more usual campsite.

Much like the UK of late, the morning was overcast but it brightened nicely. We crossed the Pont de Normandie, a toll bridge, which is impressive but a little less so the the viaduc de Millau.

Eventually we reached our first intended stop at Honfleur. There is a campsite very handily placed on the outskirts of town within walking distance of the honeypot harbour. The site is called Camping du Phare, that being a lighthouse and the old lighthouse stands resplendent just outside the campsite.

The pitches are fine and we were directed to one – saves the agony of choice – to get Frodo settled. He was happily automatically level with a little natural shade. The warm sunshine was very welcome.

After the necessary refreshment which had been purchased at our Leclerc stop, we went to stretch our legs. There was a park nearby which  was much more appealing that dealing with the honeypot harbour in mid-afternoon. The park was the Jardin des Personalités. Wandering around it we saw about a dozen busts, all lurking in hedging, but there was only one I’d ever heard of: Claude Monet. There was a chap who had basically founded Quebec but I’m afraid his name was unknown to me.

After the most extraordinary British spring that I can remember – lots of sun, little rain but quite cool easterly winds – we are once again running away to La Belle France.

We are starting this trip very differently for us, though. Having returned last year on Le Shuttle (The Channel Tunnel), this time we have decided to go over on it as well as return on it. The downside, if it is a downside, is that you can’t relax over a plateful of food on the train. We are also going over a week earlier than has been our norm, largely to avoid Satan’s Little Disciples in any of July and still get six weeks in.

I booked a relatively early Monday morning crossing at 07:45. So, we have to check in at least by 06:45. Travelling down on the same morning, would mean leaving home at 03:00. Sod that! We are too old and too wise; too many things could go wrong. A sleepless half night and then driving through part of France. I think not. So, we booked in to a Caravan Club site with special “ferry pitches” 15 minutes away from the tunnel and travelled down today, Sunday, the day before our train.

We left home just after midday and got to our campsite at about 15:00. The journey was straightforward. It’s a very well organized campsite. An envelope with your registration is left in a cabinet. The envelope contains the gate code for access and instructions on how best to get to both the tunnel and the ferry port. “Ignore your satnav”; frequently good advice.

There’s a handy-dandy pub a couple of hundred yards away in the village of Densole. We had thought it would be fun to eat in the pub but sadly the kitchen is closed after 15:00 on Sundays. So, we’ve brought a picnic for our evening meal. That didn’t stop us enjoying a couple of drinks in the Black Horse pub after we arrived, though. And very convivial it was, too.

Oh, Frodo has a shiny new dashcam. This was occasioned by a clash of wing mirrors during our return trip in the UK from Bempton Cliffs. [Don’t ask.] Finding a dashcam that fits in between his windscreen and overnight windscreen blinds was a bit of a challenge but it’s in. Rather like insurance, here’s hoping that we don’t need it.