Day 1.
Tuesday 30th September.
Off we go !
Our journey from home to Folkstone went without an issue, in fact as we left promptly at 7am on the dot we arrived well in advance of our allocated time slot to cross on Le Shuttle. At the entrance to the terminal long snake like barriers were still in place, where only a few weeks back reports of thousands of holiday makers were stuck in miles of queues on the roads to Calais & Folkstone. The British blamed the French as usual. Being so early I presumed we would be waiting around, but no, we were given our sticker A5 for the window and we were waved past to board the next departure. French Passport control undertaken on our-side of the tunnel, I could now relax and put our Passports safely away again.
Approx 35 mins later we were on the continent, as they used to say. France. Drive on the right, drive on the right, look left, look left first, were said by myself several times, sometimes fairly loudly. Breath… Relax… Our newly purchased Sat Nav had been programmed prior to arriving En France, making good use of our time on the Le Shuttle. This should be straight forward, just follow the route to Chalon’s en Champagne. Even the name conjured up the promise of a good one-night stop-over to help us on the route of Lake Garda. The road was pretty straight forward, however now being the passenger in a right-hand drive car, I was now next to the Central reservation. Suffice to say 80 miles an hour felt rather un pleasant at times, especially when over taking the many larger vehicles that accompanied us most of the way. We arrived earlier than expected, a theme seems to be developing. My logical thinking behind our stops to Lake Garda were as the crow flies, no more than 3-4 hours driving (day time only) and this is how our stops were born. Booking.com & reviews all checked, what could go wrong!!
Chalon’s en Champagne
2 hours early, we parked directly outside the B & B a Large Gothic house, it wouldn’t have been out of place in a horror film. I held my tongue on how bad the curtains looked and thought if I didn’t mention it Ed wouldn’t notice… It really did look quite nice on Booking.com.
We sat for 15 minutes and googled how to say “sorry we have arrived two hours early” in French. Surely it can’t be that hard. I drew the short straw and headed to the locked gate where the intercom was located. Buzzed once, I’m not sure what I said but it clearly wasn’t French. A rather angry Lady opened the door at the side of the house and approached me, I was so glad of the locked gate between us. I tried to announce my self but she was having none of it. There was a slight resemblance to Cruella De Ville only all white hair. She promptly told me in no uncertain terms that she was very busy working and we would have to return in two hours. I said yes off course like a polite Anglaise lady and scuttled back to the car where Ed was almost asleep. Ed’s first reaction was ok, we will just have to wait, however I now felt like my mouth was as dry as a desert, I’m not sure if it was fright or I just needed a drink. Anyway, someone must have been looking down on us. We drove less than a mile and discovered this lovely looking Champagne Bar/Restaurant. We parked just opposite; (Ed always feels more relaxed if he can see the car). Do we need a ticket? the machine was all in French now what ? Well would you believe it, our already in use parking app Pay By Phone works here too. 😊
La Brasserie Du Jard
Oh yes please, two glasses of champagne, oh how they hit the spot…
That was roughly 3.30pm I would say, Gezim & Shukrane’s beautiful restaurant & B & B, had only been open 9 months, you can tell where this is going can’t you. A lovely day was had, a late lunch avec bottle of Rose, followed by check in to the newly renovated listed apartment, high ceilings with original features, with the promise of a discount, as we were all now friends. After a refreshing power nap, we were once again down stairs in the restaurant for our evening meal and another top up, Champagne off course, well when in Rome. x
P.S Cruella did try to call us at 8pm – We decided to at least be polite and text her incase she was waiting up for us ! I said we had decided to travel on to our next destination and that we didn’t require a refund (not that it was going to be offered) oh and I didn’t mention the curtains. (us Brits are just too polite) 🙂
