Thu 9th May – Fri 10th May 2024
Our plan for this trip is to spend the next month exploring Brittany.
Thursday 9th May: Folly Farm, near Islip, Oxfordshire.
We broke the journey south to Portsmouth, with a stop-over near Oxford. Folly Farm is a small campsite, around 3.5 miles from the A34, which is a “certificated site” of the Camping and Caravanning Club. We had booked in for one night at a cost of £12, the price with no electric hook-up.
This is a really pretty part of Oxfordshire and as we passed through the beautiful village of Islip, we felt as though we should be spending some time exploring there. Perhaps on the way back home.
We were parked in a large field with a bit of as slope for the night. Nothing too severe, so we managed to avoid the need for the ramps to level-up. We were treated to lovely views over the surrounding countryside, visits from a pheasant and a red kite flying overhead (which managed to evade being photographed).
Friday 10th May: Cherbourg
On a calm, fine but misty day, we crossed the channel to Cherbourg on Brittany Ferries ship “Cotentin”. This vessel is a smaller one than we are used to travelling on, on our usual route, Portsmouth to Caen. The smaller size meant that there was less scope for entertainment during the crossing.
As we were going to Cherbourg, the crossing should have been shorter, but due to “operational reasons” our departure was moved from 2pm to 12:30pm and Cotentin travelled at what seemed a snail’s pace, taking five and a half hours. Even the fact that we had a cabin with an outside view did not help; we could see nothing due to the mist.
After leaving Portsmouth, we met the Brittany Ferries “Normandie”, on its way there. We have travelled on Normandie many times and it is a huge ferry, but compared to the cruise-liner we saw berthed, quite small.
When we arrived in Cherbourg, there was another cruise-liner docked. At first we thought the Spirit of Discovery had beaten us across the channel (unsurprisingly), but no, this was another vessel, the P&O Cruises “Ventura”. I am not sure I would enjoy a cruise, Alison calls them floating care homes and I think I might see where she is coming from on this.
After disembarkation we stayed the night at a local “aire de camping car” at Collignon. A fully automatic aire, we payed by card and the barrier opened after scanning the QR code on the scanner. The same code allowed us out, the following morning. This aire was attached to a large campsite which offered a range of facilities including a cafe and a children’s play area.
That evening, we enjoyed a walk along the coastal path to Le Becquet, a small village with a harbour, at the end of which is marked-out for motorhome parking places. It seems a world away from the UK, where motorhomes seem to be seen as a nuisance.
On the beach were some guys fishing and the large crab mural on the wall behind them looked like it was eying them up for lunch.
Our walk back to the site was towards the west and we were able to watch the sunset over Cherbourg harbour. A beautiful end to the day.
"See-u-Later" 