Category: VW Campervan

Exclusive camping!

On By MashleyIn Belgium, T4 Camper, travel, VW Campervan, vwt4Leave a comment

Getting off the motorway past the accident was a bit of a bodge, there was no way through so we all had to turn around and go up the emergency lane the wrong way and then leave via the slip road that comes onto the motorway from a local village, we had to wait a while but eventually we got going. 

We were so lucky not to have been involved in that crash, it must have just happened as we pulled up behind it. 

Our course had been diverted from Bruges to the garage  in Oostkamp and we arrived about 30 minutes after we got off the motorway. Long story short, 300 euros to fix then van and the part wouldn’t arrive the following day, after much discussion and possible scenarios it was decided we’d be staying with VW for the night! 

  
We’ve stayed in worse places and to be honest, what else could we do? 

It was chucking it down with rain so we got our waterproofs on, grabbed the bikes and rode into Bruges, here’s a picture of lolly looking a lot bigger than she actually is!

  
The ride wasn’t long and we joked that staying at the VW garage was a result really as it was closer to Bruges than our campsite! 

There is an old fish market in a square, we parked our bikes there and went for a wander, the first place we came across was the ice rink and a load of food and drink stalls, smelled lovely but were probably tourist prices, we carried on wandering about in the rain and eventually came to the conclusion we should drink some beers, we found an empty bar with a window seat and plotted up, here we are with a leffe each. 

  
Something has happened to my wife, when we met she didn’t do booze and certainly not beer, that has all changed now and we spent the next couple of hours drinking leffe, chouff and jupiler, the last being out least favourite. 

Before we came I bought lolly a guide book for Bruges and in it she read about a restaurant that came with a beer to suit each course, Den Dyver it’s called, we agreed that is where we would eat and set about finding it, I was given directions which I was confident I understood, turns out I didn’t and after lolly took control of our course we eventually found the restaurant which was right by where we parked our bikes.

We came across this guy en route, he’s made out of old tyres. 

  
The restaurant was pleasantly empty and they no longer did the beer with each course, the guide book was three years old and they stopped the beer thing a couple of years earlier. The food still looked awesome even though none of the menu was in English, it’s in Dutch or French and I suprised myself as I worked out most of what was on there using French.  

My starter was amazing, it has a name that I cant remember but it’s a traditional dish and it’s brown shrimps, mash potato, poached egg and hollandaise sauce, lolly had carpaccio scallops, they were nice but I preferred mine. Main course was chataubriand to share, epic is about the best way to describe it, we ate all of it and couldn’t possibly eat anything else when we’d finished. 

The meal wasn’t cheap but it wasn’t massively expensive either, London prices really which we’re used to on occasion, well worth it and if you’re ever over here pay it a visit. 

We grabbed our bikes and rode back to the van, the rain had stopped and this time we had rememberd lights for both of us so less tricky than our previous night riding in France. 

We setup the bed and crashed, tomorrow is another day, Lollys birthday in fact! 

Bad times. 

On By MashleyIn Belgium, road trip, T4 Camper, VW CampervanLeave a comment

It was all goin so well until we tried to get off the Eurostar, starter motor decided to just spin until it burnt out, joy, can’t start the van. 

We got towed off, bump started and were on our way again, we can’t turn the van off as we won’t be able to start it again without a bump start, feels like we’re in that movie speed!

It was all looking better, then this happened on the A16. 

  
Hopefully nobody is hurt, we’re not. 

  
It at least gave me a chance to call ahead to a vw garage in Bruges to get the van fixed, hope they can fix it today, we need to sleep in it tonight. 

VW Heritage

On By MashleyIn T4 Camper, VW CampervanLeave a comment

If you own a classic VW, be it a camper, golf or beetle, something will fail and that something will need to be replaced. There are numerous suppliers of specialist parts on the internet and in my experience, they generally focus on the one vehicle, there is a place however that has a comprehensive and fairly priced catalouge covering all types of classic VW parts under one roof, VW Heritage.

Based in the UK, VW Heritage have been in business for 26 years, is run by VW enthusiasts and supply parts for all types of classic VW’s including a few I haven’t even heard of like a lovely little thing called a Type 3.  They also write a blog with articles regularly published about all things VW, while we were swanning about in France VW Heritage published an article about our trip and when I got home I found a mail from VW Heritage asking if I would be willing to review some parts, certainly I said!

After a quick chat via email with Andy at VWH, a pair of rear smoked LED lights and Bosch wiper blades were dispatched and arrived at mine the very next day, super quick delivery and well packaged, no broken bits, bonus !

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The first thing I fitted was the Bosch direct connect wipers because it was an easy job!

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It was more grief getting the old wipers off than these ones on, as you would come to expect from Bosch, the wipers are well made and extremely easy to fit, since I fitted them it has rained and I can confirm they work excellently, glide smoothly across the windscreen with no squeaks and no smears either, you can find them on the VWH site here and below is a picture of one of them on the van..

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With the wipers fitted I turned my attention to the rear LED lights.

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The lights are of good quality and are well made, they include orange turn lamp bulbs and some reflectors to stick somewhere, there are no fitting instructions included but they are pretty easy to install and can be done in under an hour, I’ve written up a more detailed fitting guide here.

I really like the look of the lights and I think they look much better than the original ones, the only draw back now they are fitted is they make my tailgate look even more tatty so i’m going to have to get that sorted in the not too distant future!

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If you are interested in a set you can find them on the VW Heritage site by clicking this link.

In conclusion, i’m really happy with the products I received, they arrived quickly, in one piece and were easy to install.

Next time I need a part for my van my first stop will be VW Heritage, either via the online store or thumbing through the T4 catalogue they sent me with the parts!

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Le Conclusion

On By MashleyIn road trip, travel, VW Campervan, vwt4Leave a comment

We’ve been home almost a week now, I went straight back to work, Lolly had the remainder of the week off before starting her new job. It’s the longest trip we’ve done in the van both in distance (just over 2000 miles) and time (21 days), I thought it would be a good idea to write down what we would do differently next time and things we (mainly me) would like to do to the van for our next adventure. 

I also need to cut my grass!

  
Moving About

We both agree that whilst it was nice to move about and see different places if we do it again, we’ll get as far as we want to go and then stay there for a while, maybe spend a couple of days getting somewhere, hold up for a week, then move on somewhere not too far away, stay there for more than a couple of nights, less moving the better. It’s a pain packing up the van every other day, taking all the thermal curtains down, putting the bed up, moving the surfboards from the back to the front and then back again when taking off, it would be much easier if we could arrive, set up camp and then leave it like that for a bit.

Stuff

I doubt we’d take much less, maybe less clothes (especially if we head back to Montalivet) and i’d deffo find a better way to store the body boards as they take up a lot of room in the van, there are a couple of things i’d take next time for sure. I will definitely have on board a reverse polarity adapter for the 240v hook up. We came across this twice, once in an aire and once at a campsite, from what I have read a lot of the Flot Bleu aire’s are wired up reverse which could wreak all sorts of havoc on your electrics, luckily our PMS 3 has a reverse polarity indicator.

I’d like to see if I could get another top box on the roof, in there i’d put all the bedding and one of those fold up table and chairs for when we eat or just wanted to sit outside the van.

Van upgrades.

Solar, I definitely want a solar solution for the leisure battery, whilst I enjoyed staying at the campsites with all their facilities I also really enjoyed staying at the aires, most of which had no electricity supply. I could keep the fridge going for a lot longer which would mean Lolly would have ice for her G&T’s (plus the ice won’t melt and flood the fridge), i’d have cold beers and our food would keep, the split charge kit has massively helped keep the charge up when on the move as has rewiring the fridge.

A pop top, i’ve never really seen the point of them until I saw Dickie and Julias van, I really liked the fact that they didn’t have to fold down their seats in the rear when it was time for bed, they just popped the roof, put their duvet and pillows up there and climbed up to crash, they also have a sunroof so I wouldn’t have to ditch ours which is a feature I really like. I would however have to revisit how the top box attaches to the roof, rails bolted to the pop top would do the job.

An awning, more for rain than sun, it does sometimes rain when cruising about the place in summer and to have a shelter to sit under while nature does it’s thing would be much nicer than having to sit in the van with all the stuff we just chucked in to prevent it getting wet !

Curtains, Van-x preferably, our just kamper thermal curtains are great but they are annoying to deploy, lots of licking and then occasionally falling down in the night, curtains for the rear and two side windows would be great.

Location

We really enjoyed France and both feel we have a lot more to explore and will definitely be going back, we’d both really like to do a similar trip in Spain and then maybe Morocco, dreams for now but you never know !

There is a part of me that looked enviously at the size and space the huge motorhomes had that we were frequently parked up next to, also having your own toilet and shower means you could do a whole trip without ever going to a campsite using just your own facilities, what puts me off is pretty much all of the owners had upwards of 20 years on us, we’re not ready to roll with the olds, we’re still reasonably young and happy being in the cool crowd with our lovely yellow T4  !

Le End

On By MashleyIn france, Graffiti, road trip, summer, T4 Camper, travel, VW CampervanLeave a comment

As we left Chambord a lot later than intended we drove through the night, French motorways aren’t like ours, no cats eyes, no lights.

This would be fine if you had a decent set of headlights, we don’t, DRL’s look nice but even with night breaker bulbs installed they’re still not that great, that being said they were good enough to get us to our destination, Plage merlimont.

The aire is well sign posted though you are sent through a new housing estate and we did wonder if our sat nav had crapped out  as an aire couldn’t possibly be in among all this new housing, it wasn’t, you go through the estate to get to the beach and just before the beach is the aire, it’s nothing special, just a car park for motorhomes with free fresh water and somewhere to empty your waste water if you have any, I cracked a beer, Lauren made some food, we both put the thermal curtains up, ate our food and crashed.

It was a bit colder this closer to England and we’re both fairly certain that’s why we slept so well, best nights sleep on the last day of the holiday because it was cold, how very English..

Sun greeted us the next day despite the forecast being rain, I took a picture of the aire for no particular reason other than to demonstrate how unfantastic it was.

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As always, first thing in the morning I needed to use the loo so I took a wander toward the beach where I assumed the toilet mentioned in the aire would be located, as I got closer I noticed there were a lot of people looking out to sea, I couldn’t really see anything so figured i’d use the loo and then go see what everybody was looking at, turns out there was a colony of seals on the beach basking in the morning sun.

I’ve never seen so many seals, they didn’t look like they were going anywhere in a hurry so I walked back to the van, made some tea for myself and Lolly, grabbed my camera and we both went back to look at the seals, Lolly has a theory that seals hang out on the beach so THEY can watch the humans that come to look at them, I see no reason for this not to be possible!

I don’t really do much zoom photography and as such I don’t have a very good zoom lens, the photo below is the best I could do with my 28mm-135mm.

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Lolly had our binoculars we got free from the national trust, we sat for about an hour just watching them lay about in the sun, we spotted a few more swimming in and then quite quickly the tide followed them, we had a great spot to watch them from but had to vacate fairly swiftly to avoid the incoming tide, it was starting to cloud over and just before we headed to the shore I took a nice shot of the seals from a distance.

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Before the weather turned we took a walk along the rest of the beach, after about an hour we returned to the van, packed up and went to Aldi, Lolly’s mum has a party in the not too distant future so we bought a load of cheap booze, 24 beers for 5 euros, we bought 7 crates and 8 bottles of fizzy wine for a toast! We also bought lunch, bread, cheese and ham, very continental, there was another beach not too far so we parked up and went for a final beach side picnic.

The sun came out again which was lovely, we ate our lunch and basked in the warmth knowing our return to Blighty was only a couple of hours away, turns out it wasn’t. We thought our crossing was at about 18.00 but we’d figured when we’d booked the crossing that we’d want as much time in France on our last day as possible so our crossing wasn’t till 20.50, I was a little upset to be honest as I’d kind of got my head in a space where we were off and I didn’t want to hang about for another couple of hours, that was until we went back to the beach and saw these!

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What you can see here are the remains of a german StP bunker that featured a tank turret, ammunition bunker and open emplacements for 5cm KWK pak guns though I couldn’t tell you which bit relates to what, I got all that information from here.

We spent a good bit of time walking among the remains of the bunker and photographing the various structures and their artwork.

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If you look closely on the second picture you will see a sign that states in French the beach beyond is a naturist beach, more naked people but nothing quite on the scale of the naked site. The beach is massive, we walked for at least half an hour before turning back and we hadn’t even got halfway along it, on our return trip we came across a jelly fish.

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I threw it back into the sea but I think it had perished, I know jelly fish don’t really do much but this one did nothing when returned to the sea.

When we got back to where the bunker was I set the camera up and got our last picture of the holiday.

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From there we went back to the van and drove to Calais which was about an hour away, we were delayed (not immigrant related) so i grabbed a burger king and Lolly bought gin with the last of our euros, the remainder of the trip involved a train, the M20, the M25, remembering to drive on the left and then bed, work the following morning, joy.

Le Chateau

On By MashleyIn france, road trip, summer, T4 Camper, travel, VW CampervanLeave a comment

Ever seen those funny bottles of spirits that look like the holy hand grenade of Antioch? Chambord it’s called, never tried it myself but the reason I mention is because we are off to Chateau Chambord, the inspiration for said raspberry liqueur.

It’s a 4.5 hour journey from camp naked, we set off about 11 aiming to be at the Aire we had selected for an evenings stay by around 4pm. 

Nothing much happened on the journey asides from the traffic being rubbish so we stopped for a romantic picnic by the Carrefour sign next to the motorway, as soon as we stopped the traffic cleared. 

  
When we arrived at the Aire it wasn’t quite as described, next to a main road with no toilet facilities, this would not do so we had a look round and handily 500 meters up the road was a great little campsite called camping de chatillon, 19 euros with electric for the night, sweet. Something I’ve encountered a couple of times here is reverse polarity on hook ups, same deal here tho luckily the campsite owner had an adaptor we could borrow for the night, if you are planning a trip to France I would recommend having one on board. 

Our pitch was a small modest affair. 

    
We went for a wander around the local vinyard and corn fields, returned to the van and lolly made some kick ass pasta. I had a rubbish nights sleep, one because of the massive storm that kept me up and two, I was racking my brains to figure out a solution to my ongoing battle with the fridge. 

We woke up, grabbed a shower and made our way to the local boulangerie for breakfast, we then parked up the van and cycled to Chambord, an easy 30 minute ride on dedicated cycle tracks, they love cycling over here! 

  
The chateau is a truly beautiful building and one that strangely looks better from the back than the front. 

  
We grabbed an audio guide and spent the next couple of hours wandering about the place learning who built which bit, who’s bedroom was here and what the king got up to when he didn’t fancy shagging the queen, so the rumour goes. 

There is an I credible staircase which is the canter piece of the chateau, it’s a staircase within a stair case which means one person can go up while the other goes down and you will never meet, this is the view from the bottom. 

  
Chambord iswell worth a visit as is the souvenir shop, they have tasters for every box of biscuits they sell, we tried them all. 

We jumped on our bikes and headed back to the van a lot later than we’d anticipated, we hit the road for our last stop on our trip, Plage merlimont. 

I finally figured out what to do with the fridge, this bits for camper owners. All the forums will say wire your weaco fridge directly to your leisure battery. I have a PMS 3 in my van and the problem with this is when you are hooked up the pms3 is trying to send the leisure battery a charge whilst at the same time the fridge is draining it more than the PMS supplied charge, the result is when you leave the battery got little to no charge and your fridge fails shortly after. What I have done is wire the fridge to an aux 12v output that’s built into the PMS3, I get no voltage drop so the fridge works. When it’s hooked up to 240v the fridge receives its 12v supply from the PMS unit, not the battery, this then allows the battery to receive a top up charge, simples! 

Le naked

On By MashleyIn france, road trip, T4 Camper, travel, VW Campervan, vwt41 Comment

I’m not entirely sure how I missed the bit about our next stop being a naturist site, lolly assures me that I read the description and that I said it was cool. 

I was first alerted to the nakedness when we came to check in, all of the staff were in clothes, then some naked people walked in, genuinely I had no idea we were heading to a naturist site. 

I don’t have a problem with naturism, if people want to walk about in the buff then that’s up to them, me being naked however, that I have issue with. 

I’ve never really been comfortable with being naked, for one, I have psoriasis and this season it’s come up on my head and my arse, I don’t like looking at it and I don’t think anyone else would either. Secondly I’ve never felt particularly good about my physique, I’m not massively fat but I’m not lean either, I’m not muscular but not unmuscular either if that makes sense, average is about the best way I could describe myself. 

I turn the light off when I go to bed before I take my clothes off so I don’t catch a glance of my naked self in the mirror, issues. 

Lolly assures me that nobody is particularly looking and deep down I know she’s right, the demons in my head have other idea’s however and are set to ruin what could have been a couple of fun days trying a new experience. 

After getting over the initial shock about the whole naturist thing we made our way to the pitch we’d been assigned, it was in the blazing sun with no shelter and next door to the newly arrived circus, this would be the first and possibly last time I saw a camel wandering through the open air toilets. There were also some beautiful but quite sad looking tigers. 

  
We agreed this would not do, especially as the pitch we were given was being vacated by a Welsh couple for exactly the same reasons. A short trip to reception, an explanation of our situation and requirements resulted in us being given a list of available spots and to just help ourselves. 

The list and accompanying map were a pain to use and for Lolly it got too much, it wouldn’t be long before one of us blew a fuse, lolly went to the beach, I sorted our pitch. 

Sorting our pitch involved stopping at the spar for a couple of beers, skulling one and then opening the other for the drive round the site trying to find a suitable spot from the available ones.

After a couple of no goes I came across a suitable spot and drove the van toward it, that’s when I beached the van in sand, no going anywhere. 

Within seconds I was surrounded by naked men, an English chap called Gerry introduced himself and apologised for not coming out sooner to warn me of the sand trap, apparently I wasn’t the first to get stuck. Meanwhile, a couple of the naked men left and returned with shovels and what followed was possibly one of the more bizzare things I’ve seen in my life, naked men digging out a campervan, a true once in a lifetime experience. 

Eventually we got the van out with some digging and an old towel of all things, I got the van where it needed to be and setup camp mashley. 

 
Despite finding the whole naked digging rescue thing a bit surreal I was genuinely moved at everyone’s willingness to help a stupid Englishman stuck in the sand. I headed off to the beach to find lolly, it didn’t take long to find her and the journey to the beach involved naked overload, naked people everywhere, walking, cycling, flying down water slides and the beach, naked surfing, never seen that before! We hung by the beach and caught some waves on our bodyboards, the surf there is excellent, I put on a wetsuit, still not up for being naked just yet. 

When we got back to the van our only shower option was pretty open, no doors, just a shower while people pass by on their way to their next naked activity, I bit the bullet and got on with it, wasn’t so bad. Lolly I might add has no issue with being naked and from the moment she got to the beach ditched her clothes and didn’t wear much for the remainder of our trip. 

  
The following day the weather was a bit rubbish, I hung by the van updating the blog and devising a Frankenstein charging system so our fridge would work. I also threw a shit fit about being naked on some slides but that’s a whole other story. Lauren went for a wander and we visited Aldi to pick up some supplies for a BBQ at the beach. 

The beach at Montalivet is awesome and perfect for a BBQ.  Seeing as nobody was really around and I’d pissed off lolly with my shit fit at the water slides I figured the best thing I could do was get naked on the beach with my wife and go for a naked swim, here we are below after the swim, butt naked!

  
We cooked a shed load of food, lamb, chicken and unfortunately some rubbish burgers, steak hache for any of you heading to France, make sure you season them! 

The beach is a great spot for a sunset and this nights sunset was nothing short of epic, a stunning sunset with a massive looming storm, sometimes I forget with the right composition how good a photo an iPhone can take. 

  
We took a stroll back to the van, crashed, got up and prepped for the journey to Chambord. 

Gerry and his wife Catherine came to wish us a safe journey, they were such nice people, we bumped into them loads around the site and they always said hello, Gerry was infectiously happy at all times. 

The whole naked thing seems to remove so many barriers we humans put up, everyone I encountered on the site was butt naked, friendly and happy, I suspect at one with the whole underneath we are all the same idea. 

The site is an amazing place, it’s like a small village, in fact I know smaller villages. The facilities are excellent, the surroundings beautiful and a happy community atmosphere. 

I still feel a bit weird naked but genuinely, I hope I get over it because I’d go back to CHM in Montalivet and I’d probably get naked. 

Le Black Madonna

On By MashleyIn france, road trip, T4 Camper, travel, VW CampervanLeave a comment

Rockamadour sits atop a gorge on the Dordogne and looks like it’s been carved out of the hillside, from afar it’s a really quite beautiful looking village.

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The sanctuary above is known as the sanctuary of the blessed mary (also the pilgrimage church of Notre Dame) and within it resides the wooden black madonna said to have been carved by Saint Amator (Amadour) himself. Some will tell you Rocamadour is named after Saint Amadour, others say it’s named after a goats milk cheese, I prefer the saint version.

Despite the lower part of the village being a massive tourist trap the sanctuary at the top is still very much a religious place, so much so that at the entrance to the sanctuary they have various bits of cloth you can use to cover yourself up with if you want to go and view the sanctuary, if you are wearing very short shorts, a vest or crop top then it’s required to cover up, religious folk still make a pilgrimage to the sanctuary.

As you an see from the village below, the sanctuary is quite a way up.

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Allegedly, if you say a prayer on each of the steps on the way up to the sanctuary you will see or behold a miracle, looking at some of the people climbing the stairs it was a miracle in itself they made it to the top without heart failure.

The sanctuary from an architecture point of view is really quite stunning, as i’ve mentioned before, i’m not religious in the  slightest but I do appreciate the architecture.

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I didn’t find the the wooden black madonna, to be honest, I didn’t really look, I did think the light coming through above the altar was quite special so I took a picture.

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The remainder of our time at Rocamadour involved walking up over the ramparts and admiring the view across the gorge, we also went on a funicular lift which Ian really enjoyed, he’s a lift engineer by trade and to him I guess this was a kind of lift porn, you can see Ian admiring the lift on the right below…

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We left Rocamadour and headed off in search of food, we stopped at an auberge that Ian and Lindi are good friends with the owners of, Auberge de forges, well worth a visit, great food, great location and fantastic company!

The following day we got up and headed off for a day of canoeing with Captain John, another of Lindi and Ian’s friends who’s made a life for themselves in France.

Captain John has spent a lot of time at sea, a proper old salty sea dog, i’d never met anyone who had a pet octopus that lived in a bucket on the side of boat or rescued a crow that became a best friend but, since meeting John thats all changed!

Here we all are on the Dordogne executing a safety manoeuvre whilst drinking beer, thats how good we got a canoeing, see if you can spot captain John!

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We covered a fair distance, it took us about 6 hours to get from start to finish with a minor stop for lunch en route. Lolly’s parents have often said they’d like to do the canoe trip but never got round to it, i’m really glad we all got to do it together, a really great day out..

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Once we got back to base camp we visited Captain John and Vals place, they essentially bought a barn and a hill 12 years ago, shortly after they paid their money the barn fell down and they have been working on building a house ever since, they currently live in a caravan on the lower part of their hill, the upside of the barn collapsing is John has all the stone, timber and roofing slate he’ll ever need to build their home, they are a lovely couple are John and Val, the kind of people you feel you’ve known forever but only just met, I hope we see them again sometime, Val makes awesome soup too!

We returned to chateau coups and settled in for the night, some booze and food coupled with a night shot of the van.

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Our final day with the Coups involved some proper sunbathing on Lollys part while I fannied about with the van getting things packed ready for our departure, below is a picture of Chateau Coups, it’s a lovely place in a lovely spot and Ian and Lindi have worked really hard to make it what it is.

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It’s normally quite quiet round these parts but all sorts went on when we were there, power cuts, thunder storms, a sighting of the milky way and a herd of cows being moved down the lane, Ian says it’s the busiest he’s seen!

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Before we left we decide on a little bike ride down to Hautfauge, along the way we came across a lovely church and a small war memorial, we also stopped at a little restaurant in the village that all the local workmen visit for the plat du jour, Lolly got harassed by a wasp and was running about the place much to the workmens amusement…

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Ian and Lindi wanted to show us Tour De Merle, a quite awesome ruin about 10km from their place.

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Annoyingly it was shut when we got there, when it’s open you can take a walk round, next time!

We had intended to be on the road by 17.00, it was now about 18.00 so we decided to go and get some food in Argentat, there is a nice little spot on the Dordogne that has a number of cafes, bistros and restaurants on the quay side.

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This was our view whilst munching a lovely meal on the quayside. We thanked Ian and Lindi for letting us take over their house for the last few days and headed off to Sanguinet, it was dark and the roads were badly lit so we swerved off to an aire in Brive for the night.

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At sunrise we grabbed a brew and made our way to the sea..

We’re now in the last week of our travels, we’ve covered 1418 miles in about 14 days and i’m currently trying to figure out how to give our fridge a 12 volt feed direct from the PMS unit as opposed to from the leisure battery it’s currently hard wired to, the problem i’m facing is the fridge draws more voltage than the PMS supplies as a charge to the battery when hooked up, the result is after a couple of days the fridge packs up as it’s drained the leisure battery and the ice melts and the charge the PMS gives can’t keep up with the fridges requirement, if I can find a way to send 12volts to the fridge via the PMS when hooked up to 240volts that would mean the battery would receive a top up charge from the PMS without being drained by the fridge,  i’ll work it our when I get home, for now I have the 7 stage charger I brought with me pumping the battery with more voltage than the PMS, it’s enough to charge the battery and sustain the fridge, not ideal but it works for now which means Lolly will have G&T’s!

Le wikkid beach

On By MashleyIn france, road trip, T4 Camper, travel, VW Campervan1 Comment

The beach at Biscarosse turned out to be pretty awesome.

  
The weather was just as awesome, the sun shone all day so much so we had to deploy our well travelled brolly from Ibiza gifted to us from our friends Darran and Cinzia 

  
The surf here is really good too so we grabbed our boards and I felt compelled to put my wetsuit on for a couple of reasons, one, to prevent board rash, two, so my back didn’t get sunburnt and three, other people were wearing them. 

I remember when I first bought this wetsuit and when I  put it on I looked like a right tit, you’ll be pleased to know this is still the case. 

  
It was great to catch some waves and lie about in the sun, after soaking up plenty of rays we headed back to the van to grab the Cobb for a sunset BBQ, I took a picture from the van to show you the view we have when chilling by the van. 

  
This aire is pretty popular, this is our bit, loads of motor homes! Despite how busy it looks it’s really quite peaceful. 

  
One thing I have noticed is there are T4’s everywhere, each campsite or Aire we visit there is always at least one T4, Eurovans they call them, there are a few kicking about here. 

  
We headed off over the dunes to set the Cobb up and have a sunset bbqs, it was about a ten minute walk from the van, the dunes were substantial, you can just about see Lolly in this picture. 

  
Ever since we have owned the Cobb, when explaining to people how versatile it is we always mention you can cook pizzas on it despite never having actually cooked one, we can now confidently say the the Cobb cooks a wikkid pizza! 

  
The sunset here was quite spectacular, totally worth lugging the BBQ up the dune and then walking back through the forest of darkness and doom. 

  
Once we got back to the van I read Lolly a few chapters from the Martian and then we crashed, the following morning we got up looking forward to spending a day exploring and hanging out in our favourite place so far, then Lolly’s mum called to ask us what time we’d be arriving in St Emillion as they were on their way, bugger, slight clerical error, off to St Emillion we go then!