Dorset

Well, as we left the boat at 8.00am and the weather looked good, it was decided that a night or two in the UK to finish the holiday was in order. So off we went to Charmouth stopping on route in Bournemouth for a full English breakfast on the sunny seafront - very pleasant. Wood Farm site is a CC affiliated site and also in the ACSI discount book at €15 a night so we gave it a try and were charged £14 - not bad.

It was a nice warm day and a relaxing afternoon was spent fishing in the lake, catching a few roach and rudd. Next morning was completely different, well we were back in England,  cold damp misty - so returned home early afternoon.

I drove a total of 2700 miles this holiday during the 66 days we were away, a lower daily average than previous years. Despite staying 5 days on one site (that was at Roda de Bara and a record for us!) we still somehow managed to stay in 24 different places.

Cherbourg

We awoke to a wet and miserable morning so we decided to drive across and then up the eastern side of the Cherbourg peninsular. First Utah beach for a paddle and then stopped briefly in St Mere Eglise, the first town to be liberated in 1944. Noted that it has a very convenient MH aire right by the famous church (remember the parachute in 'The Longest Day') about 1 hour south of Cherbourg. We had our last 'moules and frites' and a glass of Muscadet in the old town square before boarding the Cap Finistere for a smooth overnight crossing to Portsmouth, arriving at 7-45am.

Mont St Michael

Drove north thru Pornic and over the Loire on St Naziare bridge to stop at Mont St Michael for the night. Had a meal in one of the little restaurants and browsed around the shops.

Outrageous tourist prices in restaurants and shops as usual.

Rosemary was going on about the exorbitant price of sweets in a gift shop with a Chinese looking lady who turned out to be the owner. Oops - la la.

Pornic - La Boutardiere

This is our next to last stop before catching the ferry from Cherbourg on Monday and so we are stopping for three nights. There is a lot activity on the site as we have hit peak season and lots of French caravans are arriving. Its getting too hot and its time to be returning home.
There are nice walks along the cliffs to the local village in one direction and Pornic in the other (but 16km is too far!). Tried in vain to get the satellite receiver working again to catch the last of Wimbledon.  Walked in to the local village, Le Berniere en Retz, just caught the market and bought some cheese and seafood (ie oysters). Paddled back along the beach as the tide was now well out exposing even more seafood. Walked the other way towards Pornic to look at the traditional fishing nets called 'carrelets'. (video on YouTube) based along the cliffs.
Did a bit of whittling and made Rosemary a necklace out of a small oyster shell.

St. Emilion

We left little England to head for the coast around Rocheforte and called en route at the world famous wine town of St. Emilion. Its actually a very interesting old town although it is 99% dedicated to selling the wines from the numerous chataeau, some of which eg Petrus are at astronomical prices. The many restaurants serve nice meals with the famous wines by the glass. Well you only go to St. Emilion once so we treated ourselves to lunch and I had a small glass of a good premier cru wine to go with it.

Rosemary is still going on about her goats cheese, duck and walnut tartine which was rather good!
We bought a couple of vines to bring home and try growing our own grapes togther with a bottle of the 2006 vintage from the same chateau for xmas (just in case!).