roemin around

Arrived at the port in plenty of time to catch one of the big new P&O ferries. Had a proper English bacon sandwich before it docked in Dover at midday and we drove straight back to Leicester stopping en route at Toddington services  where Mark and Christina met us for a burger. Its the first time in about 10 years that I have been in England on Fathers Day so it was rare treat to see one of the family on this particular day. We were back in Croft by about 6:30 to start unpacking the van.

It was a very wild night of wind and heavy showers. But not wild enough to blow my satellite dish over (thats another story). The morning was still windy, but at least it was dry so I took the van out for a final day drive. Battled down the coast road, from Cap Blanc Nez to Cap Gris Nez and had moules and frites in one of the villages in between. Watched the procession of ferries in and out of Calais where they are close in-shore at Fort Mahon. Done the last bit of wine shopping/stowing and now ready for off in the morning and on Fathers day.

Another grey day so I decided to go almost as far as Calais and stay for 2 nights on an ACSI site at Guines rather than stop on the quay for the last night. Guines is only 10km from Calais so easy to get to the morning ferry. The site is almost 100% British with people either coming or going to the ferry. The layout and hedges would not be out of place at the caravan club! Not so sure about the gourmet restaurant. My 'Shrimp' ground level dish managed to get a signal thru the trees where many big motor homes with their roof mounted 'Oyster' satellite dishes failed because of the tall trees surrounding most pitches :-)  We are still on Luxembourg diesel - so thats 3 countries on one tankfull and still enough to get to Dover.

Left Germany and filled up with deisel at only £1 per litre and then we spent the day travelling thru Luxembourg and Belgium to the French border. The weather was not very good, with a couple of torrential downpours, so it was a good opportunity to drive over 200 miles closer to Calais.       We stayed on a small campsite near the water sports centre at Tourain for the night. We had stayed on this site a few years ago returning from Italy but did not realise until we arrived there. The owner had a rare sense of humour - for a Belgian!

Spent a little time on the Wine Strasse, visiting the site of another Ludwig residence and shopped in the local supermarket for some wine to bring back from the region. Then we put in a few (150) miles on the autobahns crossing the Mosel near Trier where we had been almost 4 weeks before and spending 2 nights on a camping cheque site on the Luxemburg border. There was a big Hymer rally on the site and the washing machines were free! The campsite is in Germany but we walked to Luxembourg, to Echternauch, across the bridge over the river Saar and had a Chinese buffet lunch. We discovered we were just one day late to witness the 'famous' dancing procession. This is a catholic church procession, the archbishop of Luxembourg was there, but it reads more like a Monty Python sketch in the visitors guide. We had a barbeque and watched The Apprentice on satellite later.

We left Titisee and drove north along part of the Uhen Strasse (clock route) which passses thru many small towns and villages associated with cuckoo clock manufacturing. The Cuckoo capital is Triberg so we stopped there and looked around 'the shop of 1000 clocks'. There were some very impressive clocks, not all cuckoo, at some very impressive prices. I picked up a genuine hand carved door for 1.50 euro, so just need and cuckoo and a clock mechanism now! The highest waterfall in Germany is nearby and was worth a brief stop before continuing north along some pretty river valleys, more like peak district now, before emerging on autobahn system to get round Karlsruhr. The roads were actually very quiet because it was a public holiday and we made good time to Landau  which is on the edge of the Rhein-Platz wine region. We found a small family run camper stop with 5 places, like a CL, at a Weingut (vine yard) in the village of Fellingden. Not touristy, bit of a language problem but...

One of the benefits of a vacation in the Black Forest area is free public transport which includes the railways. So today we walked the mile or so into Titisee along the east shore of the lake, dodging mountain  bikes and other walkers, in both directions. It's a popular walk! Titisee was very crowded with week-enders and people coming to the recently opened Badenparadise which sounds like a huge centre parks water park all under one roof. After a modest Sunday lunch, featuring 'fresh local mushrooms', we then caught the train to Frieburg and enjoyed a very scenic return trip in a double decker carriage. We stayed on the train passing thru Titisee to another activity lake at Shluchsee, where we stopped for a coffee and gateau of the black forest variety, before returning and catching a bus back to the campsite. It was a very pleasant afternoon for both of us to see the scenery which is often missed when we are driving and it cost absolutely nothing. What a good idea!!! ...