Campervan Therapy

The plan is to bomb through France to Catalonia for our Spring tour. The minute we park up in Dieppe at Aire Camping-car Dieppe, there’s the usual magic, with the lights from the narrow restaurants reflected in the port’s waters, the masts of the sailing boats, the ghostly chalk cliffs, and Notre-Dame de Bonsecours looking out for her lost sailors perched on the clifftop.

Morning finds us rambling up through stone courtyards, by the half-timbered, crooked house, through the mural-painted alley to the church standing in a green meadow overlooking the ragged coastline.

Inside, I can never fail to be moved by the book of all the sailors lost at sea. As we read the plaque about the liberation of prisoners of war in 1944 by Canadian troops, an elderly man enters, his face lined, his eyes sad. He lights a candle. Just at that moment the sun pours through the stained-glass window throwing a kaleidoscope of colours onto the white wall. I can’t help wondering whether he lost someone close to him, or whether he just likes to pay his respects to all the names recorded in the big book.

Our next stop is the Loire region’s Bracieux. The Huttopia campsite is an ecologically conscious joy. The grass is kept long enough for daisies, dandelions and clover to riot, limes, planes, poplar and pines stand proud and hawthorn’s candyfloss blossoms remind us that it’s our favourite time of year.

The church’s steeple pokes up through the trees, its tufa walls are so white it almost hurts your eyes.

Crossing the Beuvron River, we feast at the Au Relais d’Artémis, appropriately named after the huntress goddess, the woods of the Royals’ old hunting grounds stretching for miles. It’s a sensory treat from the cucumber gazpacho to the lamb Provençal and the local cheeses, all washed down with a smooth Touraine Gamay.  

Driving through vast forested lands the next day to Romorantin to pick up the A71 south to Clermont Ferrand, we pass lake after emerald lake, all secretive, offering just a glimpse through the trees.

We catch up with our friends, Mary and Martin, and their sheep of a dog, Luna, in Issoire in the Puy de Dome region, at Camping Du Mas, surrounded by the cones of extinct volcanoes, by a lake and the Allier River. In the distance, there’s the snow-striped conical mountains.

The A75 takes us from verdant pastureland to craggy gorges, over mountain passes, under hilltop castles, fortified villages and by Garabit’s elegant, red oxide viaduct straddling the wooded hillsides above a mirror of a lake.

When we cross the equally elegant white suspension bridge, the Millau Viaduct, we emerge into a land of Mediterranean pines, yellow broom, and the herbal garrigue as well as miles of vines and pantiles.

In Villeneuve-lès-Béziers at canalside Camping Les Berges Du Canal, we choose a pitch facing a vineyard. Strolling by the plane-tree edged canal, watching the ducks swimming and the canal boats, we luxuriate in the warm sun and fresh breeze. Even better, we can walk into Béziers along the side of the canal tomorrow to have a little poke around before we head for the border into Catalonia.