Our next stop off on our rambling route to the ferry port of Dieppe, is Fromentine and Camping Sandaya de la Grande Côte, an all bells and whistles site, with bars, pizza cafés, an army of young entertainers running booming discos and water aerobic workouts for everyone from tots on shoulders to grandparents.
The first night there the bar bursts into fairy-lit life, with a French band fronted by a woman bass player. She launches into Dusty Springfield’s Son of a Preacher Man and soon we’re all dancing the night away.
We spend a few days cycling through the pine and holm oak forests and walking through the surf on the beach which is so long it disappears into the horizon. When the tide is out you can see the sandbanks which make navigation so treacherous.
Monday’s market in Fromentine village may be small but its fresh tomatoes, in every shape and size, its tuna pâte, and local Charentais melons are a treat. L’Annexe Restaurant proves delicious, with pulled curried pork shoulder and mango, steak with puréed potato and a rich wine reduction, followed by local goat’s cheese, unfussy recipes, executed with finesse.
The ferry rumbles across to the Île de Yeu, sun silvering the sea. The rocky island seems magical, floating in the sea, with its rose granite coves, prehistoric dolmens, and feudal castles. Port Joinville with its white painted houses and blue shutters is a bustling place, with Deux Chevaux and Renault 4s taking us back to our youth.
They were old tractor engines then and are even more so now in the age of silent, gliding, electric behemoths. It takes us back to our honeymoon when we drove to Corfu in an emerald Citroen Dyane, with its green and white striped deckchair of a roof.
When we leave the dodgem cars of the port behind, we trek across walking trails by horses grazing, to a cove among granite cliffs, white sails before us, ferns and blackberries rampaging behind us. We sit on rocks heated by the sun, feasting on the food we foraged in Port Joinville’s supermarket: rabbit pâte, remoulade, and grated carrot salad – picnics don’t come much better than that. We’re accompanied by the hoarse cry of the greater black backed gull – a rare one, so that’s also a treat.
We scramble up through the rocky track to Vieux Château, the 14th Century stronghold surrounded by sea when the tide is in. Its stout walls are at least a metre thick and soar up from the castle’s bedrock. Interestingly, it was a strong woman, Jeanne de Belleville, who replaced the 10th Century wooden monastery fortress with this stout granite building, its foundations buried in rock as she recognised its strategic importance.
Fortified even more over the years, the castle survived invasions by an English Privateer, Robert Knolles, who ruled the island for 37 years, and the Spanish who were beaten back from the island.
We walk back to Port Joinville by cove after cove of ragged rocks, silver sand, and sea changing from indigo to pale blue.
There’s always something about offshore islands that takes me back to my Enid Blyton childhood, where great adventures are to be had without an adult in sight and today has allowed our inner child free rein.
Campervan Therapy 
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