To the Heart of It, Moulins, Central France
Zagan the motorhome’s in the middle, sat pretty much smack bang in the centre of France at the river-side municipal aire in Moulins (N46.55741 E3.32520). It costs 10c an hour to stay here, a whole €2.40 per 24 hours. There are 7 or 8 vans in here now, and more are slowly arriving, a popular spot for a Tuesday in December. Oh, and it’s just started raining, which gives me the boyish feeling I used to get as a child, being comfortable, safe and dry sat in a tent somewhere in Blighty.
The aire at Moulins
After the dramatic views at the Puy-de-Dôme, our next stop was bound to suffer a little from the volcano’s shadow. Our approach to driving is to try and keep to less than 2 hours a stint, ideally an hour, even 30 mins if we’re drifting between equally fabulous parking places (Greece, I’m on about Greece here, the Peloponnese and Pelion Peninsular in particular, where zero-hour drives were often preferred). So from the car park beneath the hill we prodded our satnav for a route to Saint-Pourçain-sur-Sioule (N46.31298 E3.29655), on the basis it had a great free aire, and meant a shorter drive to Jamie and Rosie’s place the next day.
Motorhome aire at Saint-Pourçain-sur-Sioule
After a whole 24-odd hours in Saint-Pourçain, my memories of it will include:
- Sitting in a sun-filled cab watching kingfishers work the shallow river ahead of us
- Being shown photos of the stone-and-sea North Cape in Norway by our Dutch neighbour who’d driven there the year before (in June: hardly any snow and temperatures of about 15 degrees)
- Eating a €14 roast chicken over the course of 3 delicious meals – one of which consisted only of chicken
- Being told afterwards that Saint-Pourçain’s wine has a local reputation of tasting like rat-cack, and no-one there buys the stuff (phew, neither did we)
- Watching a Frenchman walk out of his motorhome (which almost certainly has a toilet on board) and urinate onto the riverbank in front of anyone who cared to watch. We did better than that, grabbing a photo of the chap. To be fair to him: he doesn’t win a prize for oddest public urinator: that goes to the chap who ran out of a cafe to wee up a lampost in the alley we were walking down. Let me just check, this is Western Europe we’re in? Yup, we’re in one of the most civilised nations on Earth, go figure.
French man walks past toilet to piss in public. Not all Frenchmen do this, but enough do to make a ‘spot the pisser’ game a goer on long journeys
Our first ever 3D motorhome aire sign, woo hoo!
The Saint-Pourçain aire is on a flood plain. Ju couldn’t get enough of the running man’s pose on the evacuation signs
Errrm? What exactly’s going on here? Even the bike looks worried!
Frenchmen, take note!
The following day we cruised off through France’s innards to Jamie and Rosie’s place. We had the good fortune to meet these guys a couple of years back as we rebounded to the UK after 2 years on the road. They’d both travelled widely and were very open and honest with us about how we might expect to feel ‘re-integrating’ into mainstream society (sounds dramatic, but that’s what was happening). They were very complimentary to us too, which gave our confidence a jackbooted kick up the butt, helping propel us back home and dive head first into the Blue Marble Project (the code name we came up with for hitting financial independence).
The title of this post is meant to have a clever double meaning, but I’m fairly sure I’m not clever enough to pull it off, so I’ll be out with it! Part of it is the fact we’re sat right in the centre of France, and part of it is down the fact we always get direct and frank discussions with these guys; few punches are pulled. “What’s your long term plan?” “Why do you write a blog?” “Are you getting everything you want from your new travels?” “Do you recognise what a huge achievement it is to be in your position at your age?” I’m paraphrasing, but we ran through all of these questions over the course of a wonderful discussion between 3pm in the afternoon and midnight, fuelled on with an endless supply of boeuf bourguignon, gratin potatoes, rice pudding tea, wine, beer and mince pies.
The questions were deadly well targeted. Yes – we do sometimes feel we’re missing something with the way we travel – in particular our fumbling language skills create a barrier between us and local people, so we see a great deal of architecture, food, wine, landscapes and so on, but get little direct insight into the folks on the ground. Their feelings, thoughts and ideas we miss. No – we don’t have a long term plan. 2016 is as planned as we want to make it, with an aim to spend some time in the Alps in Feb/Mar before doing a run up through the Baltics and ‘over the top’ through Finland and Norway (Adam and Sophie have done this trip so we’ll reference their EuropebyCamper.com blog). As to whether it’s sunk in that we don’t need to work again, ever, the answer to that one has to be no. Inside I can’t help but think we’re heading home and I need to find a job. I don’t, but 30 years of conditioning can’t be wiped away in 60-odd days it seems. Yes – we do need another project, we just don’t know what it is yet.
From time to time the conversation turned to them, their work and life plans. A couple of years back they were in a much more difficult place, dealing with family illness, grafting very hard and juggling other problems. The smiles and glinting eyes which greeted us this time tell of a turnaround. We couldn’t be more pleased for them: fantastic, generous, thoughtful people who deserve every success and comfort (hint hint: Jamie: you do need to finish that bathroom man! :-))
Jamie and Rosie with their new-to-them 10 year old Hymer (which has done all of 7000 miles – it’s spanking new!) and their old faithful classic Hymer (which will be on the market next spring if you fancy life on t’open road). Happy travels guys!
Leaving their driveway we again felt elated. And a bit hungover to be truthful. Our route back home was initially going to the west of Paris, but we’ve been that way more than once so have opted to go east, through the Champagne region. Various recommendations were quickly written down by Ju last night on her battered notepad, so we now have a rough idea where we’ll head the next few days as we line up Saint Omer in our sights for Charlie’s appointment with the vet next Tuesday. Moulins was on the route, and only 40 minutes away, so in we rolled, and out to wander the town, and back in. It’s now dark and Charlie has decided (by eating the choc drop to the left) that we should walk back into town for a cafe visit and a cheeky kebab. Good Mogwai.
I was under the impression churches somehow self-cleaned, apparently not.
Who thinks of gargoyle designs? What’s the idea behind this bad boy spotted in Moulins?
Dali-esque garden in Moulins
View of the town on the 10 min walk in from the motorhome aire
Moulins cathedral, black and white like many of Italy’s great churches
Erm – double vision?
Hah! Angry naked lady spots me grabbing a naughty pic of her in the bath. She appears to be be coming at me with a stick!
Jamie warned us about this crossroads – one of the few where the old nutcase ‘Priorité à Droite’ rule still applies (driving down a main road, you have to give way to traffic on minor roads coming from the right – work that one out!)
Xmas decorations are up in front of the town hall in Moulins
Bird in the river, sharing a log brought down by a previous flood
Shot by the Gestapo? Similar signs of deportation, random shootings and other wartime horrors are everywhere in France.
There was a local vote here last Sunday. Turnout was roughly 50% and the national front came second
Moulins
Ju ‘window licking’ (the French phrase for window shopping) at the Most Expensive Chocolate Shop in the World, Moulins (looked nice mind)
Cheers, Jay
Chocolate looks great loving the updates👍🏼😊 Are you back in UK for Christmas? If so do drop by if you have time on way north? We are at Shooters Hill. Or if you have a low emissions zone issue Bluewater is near and we could buy you a coffee. As a thank you for all the advice gleaned from your missives .
David and Karen
Enjoy reading the blog, great shot of the Kingfisher! Treat yourselves to a ‘Buck-fizz’ this week? Safe travels. Wayne.
Hi guys
Love your blog any thoughts of posting a map showing your route. We are looking to do a trip around france ourselves next year
Hi guys
Rough map of this year’s route here:
https://ourtour.co.uk/home/our-route-20152016/
Would be worth checking out the maps from previous years too (accessible from the menus – look for the ‘routes’) as we covered more of the country then, Alps etc.
Cheers! Jay
Thought it was only me who played spot the pisser :)
hi Jay, when you mention doing the Alps in Feb/Mar are you thinking of Skiing?, oh and if you get the chance will you please do some more videos….the very first ones you did with your first Motorhome the audio was not projected that well and the camera moved too much, but the ones you both make now are Faultless smooth and enjoyable…maybe more videos as a project?
Hi Marcus
Yeah man, we can easily do more videos. Problem is usually uploading ’em on the road, have to find wifi and sit it out while they go, but we can more easily do some when we get back.
Both of us like mountains and the snow, and were both snowboarders at one time (various Alps for me and a couple of times to Levi in Finland) but TBH it wasn’t really our bag. The location as the thing, the excitement. Not to say we won’t board while we’re there, but not hammering away at the slopes for a full season.
Cheers, Jay
Priorite a Droite basically is applied here in our part of Brittany moreorless in the smaller towns and villages, it had died out but has been reintroduced, as an expat I have to admit it works pretty well, it slows traffic down and you drive more carefully—-mind you it helps if you know its in use where you happen to be. I think its called French Logic!
Thanks for your touching interest in ‘The Bathroom Project’ Jay and for furthering the cause, you are formally invited to the Great Bathroom Completion Ball pencilled in for September 2017
You’re more than welcome Jamie! I suspect 2 years won’t be enough time with everything else you guys have got on though…? :-) Have fun, cheers again for a great night. Jay
the way to deal with priorite a droite is to look at the road in front of the junction you are approaching, if there is no white line painted on the road from the right, you should assume it is priority to them, its only a guide but I have to say it works ok for me
Thanks Richard, I started to do that recently and so far so good (been driving in France on and off for years but somehow never quite managed to mentally work out why the hell you’d have such a rule so have pretty much ignored it, somehow without getting mangled). Best start paying more attention though, I did recently almost get caught out when a chap (quite rightly) pulled out in front of me in town. Since I was doing all of 10mph it wasn’t a problem though! Cheers, Jay
Evacuation sign clearly designed by Eric & Ernie officianado
Ha! Cracking Alan! :-) Jay
ha, ha, the old “pee-pee rural” as our French neighbours call it. a much practiced and even more proudly announced in our village in the Gers. have got into many an elongated discussion and the final comment is always “les Anglais!!!!!!” will never totally fathom the ideal of of open road side urination but they cannot understand a big fat-boy full English breakfast! I seem to recall somewhere that if you see the yellow diamond with a black diagonal line through it it indicates a change in the normal “rules of the road” this is certainly the case near us but I would welcome views from others. the bottom line is just to ve very careful as you happily motorhome your way around France.