Day 3 – Tauves to Blanes…a very long road ahead!
07.30am – OH MY GOD…..its sooooooooo cold!!!! From being a bit warm the night before to being so freezing I had to sleep in my fleece! And had to share the quilt with Tilly, as I was a little worried she was too cold. But she slept soundly andIi feel like death warmed up!
But after a bite to eat and some coffee, I feel a little more human again. Tilly delights in helping wash up at the tap, getting wet feet in the process.
09.30am – after breakfast and packing up camp, we are off on the way again. We take a detour through places called La Bourboule and La Mont Dore, looking for a petrol station. We stop in Mont Dore, but not after driving through some breathtaking scenery and some very swiss looking villages.
Mont Dore Mountain Road...the view was amazing.
At the top of Mont Dore
10.30am – we fill up with petrol and I drop in to the Intermarche for bread and provisions to keep us going. Whilst there I am asked something by a very friendly lady, but the question is in french. Using my very limited knowledge,I explain that I am on holiday and that my grasp on the french language is limited. She asks me how long we are on holiday, how i’m finding the area and the people and where we are headed. I manage to explain that we are not here for long but that the area is breathtakingly beautiful and we would like to stay longer than we are here for. She tells me that my french isn’t that bad, but that my accent needs work……. i’ll take that as a compliment!
10.45 – we drive through a village called Chambon Sur Lac, which is picture perfect. We stop and raid the nearest patisserie (again) and watch people water ski and fishing on the lake, which sparkles in the sunlight. It is truly a beautiful place and I would love to have been there much longer. We also drive through St Nectaire and Perrier on the way back to the motorway.
View of the St Nectaire Valley.
13.00pm - Down the motorway a ways and another stop at a rest stop. These seem to be a godsend for all those who have families. They are really clean, have places to stop and eat, facilities are great and food in the services is a very high standard. Looking forward to crossing the Millau Bridge…
15.30pm – The Millau bridge comes into sight and its pretty impressive…
The view of the Millau Bridge crossing from the road.
We go across it and later find out that there is a rest stop where there is a museum all about the bridge and its creator. So…for those interested….
The Millau Viaduct is a cable-stayed road bridge that spans the valley of the river Tarn near Millau in southern France. Designed by the French structural engineer Michel Virologeux and British architect Norman Foster, it is the tallest bridge in the world, with one mast’s summit at 343.0 metres (1,125 ft). So there you go…..
17.00pm – cross the border into Spain… you know, no-one has even looked at our passports yet.
17.10pm – As we cross into Spain, the driving standards take a turn for the worse. In France the French have been polite and cordial, not like their reputation in the continent. We have enjoyed driving through France very much. Once in Spain, the French seem to take on a Spanish mentality, of “sod you, i’ll drive where and when I like…….and its tough if you don’t like it!” (I’m being polite here!!) So, be warned, when driving in Spain, the driving standards don’t just fall….they plummet….
18.30 – stuck in traffic on the way in to Blanes. It seems that the Spanish are all heading for the coast as well. They take EVERYTHING with them, and I am not kidding here. There was a rocking chair on top of one car.
There seem to be a lot of Dutch people around too. As we drive into Blanes, we are desperately hoping our campsite is a decent one, as a lot of them are in the town centre, and the town looks a bit like Skeggy!!! As it happens, the site is on the outskirts and seems clean and with good facilities..
http://www.elpinarbeach.com/principal.php?lg=gb&menu=1&n=0
We book in and are given a pitch near a load of Spanish on holiday. They are polite, but really look at you as if you have stepped on their dog. There are no other British on site, which doesn’t both us at all, but the Spanish on holiday can be very noisy…so tonight could be interesting.
19.30 – We are pitched up and hungry. So we head off to the restaurant near the beach.
The restaurant is large and the menu has a lot of choice, especially for the kids. Abs has Pasta Bolognese (of course!) and Tilly ends up with a Cheese and Mushroom Risotto..which is absolutely delish! I have to admit I did eat a little … 
Karl and I both had bread, house salad, fish and very nice fries. We also had some great red wine that was only 3 euro’s a bottle (in a restaurant this is amazingly reasonable) and we drank quite a bit of that…as did Tilly… She seems to have taken a liking to red wine.
I've only had one drink Mum...honest...!!!
Is it dinner time already?
Say Cheese!!!!
After dinner the kids were all up dancing and having fun. Although she was the only british kid there, Abigail joined in and had a lot of fun with the other kids. They were all up doing karaoke too and she didn’t want to leave at the end of the night.
so thats how it works!!
Tilly also didn’t want to leave as she was having fun running around waving madly at everyone. She got a lot of smiles.
11pm – back at the tent and all the Spanish around us are all just eating. They are really noisy, but we are hoping that the amount of wine we have had will help drown it out…….
