Thursday evening

Ferry from Jersey to St Malo (1hour 20mims)

St Malo

Arriving during the evening, it made most sense to park up overlooking the marina. It is legitimate to stay there between 7pm and 9am and very convenient too! We had of course handily stayed here ready for our unearthly morning departure last trip!

It’s a very picturesque spot, and so far we’ve managed to get a space, and no cost involved. We had a bite to eat, and then had a nice walk around the marina for our daily constitutional!

Next morning, we filled up with diesel and GPL. It’s been brilliant since we (the Royal ‘we’!) installed our GPL cyclinder. Michael ordered the diy installation kit over the Internet and did it himself. The cylinder fits in perfectly next to our propane gas cyclinder, so we always have that too as back up but haven’t needed it so far, and don’t expect to. Although not skimping on gas (even as regards the on board heater when it’s been a bit nippy outside!), the GPL is very good value and lasts ages and is adequately easy to buy. We tend to top up as we come across a garage that sells it – that’s the thing to do, top up, like we tend to do with opportunities for free water!

So all fuelled up, we fitted in a grocery shop at ‘Taden’ Lidl (which we are very familiar with) and motored the less than 5 minutes to have lunch with Jersey friends at their static caravan at La Hallerais campsite at Taden, and a very enjoyable time we had too. I have since emulated a delicious Ratatouille recipe we had that day with them. Delicious!

After our time in Taden, and leaving our friends to get on with all the things they needed to achieve whilst away, we headed on to Lehon, near the beautiful medieval town of Dinan (a regular haunt of ours over many years), and a place one doesn’t tire of. Brilliantly it’s only half an hour from St Malo and so always readily accessible.

The aire at Lehon was new to us, but a welcome discovery, found by other Jersey friends on a previous trip and one they had been pleased with. We were to be rendezvous’ing with them here and hooking up for a couple of days touring before they headed back to Jersey. It’s always a pleasure to hang out with friends.

So Lehon did indeed prove to be an ideal overnighter, and with no charge plus free water.

Oops! I seem to have overlooked taking some photos!

The next morning a bijou bio market was set up next door to the aire, and it was incredible bumping into the French owner we had bought our once owned Brittany cottage from. Maryline was making a couple of purchases and I happened to recognise her from quite some distance. She seemed as gob smacked as I did at this chance meeting. We exchanged hugs and kisses and a brief and limited bit of conversation due to the language barrier, but I gathered she is now a granny! She and her husband are both potters and have their studio in Dinan and had lived in, and loved too, La Carrée in Langourla for certainly 20 years! They had raised their family there, but it’s geography in a small rural village did not lend itself well to their business, hence the move to Dinan. We in turn lived in (albeit part time!) and loved that house for 7 years. Life evolved for us too and a desire to reduce our mortgage debt, and use our Motorhome more, had us decide to put the cottage on the market 2 years ago.

We don’t regret doing so (no more land to maintain either!), and brilliantly the house sold quickly and we have undoubtedly thousands of photo reminders of many happy times there.

So anytime you’re in Dinan, do visit the Berhault-Marrec pottery studio.

http://www.berhaultmarrec.com/index.php/en/

Our Jersey friends had often heard about our French home in the little rural village, and so it was decided we would drive the half hour journey there to fill them in properly!

To be continued!

Bfn!
Sophie
xo

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