Next day we headed back down the same hill we’d approached Grand-Corent on the previous evening, with its great views of the vast plain below, and then along the lovely lake we’d stopped for photographs the day before.

After a quick visit to the “faecal sludge” town, we got back on track as we continued to travel South. The great scenery continued, and then we passed through the one larger town on today’s route, Nantua.

Another “wild-card” Park4night was in my sights, but when you’re planning in just two dimensions on a phone screen, it’s difficult to fully anticipate the widths of the roads and the heights you’ll be reaching. As it happened, whilst the SatNav took us up into the forested mountains, the roads were fine, and we didn’t have any relentless twisting and turning.

So we finally came to the stop at Lalleyriat. This was an out of town tarmac, roadside carpark serving a lake and it all seemed very new. Although a key arterial route for the local towns, traffic was minimal. The carpark even boasted some form of fancy composting toilet.

Taking advantage of the lovely evening sun again, despite the ominous dark clouds, we took a very pleasant stroll round the small lake. Strangely, we soon started seeing lots of tiny lizard like creatures along the path. They appeared to be frozen as they were so still, but they were definitely alive, and clearly using their built-in defence mechanisms, which didn’t factor in that sometimes it would be much better to scarper rather than risk being trodden under foot.

We settled down for the night, and Sophie’s ears kept a check on the church across in the distance to ensure that we could rely on an undisturbed night.

*** Just to mention that our blogs can be up to a few weeks behind reality, as we’re always in catch-up mode ***