France 2025

All prepared to go!

I was determined not to make any bad decisions about riding on the right hand side of the road!!

On last year's tour, it was a bit of a pain having to strap a holdall full of camping gear onto the bike each day, so I got these soft panniers off EBay. Much more secure and easy to use. All kitted up and ready to go here.

Day 1 (4 June 25) - Home to Posthouse Roundabout, Chester; meet up then travel down to Portsmouth Ferry Terminal

Total miles today: 304  Miles to date: 304

We had all day to get down to Portsmouth, as it was an overnight ferry, so met up mid morning just south of Chester for coffee. The ride across from Anglesey was uneventful and we set off at around 11, taking a gentle bimbling route down the A roads via Herefordshire and the Cotswolds.

We stopped for a meal early evening about 15 miles from the ferry port and ended up checking in just after 8pm, which felt too early but there were already loads of people there.

By the time we got through security and passport control it was fairly late. We got picked to go through the security check lane and I was expecting to have to empty all the contents of the bike, like my trip to Spa a couple of years ago, but the lazy arse asked which was the easiest bag to check - I opened the side pocket of my panniers with my waterproof pants in and he said thanks and waved me through!

We got on the ferry, found our cabin and had a shower, then went for a beer. Before we knew it, it was midnight! The cabin was surprisingly comfortable and I had a good but very short sleep, being woken by gentle bonging over the PA beseeching me to go and spend money in the cafe before we docked! We had lost an hour as the clocks went forward, so only had about 4.5 hours sleep.

Day 2 (5 June 25) - Oustreham Ferry Terminal (Caen) to Domjean

Total miles today: 70  Miles to date: 374

We were off the ferry and cleared passport control by 8am so had a nice early start to make our way along the "Normandy Beaches", stopping at various parts that caught our interest.

It was really evocative seeing the site of the D-Day landings. Completely unplanned by us, we'd arrived on the weekend of the 81st anniversary, so there were loads of commemorative events going on.

Utah, Omaha, Gold, Juno, and Sword beaches, Arromanches

German Gun Emplacement, Longues-sur-Mer battery

Overlord D-Day Museum

We then set off for Dinan, about 3.5 hours away, but after a couple of hours the sightseeing and lack of sleep caught up with me, just as we could also see storm clouds approaching. I pulled us in for a quick cat-nap, but really didn't feel particularly safe to carry on. By good fortune, we'd stopped in the entrance to the Municipal Campsite and as we stopped the supermarket also opened for the afternoon!

So we took the decision to stop there for the night and make the mileage up the following day. 15 minutes later we had the tents up and 5 minutes after that the rain started and didn't really stop until early the next morning.

We brewed up under the shelter of a big tree, then had an hour's catch up snooze. We cooked emergency pasta rations in the very well equipped bus shelter 😁.

In the evening, we settled in to the shelter of the kids' wendy house in the adjacent playground; drank beer and ate crisps!

Day 3 (6 June 25) - Domjean to Quimper

Total miles today: 190  Miles to date: 564

Heading for Dinan, our route took us past the quite spectacular Mont St. Michel in the distance. 

The weather turned pretty foul during the afternoon and we decided to book a hotel for the night. We ended up on the outskirts of Quimper. The hotel was actually not bad, if a little cramped, but we were very limited for choice of food and ended up at the steak/burger place next door, which was fine but not exactly French haute cuisine!

Day 4 (7 June 25) - Quimper to Saint Nazaire

Total miles today: 178  Miles to date: 742

The weather improved during the morning and we made the nice little seaside town of Quiberon for lunch, before the rain kicked in heavily again shortly after we left.

The forecast was for the rain to stop later in the afternoon and then to be fair for the rest of the trip, so we aimed for a campsite at Le Pouliguen, on the way to Saint Nazaire. The rain did stop; however when we arrived at the campsite it was full.

So we headed for the town and discovered a beautiful river frontage and found a great place to eat where we both had delicous moules mariniere, while we sorted somewhere to stay. We decided to find another hotel to let the ground dry out from the pounding it had taken over the previous 48 hours and ended up at the Hotel F1 on the outskirts of Saint Nazaire. Again, the hotel itself was OK, if very basic, but it stank of cigarette smoke. The wallpaper was impressive and didn't even give me a tiny migraine!!

But we did find a bar 10 minutes walk away and enjoyed a beer before bed.

Day 5 (8 June 25) - Saint Nazaire to Ballon

Total miles today: 157 Miles to date: 899

We discovered the following morning that France closes down on Sunday; REALLY closes down. We ended up in McDonalds for breakfast, which was surprisingly acceptable as it was almost empty and had nice pain au chocolats and coffee.

The major feature of today was that the weather was massively better and so we could really enjoy the French roads, which were amazingly good quality and very empty. We struggled to find anywhere for coffee and lunches though and we arrived at our chosen campsite having not been able to stock up on food or drink for the night. 

The campsite was really nice and we were the only ones there. Apparently, 2 days later it would be full of British visitors to Le Mans. The owner advised us that the only place we'd get food would be in the village 30 minutes walk away, where a burger bar would open at 6! And there was nowhere that we'd get a beer 🤯

However, 5 minutes later he turned up with 2 bottles of beer on the house - what a nice guy!

Day 6 (9 June 25) - Ballon to Ousitreham Ferry Terminal (Caen)

Total miles today: 171 Miles to date: 1070

We had a lazy start to the day, as we again had only to get to the ferry later in the evening so could take it easy. That gave us a chance to properly dry kit out in the sunshine, which made packing up a lot nicer.

After not having been able to get anything the day before because it was Sunday, we discovered today was a public holiday and equally as shut down! We did however find a very lovely bar in Alencon that was open, where we had croissants and coffee for breakfast  

During the afternoon, we came across this impressive viaduct, which I thought might be the Millau Viaduct but it turns out that is MUCH bigger.

Later in the afternoon we rolled back towards Oustreham and came in to town via the Pegasus Bridge, which is where the inland assault on Normandy started at the same time as the D-Day landings. This cafe was the first building in Europe to be liberated by allied forces and again it was very humbling and quite emotional to see the sites of battles we had heard of throughout our lives.

In a bizarre twist, as I was getting back on my bike I spotted another Doug doppelganger, having seen a previous one on Hvar, Croatia earlier in the year. Closer examination of all the photos from each occasion showed that it was in fact the same couple again!!

Croatia

France

We ate at the overpriced and very nasty brasserie at Pegasus Bridge, as it was about the only place we'd seen that sold food. But then decided to try and find a bar near the seaside to while away a couple of hours before we went to the port. Ironically, we ended up at a very lovely place in Lion-sur-Mer, where they sold exquisite looking food! Hey ho!

We watched the ferry come in from a distance and as it made its final approach we headed for the port for a very easy embarkation. This time we'd learned and were tucked up in the cabin by 11 to try and get a decent amount of sleep before the long drag home tomorrow.

Here's the trace of the French part of the journey:

Day 7 (10 June 25) - Portsmouth Ferry Terminal to to Posthouse Roundabout, Chester then on to home

Total miles today: 304 Miles to date: 1374

We both got a decent amount of sleep, helped by getting our hour back, before we were again bonged awake to spend money in the cafe.

Very smooth passport control etc and we were out of the port and on the road by 6.30.

We "made progress" on the way back, as our IAM instructors had taught us, and the miles seemed to fly by at twice the speed of previous days. Shortly after lunchtime we were back at our start point south of Chester and had a celebratory coffee in Starbucks before heading for our respective homes. Another 80 miles saw me rolling back into Amlwch at about 4pm.

Reflections

This trip seemed different from our previous ones. And on reflection for me it was mainly about two things. 

Firstly, apart from the bits of D-Day history down the Normandy coast (which I loved seeing) there seemed to be a lack of "purpose" to the trip, so felt a bit like we were riding for the sake of it. 

And secondly we did significantly higher mileages most days than we've done before (50% more). Maybe I'm just getting a bit old but I was really tired on some of the days, which took away from the enjoyment of the riding somewhat.

The hotels were good lessons learned for us - it would definitely have been worth spending a bit more to be in better parts of town. And we would probably carry more emergency beer and food rations with us next time, especially if travelling in France on a Sunday!!

But all of that can be addressed and didn't detract from the pleasure of exploring on two wheels with such a good mate!

Prep for France tour 2025

Well this year has started very sparsely in my motorcycling world, with just a few odd days out on the Kawasaki to try and strengthen my neck muscles in readiness for Paul and I heading off to France for what is becoming our annual tour.

The first of these was an overnight trip to my sister's in Wirral. On the way back, what had been an occasional niggly reluctance of the immobiliser to "disengage" became a big issue when she refused to start at all, after stopping for petrol before I set off for home. After trying everything I could think of, I admitted defeat and called the recovery service. When they arrived an hour later, of course the bike started first press of the button! We made it home without further drama, but the next morning I stripped the immobiliser out from the wiring and put everything back to what I assumed was standard. Amazingly she started immediately and I have had no further starting issues, albeit I'm starting to suspect I may have a slightly temperamental ignition switch, but that's a different story.

I bit the bullet and later that week set off on a 5 hour journey down to Reading to see my son, returning the following day. Not a beat was missed, so I carried on preparing the bike for the France trip a couple of weeks later.