We are on the move again, now parked in a camp site in Merville-Franceville Plage, right next to one of the historic invasion beaches in Normandy – “Sword” beach stretches from Cabourg in the east, through Merville and Ouistreham in the west, where one of the main armies of British, Canadian and French troops landed.  Merville is also the site of a large German gun battery that the British paratroops had to neutralise as it covered the landing beaches, and they also had to capture ‘Pegasus bridge’ between Merville and Ouistreham to secure the west flank of the invasion.  There are big memorials to these actions in the area, and more being built in the run-up to the 70th anniversary of the invasion in 2014.   We walked along the beach and around the dunes and town this morning for 1½ hours, and although the sun was shining (mostly) there was a freezing westerly wind blowing.  Needless to say we stopped for the obligatory café on returning to the seafront to warm up again, before heading back to the campsite.

Last week saw Mike’s doctor and diabetes clinic appointments completed and all is well.  He has lost 5 kg in the past 3 months, just from our more active lifestyle, and all the test results are good, so we are now all up to date with prescriptions for the next 3 months.  The UK doctors won’t prescribe more than 3 months, so we will have to sort out a further 3 months in Spain – we’re told most of these meds are available across the counter there anyway.

Our last few nights in UK were spent at Brockenhurst in the New Forest as we had to move on from the Surrey site – we are only allowed a maximum of 21 nights on individual Caravan Club sites around London, and we had reached our limit.  Our departure was a bit hurried as the wardens had said they would sort out us staying for the extra 2 nights, but when it came to the crunch, it became impossible “according to the Club rules”.  However, the New Forest was a pleasant interlude, with walks in the forest amongst the grazing ponies, and visiting Lymington again on the coast.  Many areas of the forest area were flooded from all the recent rain, but we managed to jump the puddles without getting too muddy when we walked the 2 miles into Brockenhurst.   Lots of ponies were also in the town centre, along with a family of donkeys, all trying to cadge food off the residents and visitors.  Although it is ‘verboten’ to feed them, the ponies obviously couldn’t read the notices.

Our last night was spent on the wharf at the ferry terminal in Portsmouth – wet, cold and miserable, but we spent the evening in the café at the terminal where it was warm and bright, and only went back to the camper at 10.00pm to sleep.  Our reporting time for the ferry to Normandy was 7.15am on Saturday, so it was much more convenient to camp on the wharf than at a campsite an hour away.  It was interesting to see so many the British naval ships in Portsmouth dockyards as we sailed out on the ferry – everything from a jump-jet carrier, with attendant frigates and destroyers, to a visiting American submarine and Egyptian (or Saudi Arabian ?) destroyer side by side.

So here we are again, back in France, and we will head south and east from here down to Provence for a week or so before continuing on to Malaga in south of Spain.   Broad plan of attack is to drive down through Chartres, Orleans, Nevers and Lyon, then down the Rhône Valley to Provence.  This should take about 2 weeks as we are not in a rush, but still conscious of the weather getting colder even as we move south.

One photo included showing one of the decorated roundabouts we have seen so many of in northern France – both in Brittany and Normandy.  Beautifully kitted out with nautical or farming scenes, and one even had an old wine press in the middle with decorated barrels around it.

Cheers.