2018-04-11 Northern Italy and Southern France Flower Camping de Mars to Sancoins

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Northern Italy and Southern France Flower Camping de Mars to Sancoins

Northern Italy and Southern France by Hymer Motorhome

Camping de Mars to Sancoins

Cold again when we wake, 2°C. We put the heating on and sit in bed drinking hot coffee and catching up on our journals. It is an overcast sky, not the sunny day I was hoping for so that we could sit out on our lovely big pitch overlooking the river. The heavy cloud lightens a little, but it stays dull.

We take advantage of the showers here at Flower Camping de Mars, they are very good; we have a slow morning catching up. Many birds around the site, Red Kites, Blue Tits, Great Tits, Chaffinch, Blackbird, and Blackcap. We would see all of them in our garden in Lancaster except the kites, but it’s good to see and identify them elsewhere.

We look at the map and, as the day is overcast, decide to put some miles behind us again and drive north to Nevers, about 160km. At Nevers, the river Loire splits into the Atellier and the Loire, most of the main wineries are north of Nevers so we would have a choice.

We service the Hymer and get on our way by about 11.45. We drive on the N7, a very good road, through Roanne to Lapalisse, about 80 Km. Here we stop at the supermarket to buy some food, but no wine as the selection is poor. We have lunch on the car park, fill up with diesel and get on our way again. At Lapalisse we have a choice of route: the N7 which is the better road but longer and has congestion on it, or the D480 through the villages and parallel with the Loire, we take the D480. Just north of Marseigne we turn onto the D161, a narrow road, too narrow for Hymer to pass anything but a car but generally very quiet with only a few instances where we have to squeeze in to pass!

This area is rural and agricultural, not dissimilar to England, with fields full of the very pale cream Charolais cows and their calves, some small and newly born. At Chapeau we turn onto the D53 and drive to Moulins, a large town, where we pick up the N7 again and follow the Atellier river to St Pierre le Moutier. Here we take the D2076 to Sancoins and find our camping spot next to the canal. This is a super Aire de Camping-car in a wide strip along the side of the canal with spaces next to the canal and spaces on the other side of the strip next to the woodland, even with privet hedge bays! It is quiet and very still, apart from the very noisy rooks in the rookery overhead.

We walk into the town of Sancoins, it is very run down with many shops empty or for sale. It’s sad to see a town in such a state.

Back to the Hymer we open a bottle of Cremant de Bourgogne and have the remainder of the chicken in a chilli sauce.

Our Hymer motorhome trip to Northern Italy and Southern France

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Summary of motorhome journey – Flower Camping de Mars to Sancoins