Alsace Wine Tour – Tournai to Givet

Previous day || Back to trip summary page. ¦¦ Next day

Tournai to Givet

We enjoyed our visit to Tournai more than we expected, the aire de camping cars was good and there was more to see and do than we imagined. Now it’s time to move on towards the Alsace, the destination of this trek. Looking at the distance left to travel it’s obvious that I miscalculated the driving time. I was expecting to reach Luxembourg one more day, which is not sensible, so we search for a suitable stopover about half-day. After a little searching we decide that there are not many suitable aires in Belgium, so France will be a more suitable destination. Looking at the maps we can see that there is long finger of France that sticks up into Belgium and a number of aires are located there, so we pick Givet and head off there.

First stop however is filling station for LPG (GPL), we had intended to fill up our refillable LPG tanks before leaving England, but time overtook us and it never happened. We have two large tanks, each of which holds 21 litres of liquid gas for cooking and water heating. Our normal consumption is around one litre a day which is mostly used by the fridge freezer. The tanks are equipped with pressure gauges that are supposed to give an indication of how full the tank is. A waste of time really because pressure is not an indication of how much gas is in the tank, it’s the wrong measuring stick, the only reliable way to check the amount of LPG in the tanks would be to weigh them, which is not sensible. So, we look at the gauges and just fill up and see how much LPG goes in, usually it’s much less than we expect.

We located a suitable LPG filling station nearby, LPG is much cheaper in Belgium than in France, so it’s a good time to fill up. The filling station is on our route, we reach is easily and position the Hymer next to the LPG pump. The pump has the same connection as in France so I fit the appropriate adapter and hook up the pipe. See photos below. Filling with LPG went well, as normal, price is good €0.74 per litre. We purchased 29 litres of LPG so we had about 12 litres available. Then we drove onward towards Givet, stopping for lunch at the aire de Fonatine in baking sunshine. There was very little shade so we stopped, ate lunch and moved on. 

Filling with LPG (GPL) at LUKOIL, Tourai

Click any image to enlarge.

This aire was perfect, a tarmac surface, slightly sloping, with carefully marked pitches plus a good drive-over grey water disposal point, cassette disposal and fresh water column. Water available for a jeton, which you could purchase nearby, or use electronic payment. We needed water and already had a couple of jetons from previous treks so filled up here. I walked a short distance to a small supermarket and purchased ice lollies, ice cream and beer. I read a notice on the aire which said that tomorrow, 14 July, no parking because the area would be used for a fireworks display. There were many similar notices around the town, so obviously there was going to be a big event, Bastille Day, and a lot of people were expected. We were really disappointed because we wanted to stay more than one night, however, that would not be possible. We walked around the town, quite run-down, many empty shops and businesses. The restaurants seemed expensive when we looked at the menus.

We settled down and had dinner in the Hymer. Late evening a brass band came marching around with a procession following. There were 7 motorhomes on the aire, 3 Germans, 2 French, 1 Norwegian and us from the UK. 

Photos around the Aire de Camping Cars at Givet

Click at image to enlarge