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09.06.08
Noyant to La Breille les Pins (well not really)
A good long day of three surprises. We are now passing through an area of very well drained sandy soils much more in use for arable farming than the rich cow lands north of here. In spite of this, these three ladies caught my eye early in the morning. The sun however was not rising and the day remained cool until midday when the sun banished the cloud giving us temperatures up to 30degC. Also early in the morning the first surprise a barn owl looking for a roost after a hard days night.
The second surprise was a metre long Grass snake snoozing in the sun about 13:00hours. He was very surprised in the grass in the middle of the track when we thundered up one in each tractor rut, and did not know which way to go, finally shooting across my rut 2 ft in front of me. I DO NOT LIKE SNAKES. Even harmless ones.
Mid morning we arrived at Parcay-les-Pins hoping to find a midmorning cup of coffee. But the village bar was closed all day Monday (but they do claim to speak very good English!). We availed ourselves of the bar’s seats in the square whereupon a local asked us whether we needed a drink of water; how kind but we still have plenty in our water bottles. A quick visit to the local shop got a couple of cans of fizz to drink and also showed that the most popular newspaper being sold there was the Daily Telegraph. More signs suppose of French villages being taken over by Brits. How awful.
We pressed on in the heat after lunch, expecting to arrive at La Breille les Pins campsite about 15:00. I will not dwell on the minor navigational error that made us about 30mins late, very hot and glad to have got there. Then the third surprise of the day, the campsite we had got off local leaflets in yesterday's campsite was not where we thought it was but 2 miles away by road. With hot feet we pressed on after directions and a beer from people in what we think was a closed local club, we probably got club rates at 1.6 euros each, I think they took pity on us.
Day still hot and washing drying well in the breeze as this blog is prepared in the most comfortable place yet – a settee in the games room on the site on a fair sized lake.