The Journey Home

June 5^th

Rimini to Cortemeila 303 miles

Having wandered around the shops last night, for a couple of hours, and the view of the beach earlier with all those sun beds, we decided that Rimini lovely as it was, was not our scene. So packed up and headed towards some friends who’d moved to northern Italy a few years earlier.

A long days driving today, should have been about 260 miles but coming across a closed junction off the motorway, we had no choice but to stay with it for a few more miles, but unfortunately taking the next exit sent us onto a northbound motorway totally in the opposite with nowhere to turn around. AARRRGGGHHHHH.

Arriving about an hour and a half later than intended we were warmly welcomed by John and Rita with a glass of wine (well several actually) and a lovely meal.

Our friends told us it had been raining all day with them, so we felt lucky that apart from a light drizzle as we’d climbed up the hill towards our hosts we’d had a dry journey.

June 6^th

After a good nights sleep, woke to an overcast morning. Apparently it had rained here nearly every day in May, and June hadn’t got off to a great start either.

Mid morning we set off to see Jonquilio, Rita’s horse, Alison rode him for half an hour, the rain coming and going. Rita is unable to ride at the moment due to a nasty bite on her hand by one of Jonquilio’s stable mates.

Lunch was had in “Aqui Therme” a lovely town aptly named as it has a natural hot spring in the centre of town. I did wonder why this hot gift was not put to good use by the locals, maybe having bathing pools, the water being a good healing medium for skin allergies etc.

June 7^th Cortemelia (Italy) to Briancon (France) 132 miles

After another lovely dinner and a good nights sleep we set off to cross the Alps on the final leg of our journey. We didn’t get going till midday (the bed was too comfortable to get up early) and though it looked like rain it was still dry.

We wound our way through the lovely Piemonte countryside before joining the autostrada south of Turin and heading west towards the mountains. Our intention was to cross the Mon Cenis pass but when we reached Susa we discovered the pass was closed, the road having been washed away by the recent rains! We went south to try the Montgenevre hoping it would be open as the other alternative was a 15km tunnel which we didn’t fancy.

This turned out to be the original medieval part of the town complete with moat, drawbridge, portcullis and even fresh running water in a channel down the centre of the main street! There were lots of shops and restaurants in narrow cobbled streets as well as an impressive church. We had a super meal in a cellar restaurant part owned by an English guy who was also the chef.

June 8^th Briancon to Dijon, 230 miles.

We woke to more rain! This eventually eased so we donned our wet suits and set off towards Grenoble where we were going to pick up the autostrada, with Dijon as that days’ destination.

Our route took us over the Col de Lautaret and through a National Park. We rode through alpine meadows filled with flowers of every colour of the rainbow, past lakes and through valleys with majestic snow capped peaks (snow was actually settling on these mountain peaks!) There were numerous water falls, some of which I think were new! And even in the rain it was stunningly beautiful, though I hadn’t expected snow in June!!

As we descended the weather improved and by the time we got on the motorway the sun was almost out. With dry roads and no trucks, it was Sunday, we made good progress and stopped for the night at a service station just south of Dijon. That night there was a terrific thunder storm and we woke to blue cloudless skies and sunshine!

June 9^th Dijon to Guignicourt (near Reims) 236 miles

We stayed on the autostrada which was still relatively light in traffic and continued northwards. We came off just north of Reims having ridden 380 miles of motorway with no accidents or traffic jams (definitely not the M25!) The map had showed canals and rivers in this area so we reckoned there must be campsites as well. Our instincts were correct and after asking in a village shop were directed to a lovely site in the village of Guignicourt.

It was beside a river, complete with swans, and there were at least half a dozen British caravans and motor homes already in situe. We erected the tent with relative ease, considering it was our 1^st time, and felt that any one watching wouldn’t have know we were amateurs, though the fact we were reading the instructions might have given it away! I then discovered my pannier was full of ants! It wasn’t difficult to empty it and get rid of them but we weren’t sure of the source! Were we on top of the nest or had they arrived on my jacket that had been sitting under a tree for a while? We decided to stand our ground, after all we were bigger than them, and basically we couldn’t be bothered to move the tent! After a brew we went off to investigate the town.

We found one bar open, (why does everywhere in France always seem to be closed?) and had a couple of beers before walking back along the river to the campsite for a snack supper. There were no ants about so we figured it was safe to retire! With no telly we went to bed as the sun went down and woke up very early with the rising sun (4am) shining directly in the tent. Neither of us slept brilliantly but we had at least slept under canvas, well manmade fibre.

June 10^th Guignicourt (France) to Rotherfield (Kent UK) via Calais 239 miles.

Once we’d had our morning coffee, I was contemplating walking into town to get breakfast when it came to us in the form of a bakers van with fresh bread a croissants!

We packed the scooter for the last time and set of for Calais. We had no idea of ferry times that was down to luck. We started out on national roads but after a couple of hours the traffic was getting to Tony, so we stopped at a Lidl’s to get ham and brie to go in our fresh bread before getting on the autostrada and heading for Calais. Arriving just after 16.00hrs, luck was on our side and we were sailing at 16.40! We sailed into Dover around 17.00hrs and encountered our 1^st traffic jam since leaving England 10 weeks earlier! (That had been the queue into Dover!!) It took nearly half an hour to get out of the dock!! We’d brought the sun with us, as promised, and once out of Dover settled down for the last 60 miles of our marathon.

Driving through the Kent countryside in the evening sunshine was as beautiful as any of the other wonderful places we’d visited on out travels. We arrived home just after 7pm tired, but in one piece, after a total of just under 3500 driven miles plus several hundred ferry miles.

We collected more money on our travels and several people in the UK have collected donations in our absence. We think the final figure we’ve raised will be around £2000. A HUGE thank you to all of you for being so generous and for believing in us even if you thought we were mad! I think you were right, but WE DID IT!!!