In June ’24 we visited Ali’s friend Ali Wrighton and her husband Pete, at the village of Roëzé-sur-Sarthe, just outside Le Mans. Ali and her mother had visited them back in May ’23 while I stayed behind cat-sitting.
By chance we were to be crossing the English Channel from Newhaven to Dieppe on the morning of the 80th anniversary of the D Day landings. The 9am sailing necessitated a departure from home stupidly early in the morning, at five. There were closures on the M23 so the SatNav took us on a charming route through Tunbridge Wells and Crowborough, arriving at Newhaven at seven.
Boarding was swift and efficient, and the ferry set sail at nine fifteen.
Leaving Newhaven
There were several people wearing commemorative ‘D Day’ T shirts and at least one commemorative flag was posted on the wall of the bar.
On the Ferry
Once off the ferry we negotiated the passport control and hit the road, following the SatNav’s badly pronounced directions. Ali drove the French leg of the journey, being more experienced than me in driving in Europe, while I supplemented the SatNav’s instructions to the best of my ability. After questioning Gaz, I determined that the last time I drove in Europe was a trip to visit him in Goch, Germany for Christmas 1998.
Unexpectedly, we skirted the city of Rouen before hitting the Autoroute south, arriving at Ali and Pete’s just after six thirty. Pete was lurking on the road outside their place on his converted mobility scooter to ensure we didn’t drive past them.
We unpacked our luggage and the various foodstuffs that Ali had requested we bring, then sat outside drinking wine and French beer with their chickens fussing around us. Then, a late-evening barbecue of fresh sardines and tuna, before chatting late into the night and a very restful night’s sleep.
In the garden
On Friday morning, after a leisurely breakfast of croissants and home made bread, we headed off to a nearby micro-brewery. Ali had included a ‘promissory note’ in my recent birthday card promising a trip to a micro-brewery and to the Le Mans 24 hour race museum. Our hosts had been cautioned that the micro-brewery didn’t offer tours, but the brewmaster spotted us peeking in the barn and happily showed us the mash tuns, boiling away, and briefly described the brewing process. From there we adjourned to the brewery shop to try a few beers and we later left with a couple of boxes of assorted beers.
Jolicouer Brewery
From there we dove to a nearby village and enjoyed lunch in a ‘traditional’ café, before driving the Mulsanne Straight to the Le Mans 24 Hours museum – another ‘promissory note’ commitment honoured. The museum had an amazing collection of cars that had won the race over the past hundred years and it was fascinating to trace the evolution of the cars from the massive Bentleys of the twenties, through the Porsches of the seventies, up to the present day hypercars.
Classic Porsche
At the Circuit
Pete needed to visit a local DIY store, which dwarfed anything I’ve ever visited in the UK, and then, in the evening, we attended an ‘end of term’ performance at a local ‘circus school’. Le Mans hosts of the the finest schools in France – who knew? Then back to Ali & Pete’s house for some barbecue, local beers and chatting by a home-made fire-pit. Pete is quite a DIYer with an extensive workshop.
During Fridays excursions my ‘phone kept pinging with various WhatsApp messages, one of my fellow County Councillors- who had been selected as a candidate in the upcoming General Election – had been suspended from the Conservative Party for some ‘indiscretions’. I ducked out of the circus performance for a chat with my colleague ’Frinton’ Mark, and Saturday morning found me sitting in the woods with my iPad on a ‘Zoom’ call with the County Council cabinet.
Ali’s stomach was playing her up so, after a breakfast of home-laid eggs and Pete’s home-baked bread, we decided that a lazy day was in order. I drove the Saab to top up the fuel tank, it’s a long drive back to Dieppe, and then later we visited the local supermarket. Unlike England, shops don’t open on Sundays. We stocked up on ‘the essentials’ – French beer, cheese, mustard, jam and cornichons – then drove back via the local recycling centre, or déchetterie – which sounds much nicer.
We spent the afternoon under the trees behind the house with chickens rummaging around us, a lovely way to spend the afternoon, then ate barbecued chicken and brochettes on the large patio. Later we adjourned inside as it was somewhat cooler than Friday evening.
In the garden – again
Sunday dawned bright and sunny, Ali seemed to be on the mend but still not 100%. I sat in the sunshine drinking coffee while Pete cycled the half mile into the village to buy fresh baguettes from the baguette vending machine. We had planned to visit the old city of Le Mans, but decided to enjoy another lazy day.
Later in the morning, Ali, Ali and I went for a drive around some local villages including Arnage and Berville which was hosting a boot sale near the village water mill.
At the Berville Mill
Ali W found a foot stool for the princely sum of five euros that matched some furniture she had bought previously. We bought a pretty ‘Ricard’ pastis flask, but the old lady who sold it to us wouldn’t budge below six euros. We then enjoyed a lunch of cheese, cold meats and salads back at the house.
After lunch, Ali W and I rented a small electric dinghy on the nearby river Sarthe, while ‘my’ Ali and Pete stayed home resting.
Messing about on the River Sarthe
Ali W and I enjoyed a very pleasant hour pootling along the river, then returned home and sat in the dappled sunshine, beneath the trees while the chickens scrabbled around us.
A new friend!
Later we were joined by Greg, a tradesman who regularly visits from the UK to do building work for Ali and Pete, he’d come through the tunnel with his excitable spaniel ‘Doris’. The journey from Calais took around four and a half hours, making his overall journey faster than our ferry crossing with slightly shorter car journey.
While we had been out, Pete had prepared a leg of lamb ‘Kleftico’ for dinner. It had been slow roasted for nearly seven hours and was tender and tasty, with new potatoes cooked in the meat juices and accompanied by braised cabbage. We sat around chatting after dinner, then headed up for a (relatively) early night. Monday was going to be a long day.
Ali had set an alarm for just before six and Monday morning and we were up an dressed quickly, finished loading the car, bade our fond farewells and hit the road just after six thirty. The SatNav predicted arrival at Dieppe for nine fifty, but we were somewhat wrong-footed and delayed when, in the village of Bac De La Bouille, the instruction ‘ turn right in three hundred metres’ failed to mention that those three hundred metres were the River Seine and we needed to catch a local ferry. As a result we were delayed by around twenty minutes and arrived at the ferry terminal at ten past ten.
Ferry ‘cross the Seine
The ship sailed on time and we again ensconced ourselves in the aft bar area, unfortunately the duty-free shop had run out of my preferred choices of rum, but at a tenner a litre I was prepared to compromise.
We docked in Newhaven on time at three and were offloaded and through passport control forty five minutes later, a frustrating wait that perhaps tips the scales towards the Tunnel for future trips. Traffic was heavy, but not as heavy as we witnessed in the opposite direction; we arrived home just before six.
It had indeed been a long day, and a wonderful weekend, we look forward to going back.