LE MANS & ALENCON

Sunday 16^th

A bright sunny morning for packing up and saying goodbye to everyone, they had all been so friendly. We were on the road by 10.45am  to drive about 50 miles to Le Mans. It was a very pleasant easy drive to the outskirts of the town and we eventually found the Aire by the river, having done 2 circuits of the one-way system across the bridges ‘cos we missed the turning to the Aire first time around. It was a bit like an open-top city tour bus!  We were not that impressed with the fact that it sloped toward the river, and it was full to overflowing, we parked on a non-parking space. It was now very hot and humid, so we decided to have bit of lunch, then go for a look around the town, but move on to stop the night.  As it was a week before the  24hour race , the main square was all set up for some sort of parade of the cars with tiered seating and barriers all over the place. We were somewhat disappointed at how scruffy everywhere was, rather like Chatham. We took a few phone photos of cars, and the trams coming up the quite steep street, so we shall have to see what they come out like. 

We left there around 4.00pm and drove a further 11 miles, with silly sat-nav taking us down some very tiny country lanes to a village called Montbizot which had a much nicer Aire next to a play park.  Room for about a dozen motorhomes on grass parking behind a hedge. Only downside was the road the other side of the hedge was quite busy  We sat out in the sun alongside 2 French vans that were already there, then another English one arrived (having driven over an hour out of his way from Le Mans due to his silly sat-nav – Tom-tom or Garmin, they are as bad a seach other). By then it was wine-o’clock and think about some dinner. Overnight was very hot so we had all the windows open.

Monday 17th

Needless to say it started to rain overnight, so we had to batten down all the hatches. By 8.00am the God of Thor obviously thought that it was his birthday and decided to celebrate with thunder, lightning and hailstones, so we had a bit of a lie-in listening to it hammering on the roof. It dried up after breakfast and we headed off on foot for a look around the village to see what we could find…a closed church, a closed butcher’s, an open tabac and an open hairdressers. Back to the van and set off for Alencon which was only 24 miles away. We had chosen it because it is supposedly famous for lace-making. However en route a LIDL jumped out at us so we stopped off for some supplies, major one being tissues as Brian has a nose like a tap at the moment (hay-fever not a cold!) Then we fell over Decathlon, which is one of the major camping suppliers in France and had a mooch around in there for about an hour. Then, it was LeClerc for petrol and some fresh veg which we could not get in LIDL. Finally arrived at Municipal Camping de Guerame at 2.40pm, only to find it still shut for lunch, so we sat in the van and had our lunch while we waited until 3.00pm. Quite a pleasant site and we found a flat bit of gravel to set up on. As it was very hot and humid again we collapsed and sat outside, once we had put the shopping away and washed the undies. I even cooked a proper dinner in the Remoska and we ate about 8.00pm. It is still light enough to sit and read until after 10.00pm which is quite nice.

Tuesday 18^th

The heavens opened again during the night and we have now got a wet bed end ‘cos we didn’t get the window closed quickly enough. It is surprising how much water can get through a fly wire in the roof lights, so the choice is do we shut them first or the windows? I have now tried out our shower, small but perfectly formed springs to mind, as I was not very enamoured with the facilities here. The ladies toilets have 4 interesting choices…a stand and squat hole; a child-sized sit with no seat; a normal sit with no seat and no lock on the door but a knob to hang things on; or a normal sit with no seat with a lock on the door but no knob!  Needless to say we are only using them in desperation.   The rain sort of dried up by lunchtime so we put our shoes and coats on and headed off in to the town.  It was much larger than we realised, with lots of very old buildings, some nearly falling down that were propped up by wooden structures similar to the one we saw in the church at Mouliherne.  We found the Basilica de Notre Dame and spent a while looking at all the lovely paintings and stained –glass windows, then the Tourist Office for a map and found out about the Museum which housed all the lace stuff.  Armed with all the info we tried to find our way through the maze of little streets, it is a good job they are mostly one-way ‘cos nowhere could 2 vehicles pass each other. 

The lace making part of the museum was fantastic. Alencon lace is what is called ‘needle-lace’ and not worked with bobbins on a cushion at all. Designs are pricked out with a pin thingy on coloured paper, then a thread laid down over the pattern and stitched over to hold it in place. After that the lace is worked with a needle + thread over the laid down thread.  When all is finished the backing paper is cut off and hey presto one has an intricate piece of lace to use. It apparently takes about 15 hours to work a square centimetre!  We saw some old stoles, parasols, gloves and bits to go around the neck, many of which had taken over 1000 hours to make. We eventually made our way back to the van about 5.00pm, just in time for the sun to come out for a while and for me to cook another proper dinner!


photos of Le Mans & Alencon