Today was a lazy day.. to begin with. Entertained myself in the park for a little while, just wasting time until a little after lunch when Mum rushed down and informed us we had to leave - Dad had lost the keys to the top box (a container thing that we put on our roof racks to carry stuff) and two of the bikes! Oh no!
So we had to hop in the car and start driving and re-tracing our steps back to the service station we stopped at after arriving in France, in the hope that some how the keys where still there. We drove for a few hours back to the petrol station, looked around furiously for a small shiny set of keys, and discovered our keys were no where to be found. We even reported the loss to the local police station in case someone miraculously handed them in. Then we headed back to the campground.
Rhys went with Dad into town that night and we all ate dinner before nodding off…
We caught the ferry across to France and drove to a campsite in the town of Arramanches in Normandy, France, which some of you might know from the famous battle of World War II known as D-Day. It is best known as one of the beaches where Allied forces landed on June 6, 1944, to begin the liberation of mainland Europe of Nazi forces.
Mulberry Bay harbor, Arramanches, Normandy, France.
After setting up camp, we had nothing much to do so we just passed the time with games and reading, as it was getting pretty late. We’d start exploring tomorrow.
Woken up this morning by mum, telling us to get down stairs straight away to make sure we could say goodbye to Jacki before she left for work.
It was more than an hours wait before Jacki got down stairs, let alone left for work. She said she was late because my younger brother, Rhys, was up at a “ridiculous hour”. Rhys claimed he usually got up at five in the morning (not eight, like he actually does).
Dad and Andy went to a garage to sort out the car (we were having some handbrake issues). We (Mum, Rhys and I) sat around and watched Harry Potter on DVD until they got back. We were about half way through the film when Dad and Andy when to collect the Peugeot and we set off after lunch (my diary reads: “we were only half way through when the two old men went to collect the car“).
We stopped in a campsite called New Forrest near the town of Pool, were we set up camp for the night.
I felt a bit timid, maybe a bit scared you could say. I really didn’t want to go - to leave all my friends behind, and the life I had known for the last 5 years, but I was also excited. That, and I guess I had to go - it being my parents decision, and all.
Our red Peugeot 405 just leaving our house of 5 years.
We set off around six-thirty in the morning and before we even leave our driveway, dad broke the handbrake. Whoo! Anyway, after hours and hours of solid driving we arrived at Andy & Jacki’s place around ten at night, heading off to bed son after. But it wasn’t until at least an hour after getting in bed that we actually went off to sleep, because Elsa, Andy & Jacki’s cat, kept terrorizing (playing with) us.
It was kind of weird thinking that we’d be living in that red car, and a fold-up camper van for the next six months. Really makes you think about how excessive our society is. I mean, do you really need a huge house with lots of bedrooms, and on-suite and a swimming pool, when a family of four can live out of an old Peugeot and a camper van? I’d rather be seeing the world in a crappy red Peugeot than be stuck inside a mansion.