Back to Blighty

As the rain commenced in Esquelbecq, we packed up the van and drove on to Dunkirk to do a  final shop, before catching the ferry at Calais. By the time we reached Dunkirk, the rain had stopped and the sun was shining through again.  

Interestingly, a French guy warned us about itinerants wandering around the large parking lot, and advised us to be very careful with our things. As it turned out, there was no threat, or apparent threat, of any kind. 

We had our dinner here before we drove on to Calais - it was raining again. We turned off the motorway to the port about 6km from the actual port, and for the whole 6km there was double fences with razor wire on the top of each fence, and between the fences, attempting to ensure that truck or cars cannot be interfered with. All along the motorway electronic warnings were flashing notices to motorist to be aware that objects may be thrown onto the highway in order to stop the traffic. At no stage did we see any evidence of this. 

The UK Border Security gave our passports the most thorough check that we had ever had! It held us up for about ten minutes while they did their probe. Normally it is about one minute to pass through this part of the port. At the next stage we were given a good search by the French Police looking for any unauthorised person that may be concealed in, or on, the van. 

The passage to Dover was about an hour and a quarter, where we disembarked, drove to the harbour esplanade where we spent the night, along with other motorhomes. 

Anyone passing through the system of the Calais-Dover crossing could not but shake their heads at the Brexit cretans who believe that a hard Brexit is the answer! 16,000 lorries pass through this port on a daily basis - get real!

We woke this morning to a cooler Dover morning, took a long walk along the waterfront and just soaked in the view. (Last evening the lights of France were quite clear.) 

Later we tackled the M20 and the M25 motorways, we were doing okay until we got around near the M3 intersection and then the notorious traffic jams kicked in!  

James had followed our journey and decided to meet us for lunch, which was very pleasant to catch up with him after a few months away. 

We later stayed at Englefield Green for our overnight stop.