Awaycation Autumn - Southwards!

I have formulated a rough plan for the outward journey that has us stopping in three Camping-Car Park (CCP) aires on the way to Alcoceber. We could stay at free aires rather than spend between €10 and €15 a night, but we should be guaranteed an electrical hook-up and some sites are municipal campsites that have joined the CCP system and have loos as well.

We have already booked the first night away at the CCP site at Formerie. This is far enough to drive on the first day after getting off the boat at Calais around 1pm and then going to do some shopping for us and Reggie.

It's only about 115kms from Calais and we are travelling on a Tuesday and there are no school holidays!

Day 2 is a little more complex.  Paris sits like a huge spider in its web, and getting past it can mean large detours. Usually, we head towards Rouen from Formerie and then from there head south taking in Chartres and along the N10 route towards Tours, Poitiers and Bordeaux.

This time I decided to let TomTom Planner on the laptop decide the route with the emphasis on no tolls.  It does indeed take us towards Paris and then around it on the outer ring roads. Even though we have the crit'air sticker for France, I'd hate to drive a 7m van any nearer the centre.

At the moment I am looking at Beaulieu sur Loire CCP for the next overnight stop. The site is a former municipal campsite and does have loos and showers available until mid-October. It's around 185 miles on the day.

Day 3 and we should go a lot further on the toll-free A77.  We use toll motorways when we really need to, but why pay when you can go for free?

I am looking at the Brassac les Mines CCP. We are looking at the same sort of distance again today.  Rather than thrash along we can take out time and see something along the way. Once off the A77 we have some local former N roads and then the A75. South of Clermont this is toll free as far as Beziers and the A9 junction. Brassac is an expensive €15 a night.

This open to change and with a lot of the day in non toll autoroutes we could go further and cut down the next day's mileage...

The last overnight at the end of Day 4 I am aiming for is the Flot Bleu Aire at Saint-Cyprien Plage on the Mediterranean coast. We have stayed before in 2022 and it was nice but a little packed in November. Hopefully not packed in October!  

I do have a couple of CCP aires as backup. From the reviews it seems that people moan about anything and everything!  We had no problems there.  It's an aire and there isn't supposed to be camping behaviour i.e. awnings and tables and chairs etc! This is a slightly longer day, around 220 miles and I might scrub this one and go for one of the CCP options in the area.

Day 5 we set off for Alcoceber and the week in the apartment.