York, England August 24, 2009
I am going to try to post a little more often-hopefully, once a week for those of you who want to know where we are but don’t have time for Mark’s long version. (Though it doesn’t take long to just look at the pix that he posts.)
We spent a very busy two weeks in France first with Rebecca for 4 days driving out to Carnac and then Rachel was picked up in Paris and the 4 of us spent two days in Rouen. For the week in Paris the girls rented an apartment with their boyfriends and we stayed in the campground. We had 7 days where we were sightseeing or commuting about 16 hours a day. It was fun but exhausting. Rebecca and Jeremy then left for a week in London; Rachel and Will then spent 10 days car touring western France and Provence. Mark and I crossed the Channel and started our 3 months in the UK. We have to stay here 3 months in order to go back to the continent to meet the terms of the Schengen visa laws.
The good thing is that we can slow down. We spent 4 days in Cambridge—only one sightseeing and punting the River Cam. We have a Heritage pass so we are also visiting many of the great homes where we can get in free. Mark is not wild about those but I enjoy them. We have gotten up to York after visiting Sutton Hoo for the Bronze Age ship burial and Sherwood Forest. We need to be in Edinburgh on Friday.
So far we have found England more expensive than France or Germany but not as bad as Norway or Ireland. The pound has gained quite a bit in the last two months so that is not helping. However, since England is small we are spending significantly less on diesel. It is very difficult to free camp here as we have been doing the last 3 months. Many parking areas have barriers at a 6 ft height even for picnic areas and there are not the rest areas along highways like other countries. There are however, farm sites that are listed in our Caravan Club book where they don’t provide showers etc. but only charge $8-14 a night. Most campgrounds are in the $22-30 range. I noticed in York yesterday that a Big Mac is $3.50 but the grocery stores are very good on sales so we just buy whatever. Fruit right now is wonderful and we picked blackberries this morning at our camping spot. I have given up cereal for breakfast and switched to scones and clotted cream—which I could eat 3 meals a day! Write to me. Vicki