A narrow escape?

There we were, visiting a fascinating museum collection of Celtic and Roman artifacts when this chap appeared behind us! But then, like every other metal being we have met on our trip, he didn't say a lot so we just ignored him and carried on.

.

The people of Châtillon-sur-Seine, have preserved to themselves a huge collection of truly stunning pieces of archeology, all unearthed in the surrounding area, this despite immense pressure for all these artefacts to be moved to a much more prestigious location, the Louvre in Paris. One can just imagine the fight they must have had because the real prize, and clearly the envy of every archaeologist, is an elaborately decorated bronze cauldron, deemed to be for holding wine or mead but it is the size of a small bath. It was just one item amongst the grave goods of La Dame de Vix who lived nearby some 2500 years ago, long before the Roman era. She was clearly some woman if the massive gold torque she was wearing around her neck is anything to go by and, being so carefully laid out in her own 4-wheel chariot, her journey into the afterlife was extremely well planned and executed.

It was well worth pausing our journey here to spend an extra day bumbling around this town. Besides which, we could see what was soon to be coming our way - rain, two days of it together with some strong south-westerly winds. There is no way to escape it. The best plan seemed to be to travel on to some place where we can hide away and wait for it to pass, a nice secure campsite surrounded by some trees, perhaps. They are known for breaking wind(!)

A nearby national park seemed like a good bet, another big green blob on our map, but then we found a problem. For some reason the French don't consider it worthwhile going on holiday at this time of year and thus most campsites are not open. We had already observed the almost total absence of campervans travelling with us on the road - it is as if they don't exist here - and it is now begining to dawn on us why. There is simply nowhere for them to stay. However, undefeated and having found ourselves some trees beside Lac des Settons, we made short work of parking up and tucking ourselves in for the night. One can imagine that in summer it would be heaving here - there are at least three large campsites and you can hire canoes, boats, bikes, or engage in a raft of other sporting activities. But for us, in April, it is deserted; not a soul to be seen, barricades across entrances, toilets locked up, signs everywhere making it clear you are not welcome...yet. So just like the bears, we make use of the woods and enjoy the undisturbed silence...apart, that is, from the raindrops dripping from the trees and pattering on our rooftop.

Given that what we enjoy most of all about travelling about in our 'campingcar' is the ability it gives us to explore new places and to wander along untrammelled paths in the wilderness, it wasn't hard to decide that with two days of rain forecast we might as well carry on driving, moving on in our journey south. As usual we looked to Mrs Google for directions, which she normally gives us impeccably, but just occasionally she has a little wobble, a Googly moment, and plays us a little game. It usually happens as we are approaching a junction or a roundabout which she announces in advance and tells us to take the first exit. This is accompanied by a small sketch showing a circle with an arrow pointing right - it all makes sense to us since we are driving on the right here. Now and again, however, this is at odds with the blue line on the onscreen map which shows a turn to the left. So which is correct? Is she testing us perhaps? Then when we do go wrong the screen immediately says 'Rerouting' and she will then send us down some tiny back road, through a housing estate, or along a narrow twisting lane through a farm so we can get back to the road she mistakingly directed us away from in the first place. There's never an apology from her, however. Maybe she just has a quiet chuckle to herself.