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Onwards

You can’t visit a classic car enthusiast without admiring their car and we got our timing right, as it was the monthly club meet on Sunday. This was held at the Hippodrome in Maisons Laffitte, so it was just up the road.

The definition of ‘classic’ here is 30 years and so many of the vehicles there looked very familiar to us 😳. TR5 and TR6, MGB, RR, BMW, Maserati, of course the Jensen Interceptor that our host drives, 2CV, Caterham 7, a beautiful Austin Healy 3 litre and then this…






This is identical to mine, a Fiat 850 Sport Coupé, that I owned from 1978-81. Seeing it, brought back memories of welding, brazing, stripped driveshaft splines, clutch on the M1 and many miles of amazing touring. We drove around France on a camping road trip for all of September 1978 and the following year did the Ardennes for a month too.


Here’s Nige’s Jensen…




Maisons Laffitte is a very nice area to the west of Paris centre. The mansion is now owned by a trust I think and is a beautiful building.





All we needed to do then was leave Paris towards the south east but it wasn’t easy. We do not / did not have a vehicle height restriction, programmed into either of our navigation tools and so we were not guided away from the A86.

So when, in a load of traffic, we were moving towards it, the max 2m height warnings were a surprise and one that was nearly unavoidable. Just at the last minute is there an emergency slip off but not before a couple of car horns encouraged us too.

The map doesn’t show stress or the detail of stops and checks!







We made it into a nice Sunday motorway drive. We were disappointed that we were no longer on the ‘free flow’ motorway from Normandie to Paris. The French think it’s so modern to use cameras and then web payment for the tolls. Having setup our account and paid for yesterday, we then found there’s only one other free-flow and we won’t be driving it.

We arrived on the banks of the Yonne and to a gorgeous ‘aire de camping car’ at a small village called Gurgy. Here there’s a barrier and card machine and for €11 you can stay overnight with electricity included, in a broad line of about 20 spaces, facing the river. It was quite amazing and we had a great evening and sleep.





Couldn’t help myself capture these pics of two motorhomers with their must have accessory.





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