Le Havre to Florence

Our next visitors were Jo and Graham and a trip to Italy. This time our Portsmouth to Le Havre ferry was a different layout and the vehicles travelled on the open deck. Remarkable how clean our roof was compared to others!

It was midnight when we pulled away but I wanted to see the new aircraft carrier Queen Elizabeth that had arrived in port the previous day. Looked impressive from a distance but the photos were anything but impressive! 

We arrived at our earlier Paris site in time for lunch and H, G & J went to the Maintenon chateau while I had a coffee in the square and caught up on emails. In the evening  we went to see the Chartre lights. The cathedral was particularly impressive with various themes starting slowly

 And slowly growing larger, more complex and colourful.

There were a whole series....

Pretty impressive and must have taken most of the year to design and then develop.

Other structures had fewer changes which gave time for reflection….

This was the best of both worlds with the side of the cathedral in the distance.

A quick 600 kms south saw us in a lovely caravan site called Tranquil near Chambery. Nancy and Sasha were good enough to do almost the same distance and caught up with us for dinner as they had not seen G&J since our visit to Narbonne in September 2013. A really out of the way and quiet restaurant which had some great food and good wine. Just as well as N&S had caught up with friends on the way through and had a late lunch and advised they were too full to have a main meal. That soon changed when they saw the menu!!!

The next day saw another 700 kms to our first main base in Figline Valdarno just South of Florence. It had a huge village square which was remarkably quiet in the afternoon.

So how many Italians are needed to play a four hand card game? About 20. They seemed to be playing some version of whist and the discussion between the players appeared to be quite helpful to their partners so it was clearly not Bridge…. 

As we were in Italy we were constantly on the lookout for Gelato. A shop just off the square not only had a great display but on the opposite wall was an equally impressive display of alcohol. There were at least 8 different gins some of which were new names (even to Helen). With a large coffee machine in the rear it was just the place for an Affogato. Needless to say we visited a couple of times.