Well after days of bleak news from La Belle France regarding fuel shortages and barricades of burning tyres we had a rethink. We have been planning this trip to France for weeks, but suddenly the thought of a holiday playing hunt the petrol station didn’t seem so appealing.

Yesterday we set off for the Channel Tunnel not totally clear what we were going to do. But 200 miles from home to Folkestone gave us plenty of time to discuss it. Sarah wanted at least some sight of the sea and Basil would not have enough fuel in one tank to get us across France to Spain or Italy. So there was only one answer…….Croatia. Impeccable logic, I think you’ll agree.

So after a night on a handy little Certified Location – Capel Farm (51.112964 1.218923) we got up at 5.30 and were in Calais for 9am. 340 miles later and we had seen no sign of the alleged disruption to petrol supplies, but we were committed (or we should have been committed). We parked Basil up for the night on a lovely quiet little ACSI site near Strasbourg – Camping les Bouleaux (48.782843 7.249860). The sky was blue; the temperature was English hottest day of the year; and Basil’s nose was pointing inexorably South East. We had decided that our first major stop would be Lake Bled in Slovenia, and nothing was going to stop us.