This morning was bitterly cold in Massiac, barely above freezing. This somewhat perplexed me, since we are now so far south, until we started driving. As we joined the free motorway south signs made it clear that we were at a high altitude. We had entered the Massif Central, that large mountainous region in the centre of Southern France. In the first sixty or more miles we did not seem to drop below 800 metres (2,600 feet) and some of the high points exceeded 1,100 metres (3,600 feet) and the temperature stayed below 2ºC.
Somewhere south of Clermont Ferrand Sat Nav took us off the motorway to cut across to our final destination. We entered the Cevennes National Park, which was starkly beautiful at this time of year, with its forested slopes still devoid of leaves.
Anyone who has read this blog will know that Basil and I do not shirk at the most precipitous roads. They’re usually OK. But in the past the worst sections have lasted for an hour of driving at most. But today’s road demanded my total concentration for two and a half hours. Twists, turns, up and down; barely a straight piece of road on which to slightly relax. By the time we were coming out of the mountains Sarah could see I needed a rest, and where better but a handy LIDL, where Sarah did a quick shop while I rested my weary bones.
After a quick lunch in LIDL’s car park – why not – we finished off our journey by passing through Nimes and around Arles before we headed into the Camargue. I had chosen our campsite because it was in the Camargue, a famous area of wetland at the mouth of the River Rhone, and full of birdlife, including Greater Flamingos. The campsite seemed to be only 6 miles from a wildlife reserve and hired bikes, giving me ample opportunity to do a bit of bird spotting. Unfortunately it was not to be.
We know from long experience that most campsites, out of season, look a little ragged around the edges, but camping Les Bois Flottés (43.412402, 4.739004 €14 on ACSI) looked worse than most. Having seen the state of the site I booked in for only one night. The people at reception seemed very nice and indicated that they had only just taken over the site. Most of the site was closed, including the wash block and worst of all, from my point of view, they did not have any bicycles for hire!
The scuppering of my ornithology expectations and the generally run down nature of the site soon led us to decide that we will move on tomorrow. In all probability we will go to a site we visited two years ago and of which we have fond memories. You may be wondering why we are so desperate for a formal campsite all of a sudden. The answer is that I had not done any proper planning of our stay in Italy before we left home, so I need a couple of days to read my guide books for Tuscany and Umbria and plan an itinerary. It is possible to do this on an aire, but sitting outside in the sun will be so much better!
Adjacent to our site are some of the large saltwater lagoons which attract the flamingos. So we took the dogs for a walk, which was pleasant enough, but flamingos there were none. We have seen salt lagoons in a few places before, but have never walked next to one. It was fascinating to seen the red colour of the water, presumably from the salt tolerant organisms which feed the flamingos and give them their pink colouration. We were also interested to see at the waters edge large accumulations of salt crystals, which in some places had encrusted plants making them look like strange above water coral.
