September 2011 - The road home!

The 1st of September saw us with a packed car (far too packed) reversing our trip of early July, and heading south for sunny Spain.

This is not a story of the complete trip as one 1500 mile journey through Europe is like another. I must mention however one or two points of note and interest.

The Queen Elizabeth Bridge, which takes M25 traffic clockwise over the Thames, is now so busy that the number of toll booths is completely inadequate at times of even medium traffic numbers. We crossed at about 2:00pm on a Thursday and it took us over 30 minutes from the bridge approach to exiting the automatic booth (about 2km).

The impressive but overcrowded QEII Bridge

It made us late for our Chunnel crossing but happily the operators are very flexible and simply put us on the next train.

We entered France and stopped at hotels in Calais and the Loire Valley then travelled down through the centre of the country towards the A75 Autoroute. This incredible motorway is free for its entire length (apart from the Millau Viaduct which is a toll bridge) and takes you from Clermont-Ferrand to Beziers near the Mediterranean coast, a distance of 340km. It travels straight through the Massif Central and I believe it to be the most scenic motorway in Europe. The views are incredible and it rises to 1121 metres at the Col des Issartets, much of the motorway runs at over 800m above sea level, and over 50km runs in excess of 1000m.

Le Puy de Dome

The volcanoes of The Auvergne

One can see the Puy de Dome, which is the highest of the extinct volcanoes in the Auvergne, and the views are so good that you have to take great care not to sightsee at the expense of safe driving. South of the Millau Viaduct the motorway drops sharply to Beziers through a series of tight switchback bends where the speed limit is reduced to only 80kph (50mph) for safety reasons.

The Viaduct itself is a wonderful sight as it crosses the Tarn Valley. Its statistics are massively impressive and may be viewed on many websites including Wikipedia so most are not repeated here. The highest pylon is 343m high, 19m higher than the Eiffel Tower, it is 2460m long, and cost €300million to build. It now costs €6.40 to cross it. It is such an attraction that it has its own Visitor Centre where you may view films of its construction and of course purchase souveniers from a fridge magnet to huge framed photographs.

It was a fine but dull time of day when we crossed so I have included one or two photographs from the Internet to decorate this article.

Please click on these pictures to view them full size

The beautiful British designed Millau Viaduct

Worthy of mention is the hotel in which we stayed the night before. Les 2 Rives is part of the Logis group and is a beautifully turned out hotel in Banassac, a tiny village of only 800 inhabitants. It has been completely modernized recently and each room has beautiful facilities, a king-sized bed, wi-fi, and TV. Our room overlooked the river and was very restful.

Hotel Les 2 Rives, at the side of an unnamed mountain stream

After Banassac we travelled down the A75, along the French southern coastal autoroute, into Spain, around Barcelona and stopped at Tarragona. This is a city with 2000 years of history but I only want to mention the area in which we spent the night. From Booking.com we reserved a room in the Hotel Lauria, situated on the Rambla Nova, and from the looks of the map, close to the beach.

The hotel location map

The hotel was quite old fashioned but the room was large, had a balcony overlooking the smallish pool, was air conditioned, and had the usual facilities. We took a walk from the hotel, along the Rambla towards the sea, then stopped dead at the view point. We were about 50m above sea level with a very steep road down, and two main roads and a railway line to cross before we could reach the beach.

View from the end of the Rambla Nova

Anybody in a wheelchair, or parents with buggies would find it very difficult to reach the sea if not impossible. Quite amusing for us staying only one night but a complete shock for anybody on holiday.

Finally fuel costs. Our little car runs on diesel. In the UK it is more expensive that petrol, on the Continent it is slightly cheaper than petrol. The prices we encountered (in euros for comparison purposes) were as follows:-
UK normal garage 1.53
UK Morrissons 1.47
UK motorway 1.60
France normal garage 1.39
France motorway 1.51
Spain normal garage 1.25
Spain motorway 1.29.

It felt like a long drive back from our new holiday home in the Yorkshire Dales, especially in the heat, and next year we will probably leave a month later, and take the western route down through France and cut the journey by a day.

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