Wednesday 28th August saw us driving towards the Ardeche but we didn’t quite make it that day due to avoiding motorways and having two little ones who tired easily. Instead we stopped in a campsite called Le Peynade which had many little red and black insects (we think they were firebugs) on the ground but the place was nice enough with free entry to the pool (we didn’t use it though) and a little lake next to it.
We both had a real good chat with my mother who obviously wanted to check in on us both after the drama of the day before. Mothers!! What would you do without them? I can’t comment on fathers unfortunately as I never lived with mine although I did have a step dad through most of my childhood. Sadly I don’t see him now though so that’s why my mother is top of the league!
We had a lovely stroll after dinner around the outside of the camp where we saw the cutest sight- a single file line of ducks were waddling their way across the grass towards the road where they quickly dashed across as fast as they could either on their own or in small groups before forming a line again to enter the lake. It was absolutely adorable.
The pathway we were on had outdoor exercise equipment in intervals along the route and so we decided to try them all out- our little girl included. It was good fun and our daughter was loving it. It soon became dark as we were making our way back to walk around the lake before going back to our home when a group of runners came out of nowhere nearly scaring our little girl to death. It was so dark when we rounded the other side that I had to use the torch on my phone so we could see what was in front of us.
The showers in this place by the way are really good as you can control the temperature unlike the other campsites we’ve stayed in so far which has been the push button type ones. Anyway, we left the following day and stopped in a lovely little campsite whose owner was absolutely lovely. She was so friendly and polite that I actually hugged her when we left. We didn’t want to leave but anyway I’ll explain below.
The campsite which was next to a lovely little river was also a stones throw away from a huge supermarket called Hyper U, a few other stores and a McDonald’s. Yes they get everywhere don’t they! We walked to one of the stores called BUT to try and find some more toilet fluid but it wasn’t that type of store- more like a currys mixed with IKEA. However, the store next door whose name I can’t recall had their own version of what we wanted so all in all we were successful. Along our walk we saw grasshoppers that had colourful wings as they flew! I saw them when we went to Dune du pilat but wasn’t quite sure what it was I saw then but now it was very clear that what I saw was a grasshopper. Call us naive but we had no idea grasshoppers could even fly so we were both fascinated with discovering this fact and also that their wings had such a vibrant colour- we saw blue and red ones. We then went to wander around the Hyper U; we had seen a lot of Super U’s around but Hyper U was bigger. I like to browse so I was excited to go in and see what it was like- yes the life of a grown up is a weird one; the things you get excited over is unbelievable…usually it’s a household appliance of some sort. The store was huge and I embarrassed myself as I tried to walk back through the entrance as we forgot to get a trolley, when the alarm went off. So a warning to all- DO NOT GO THROUGH THE ENTRANCE TO EXIT….you have to walk through the actual exit, which is a bugger if you forgot something and you have to walk through the entire shop (luckily this time it wasn’t too far away) and like I said embarrassing when everyone stops to stare at you like you’re a criminal. All I wanted was a trolley for god’s sake. I understand why they do it but it’s embarrassing when you are caught off guard because of something you didn’t know would happen.
That done we stopped in McDonald’s for chips and shake whilst our little girl played in the children’s area- they had one indoor and outdoor. My husband was feeling under the weather again and so went back to the motorhome so he could get some rest. We think he is suffering from sun stroke as he doesn’t fair well in the heat anyway and every day it had been in the 30’s! Plus the silly moose rarely put sun lotion on and all the symptoms pointed towards it.
We were making our way back when I heard my little girl scream “Mummy” from behind me to which I turned around to see her covering her face trying to defend herself from an annoying fly that wouldn’t leave her alone and I mean it would.not.leave her alone. It was the same kind I had seen flying around the pool at the campsite. Nothing I did would deter it though so I pushed my little girl along and ran after her thinking that that was the end of it but no, as soon as I caught up with her it was there again flying around her in a frenzy whilst I tried to waft it away. It then tried to attack me and my son before going back to my daughter- by this point I was actually getting scared so I told my daughter to run. I mean what was this fly’s problem. What kind of fly acts this way? Scared for myself and our son I decided to run too. I saw and heard our little girl banging on our motorhome door screaming for her daddy to open up. He was obviously worried and opened the door in a panic to find us all bounding in as fast as we could whilst I explained what had happened when to my horror I looked up and saw it on one of our cupboards like it was saying “Think you can get away? I’ll wait until later when you’re all asleep and then get you”. And then my hero of a husband whacked it one with a shoe. One of us (I can’t remember who) picked it up to examine it- it looked like a huge fly but also like a dark wasp because it had stripes- so I did some googling and found out it was a horse fly! Well, I had heard about horse fly’s and upon reading further was definitely glad that it was well and truly dead because apparently horsefly bites hurt; they make an incision in your skin as it has a scissor like mouth and the wounds can become easily infected. They also like to chase you!! It was such a shame we had this experience though as the campsite was lovely but it left myself and our little girl traumatised so much that we couldn’t even entertain the idea of staying another night and so we left in the morning. On a good note though, our little boy had just learnt to shake his head “no”! So that said it all really didn’t it!
K.E.E.N Explorers 