We had arrived! The hovercraft entered a gap in the wall of sand dunes and reduced speed to a fast walking pace as it approached the car park. The engine note faded to a low drone and our craft gently lowered itself onto the tarmac, the air leaving the supporting skirt in a hiss.
The drivers and their passengers hurried to their vehicles anxious to continue their journeys. I wondered if any of them intended to travel as far as us.
Sadly our first moments in Continental Europe were marred by an undignified brawl. Nobody wanted to have to sit in the middle of the back seat – starved of air and only able to look straight ahead. Our parents separated us and allocated us our positions on the understanding that it would be “all change” when we stopped for fuel.
The row of vehicles on our right disembarked before us. Mr. Volvo driver looked icy daggers at me as he crawled past and the little Volvos pulled faces. Hey, I said I was sorry. So post me the dry cleaning bill! When I am old enough, I’ll get a paper round to pay for it.
Our car soon followed and we joined the procession to the customs barrier. Here a bored customs official and a couple of equally bored Gendarmes gave our documents a cursory inspection before handing them back. Even though our car, being from Britain, was right hand drive, they insisted on standing on the left of the car and dealing with the driver through the passenger window. Just a subtle way of letting us know we were in their world now. The officials took no notice of our heavily laden vehicle and merely waved us on.
Clearly it was inconceivable to them that there might possibly be anything in Britain worth smuggling into France. Like what? Cheese? Wine? Cognac? Mais non mes amis! Any smuggling would only be conceivable if it were going in the opposite direction.
A sign in English reminded us that pretty much the rest of the universe drives on the right hand side of the road, and we were off.
Dad popped some caffeine tablets to keep him alert. All the traffic seemed to be heading out of Calais. We followed and it wasn’t long before we picked up signs for Paris.
I am not sure what I expected, but the towns and villages we passed through all looked so different from home, so French if you like. I can’t actually come up with a better description.
The skies were clear and blue. The ambient temperature already several degrees warmer than when we had left Manchester.
It was strange to see things like advertising billboards, some advertising familiar products, but not being able to make head nor tail of the captions.
Indeed at the time none of us spoke either French or Spanish. However we did have a list of useful phrases for the traveller supplied by the auto club along with the route maps. One of these phrases became the immortal “Trente litres d`essance s`il vous plait.” The list of useful phrases did not supply any variations on this request, so we were obliged to order ‘thirty litres of petrol please’ any time we needed fuel.
The height of the roof rack and heavy load on board made the car slightly less fuel efficient and aerodynamic than The Houses of Parliament. Our fuel consumption was roughly the same as a badly maintained Concorde passenger jet, so we ended up visiting practically every other petrol station between Calais and Barcelona asking for {you guessed it}, thirty litres of petrol please.
This slowed us down a bit but at least it gave us the chance to exchange places in the back at fairly regular intervals.
We tried to fill up on fuel only at Total and Elf service stations because they had free gifts with every fuel purchase. By the time we returned to England we had a complete set of miniature plastic busts of famous French writers, artists and composers, courtesy of Total. Courtesy of Elf, we had enough high ball glass tumblers to kit out one of the Queens garden parties. I am sorry Shell; your freebies were rubbish.
By late morning we had reached the outskirts of Paris. I was disappointed that we would not be able to spend any time here, and hoped at least for a glimpse of the Eiffel tower on the way past. The route map recommended going around Paris on a big ring road known as the Peripherique. It indicated where we would join the Peripherique and the best place to leave it to continue our journey south.
It didn’t indicate that this was the most dangerous place on earth. The road to hell. No diversions. I suggest anybody forced to use this horror of a bypass would be well advised to take a large dose of LSD at the last toll booth before Paris – the nightmare of a bad trip could be no worse than the terrors of driving on this evil stretch of tarmac.
It has been suggested that the chariot race in Ben Hur was based on a movie mogul’s abortive attempt to circumnavigate Paris at rush hour.
The Peripherique is many laned. Cars drive flat out at all times. They drive so close to one another that direction indicators are useless. To signal your intentions to other road users the custom is to blare your horn repeatedly then just execute the manoeuvre, change lane or whatever, even if it is against the laws of Physics to be able to get your car into the available space. French drivers don’t have a lot of time for the laws of physics. So far as I can tell French drivers have heard of the Highway Code, but don’t believe it has a significant role to play in the day to day life of La Republique. Basically a nice idea but not very practical if you want to get to work on time.
We were approaching the highway with great trepidation. It did not seem possible for us to slot into the traffic flow, so tightly was it packed. We were lucky, you might say. The coach directly in front of us just threw himself off the slip road on to the main highway, forcing several cars to swerve or brake hard. Amid a cacophony of angry car horns we slid into the gap. Dad swallowed a handful of caffeine tablets, clearly uncomfortable with what was happening around us.
Soon we came upon another approach road. Traffic joining our lane at high speed, uncaring that our family was actually already in the space they wanted to occupy. Dad was forced to swerve into a faster lane accompanied by more blaring car horns.
Mother’s eyes were glued to the map. It was a lot less traumatic than watching the traffic around us. For the first time I wanted to swap places with my brother and sit in the middle.
“How much further to our exit Maria?”
“Not much further. Two more junctions I think”
“What do you mean, you think?” Panic rising. Dad did not want to be here at all.
“Just come off when you see a sign for Orleans.”
Some twenty minutes went by before the sign for the Orleans exit appeared. Dad kept looking over his shoulder, hoping for a gap in traffic so we could pull over into the exit lane.
Suddenly we found ourselves being overtaken on the inside by a monstrous truck – another manoeuvre the Highway Code advises strongly against on safety grounds. The monstrous truck was towing an even more monstrous trailer, both bearing the symbol of a laughing cartoon character cow on the sides. Dad didn’t find it funny. The thing had more wheels than a centipede has feet and it was thundering along just inches to the side of us. I have been on shorter commuter trains than this truck ensemble. Now the driver had slowed so that he was just keeping pace with us, studiously ignoring our flashing indicators.
There was no way past him. The exit for Orleans passed us by.
“Bastard” screamed my father impotently.
The monster truck was enjoying his little game with us. When we slowed down, so did he. He made us miss the next turn off as well.
“Right, that’s it. Now I’ve had enough of you clowns”. Dad’s face now set grim and determined. As we approached the next exit, he hit the brakes hard and executed a move not unlike the one Michael Schumacher made to win the Formula One championship by wiping out his nearest challenger on the first bend of the decisive race. You remember that unfortunate accident? Certainly not deliberate, right? Yes, right.
Dads move worked without a collision and at last we had escaped The Peripherique. Thank God.
We drove a short distance and pulled in at a parking spot. Dad was shaking as the adrenaline slowly ebbed out of his system. He took several moments to regain some composure.
“Okay then. Where are we exactly?”
Mum looked just a touch blank. My little brother came to her rescue “France, daddy”.
“Nobody likes a smart ass, John, so leave the map reading to your mother please”.
He turned back to mother. “Any ideas? Any at all?”
“Not really too sure. Got a little confused when we missed the Orleans turn off. Did we overshoot by two junctions or three? Tell you what, why don’t we get back on the ring road going the other way until we get back to where we should be.”
This suggestion was just enough to send dads new found composure to the back of the draw where you keep odd socks, just in case one day you happen across the missing one.
“Are you mental, woman? I am never, ever, ever going on that road again. Not even if it means we have to go home via Copenhagen to avoid it.”
He had started to shake again at the mere thought of getting on and off the Peripherique again, his left eye developing a nervous twitch. He gripped the steering wheel and began muttering to himself: “Think calm thoughts. Think calm thoughts. Remember there are children in the car. The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want. In pastures green…”
Half way through reciting the psalm he regained control, took a deep, deep breath and asked to see the map. Mum was happy to hand it over.
Dad has always had a brilliant sense of direction – my Uncle Alan reckoned he was three parts Irish and one part homing pigeon. He studied the map for a few minutes, then went through an elaborate charade with the sole intention of entertaining us kids.
Firstly he leaned out the window and checked the angle of the sun against the time on his wristwatch. Then he wet one finger and held it up to check the wind direction.
“Hmm, Chartres dead ahead. We can pick up signs for Orleans there,” he announced. A couple of minutes drive later the sign for Chartres appeared.
“ Awesome Dad. Way to go Tonto!”
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