Back to Base Camp

Hello all! 2 weeks without getting any news, you must have been wondering what is going on with our wandering around. Well, we are back to base camp where we finally had yesterday, after a 6 month + delay, our appointment for the homologation of our van. 


We had gotten back a few days prior in order to get ready for the big day: fixing some little things, emptying, cleaning, etc. We gave ourselves a lot of trouble because in the end, they didn't look at much... Roughly, they verified that the plan we had sent with the position of all the compartments and the measurements matched, that we had a fire extinguisher and that our openings and ventilations met regulations. All this trouble for that!! Well it is what it is, we had to go through it and now it's done. They did ask us to modify 2 small things which we've done already (and we've sent them the pictures proving it) and we are now waiting for THE official document confirming that our van is now certified  VASP (véhicule automoteur spécialisé) which, we hope, will come in a few days 🙏. After that it's not over, we still need to have our "carte grise" (the car registration) modified which will also take a few days and afterwards we will be able to hit the road again and continue on with our great adventure. So, another small week of waiting still to go 😐.

In the 10 days before we returned to Voiron we spent beautiful days discovering (or re-discovering) the North of France and Normandy stopping in the Somme bay,


at the cliffs of Etretat,


and in the beautiful villages of Auge country.


And, on the road back to Voiron making stops at beautiful Chartres cathedral


and checking out the progress of the worksite at Guédelon castle.


After all of this we must admit that returning to base camp feels nice. It was a bit strange at the beginning to have so much space around us but we quickly found our bearings again😅. But most of all this break allows us to:
- make some small repairs and changes in good working conditions 
- take a look back at our British stage: 8,707 km travelled, budget 😨 (some adjustments are required), what we liked and didn't like in order to ...
- prepare the next phase of our journey which will be much, much longer    
And it also allows us to see family and friends and find out how they are doing which is always a nice thing to do 😊.

To see the full map and photos of the 1st phase of "La Grande Vadrouille" click here:

What's coming next? Well stay tuned to find out! But to give you a small hint, we're going East😅.

Jérôme et Sophie


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