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Saturday 15th June 2024 Day 2 – Dieppe In the morning we were up at the crack of 7.15 and set off to the ferry in the rain at 7.45. The ferry terminal was only one mile away or less but apparently that's still enough to get fairly wet. And cold. At the terminal the formalities were straightforward but we then had to wait an hour or more in the rather austere, and cold, waiting room before finally getting to board the good ship Cote d' Albatre.
After four hours or so sea passage we arrived at Dieppe. I thought the post-Brexit entry formalities might be a pain but in the event everything turned out to be very easy. Just present a passport and your simple, honest face, they stamp the passport and bingo, you're in. I knew Brexit wouldn't be a problem.
Unfortunately the bad weather had followed us to France so we had to ride through the rain looking for our hotel, the Hotel Les Gens de Mer. (Hotel of the salty old sea dogs? Soggy old sea dogs in this case!)
Andrew had been brushing up his French via an internet tutorial and kept practising his pronunciation whenever he saw something written in French. As we passed Rue Victor Hugo he felt moved to declaim very loudly 'LA ROO VICTOR YUGO!'. At the same time a French gentleman was overtaking us and the sight of his poker face just creased me up. It was a tofu moment and I couldn't stop laughing... hohoho! Maybe you had to be there. When we got to the hotel it turned out our room had a double bed with an overhead bunk bed, and as Andrew had taken the not so good camp bed the night before it was my turn to get the short straw. Hope I don't break my neck trying to go for a p in the night.
Once ensconced in our room I found that I couldn't get Google Maps over the network, only worked with WiFi. It then took me an hour and a half wrestling with Three's insane digital assistant and two other (human) (probably) assistants before finally getting it sorted out. Ah well, never mind, eh, patience is a virtue, so they say. In the evening we went out looking for something to eat: the first cheese omelette of the trip but probably not the last. Then we found a bar, had couple of beers and a game of crib. The French were very nice. All said 'bon soir' on leaving and one bloke even shook my hand.
Standing on a street outside a pub was a very odd looking bloke, bearded, long dress and high heels. Live and let live, eh. Just 3 miles ridden today. | ||||||||
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