09-09-2017, 02:40 PM
(This post was last modified: 09-09-2017, 02:56 PM by Bryan Downes.)
From Avalon our route continued to Beaugency on the Loire, then to Caen Ousterem for the ferry to Portsmouth, and then home to Stafford. The total tour distance covered was 1741 miles.
We have enjoyed a wonderful Austin Seven motoring holiday in France; our route taking us through some beautiful countryside in Normandy; interesting and scenic farmland towards Moulin; the wine region of Beaujolais; splendid alpine scenery of the Haute Savoie; vineyards of the Burgundy wine area around Macon; the splendid Morvan National Park with its spectacular scenery; and a lot more as well. Furthermore, the traffic-free “D” roads that formed most of our route have been superb and gave us really pleasurable driving.
Our Austin Seven has been much admired everywhere we stopped and has been a great conversation starter: we met Venezuelan cyclists in the Loire, chatted with Australian cyclists on our climb up the Col de la Croix Fry in the Haute Savoir, spoke to a mechanical engineer from Israel at the top of the Col des Aravis, met Dutch and Belgian holiday makers, and enjoyed speaking to many French people from all walks of life at every coffee stop - they all admired our Austin Seven and wanted to know all about it!
Furtermore, our amazing little car never missed a beat and was completely reliable during the whole trip requiring no repairs – not even one carburettor jet needed cleaning ! Also, you may be interested to know the car retains its up draught carburettor, low compression head, original DS4 distributer with standard contact breaker, and (this could be controversial) original Austin crankshaft with properly split-pinned castellated big end nuts!
One amusing, or not so amusing, incident occurred as I was filling up with petrol at a supermarche near Avalon: a French man in a car pulled alongside, got out of his car, said in perfect English how much he liked our Austin, asked its age, my wife told him 1930 and thus 87 years, he said: “ thats old so that is three old ones!” and drove off. We were speechless! We never think of ourselves like that even though I am in my eightieth year! Most French people are very polite and nice!
All this and the joy of driving a vintage car on wonderful traffic-free well surfaced roads that put UK roads to shame.
Bryan and Roberta.
More pictures:
I should have given the last six pictures captions:
!) Annecy old centre
2) Ascending Col de la Croix Fry
3) Also ascending the Col de la Croix fry
4) Summit of Col de la Croix Fry
5) La Clusaz
6) At summit of Col des Aravis
Bryan.
More pics to follow soon.
We have enjoyed a wonderful Austin Seven motoring holiday in France; our route taking us through some beautiful countryside in Normandy; interesting and scenic farmland towards Moulin; the wine region of Beaujolais; splendid alpine scenery of the Haute Savoie; vineyards of the Burgundy wine area around Macon; the splendid Morvan National Park with its spectacular scenery; and a lot more as well. Furthermore, the traffic-free “D” roads that formed most of our route have been superb and gave us really pleasurable driving.
Our Austin Seven has been much admired everywhere we stopped and has been a great conversation starter: we met Venezuelan cyclists in the Loire, chatted with Australian cyclists on our climb up the Col de la Croix Fry in the Haute Savoir, spoke to a mechanical engineer from Israel at the top of the Col des Aravis, met Dutch and Belgian holiday makers, and enjoyed speaking to many French people from all walks of life at every coffee stop - they all admired our Austin Seven and wanted to know all about it!
Furtermore, our amazing little car never missed a beat and was completely reliable during the whole trip requiring no repairs – not even one carburettor jet needed cleaning ! Also, you may be interested to know the car retains its up draught carburettor, low compression head, original DS4 distributer with standard contact breaker, and (this could be controversial) original Austin crankshaft with properly split-pinned castellated big end nuts!
One amusing, or not so amusing, incident occurred as I was filling up with petrol at a supermarche near Avalon: a French man in a car pulled alongside, got out of his car, said in perfect English how much he liked our Austin, asked its age, my wife told him 1930 and thus 87 years, he said: “ thats old so that is three old ones!” and drove off. We were speechless! We never think of ourselves like that even though I am in my eightieth year! Most French people are very polite and nice!
All this and the joy of driving a vintage car on wonderful traffic-free well surfaced roads that put UK roads to shame.
Bryan and Roberta.
More pictures:
I should have given the last six pictures captions:
!) Annecy old centre
2) Ascending Col de la Croix Fry
3) Also ascending the Col de la Croix fry
4) Summit of Col de la Croix Fry
5) La Clusaz
6) At summit of Col des Aravis
Bryan.
More pics to follow soon.