To Paeage or not to Paeage?

Driving on the small roads of Normandy is really scary in a big truck! The odd call from my passenger of “Too much green; be a bit more of a road hog” means that I’m off the road on his side, went over a few kerbs as well.  But I’m only just inside the white line on my side. A coach nearly ran us off the road completely, I was almost stationery but he just charged through. If I break a wing mirror then we will be really stuffed. I’ve got a theory though that as we have four back wheels, two on the outside and two inside them then if I go off the road with one of the back wheels then I’ve still got three on the road so don’t lose any traction.  Perhaps that’s just women’s logic that men don’t understand. Don’t really want to put it to the test though. 

Let’s not go on the paeage we said.  Then accidentally found ourselves on the paeage because there was a 3.5 tonne restriction on the road that we wanted.  So one junction at a cost of 1.2 Euros and it wouldn’t take our Caxton card so probably £5 to process the transaction into the bargain.

Still we’ll take the scenic route. I took a wrong turn in Deauville and we ended up in a very nice middle of the town square with restaurants and shops and some very surprised diners, we obviously should not have been there.  Then a right turn took me back onto the road that we should have been on, then he said “turn left here” and we turned off the road that we should have been on.  At this point I asked very gently, what does the sat nag say?  However Mr Right is not Mr Techie and he hates the sat nag, he said it would not clear the screen to which I gently stated “I don’t care how you navigate – get the f**king map out if you have to, just get me out of here!”  At this point I stopped the van abruptly; burst into tears; got out of the van and stamped my feet like a two year old shouting “I don’t want to do this any more”, actually I didn’t, but it was close, actually I pulled over when it was safe, took a few deep breaths and re-programmed the sat nag.  Thank god for HRT.

So calm again and the sat nag ready we happily trundled on, you don’t turn our van around easily so it was to continue on until we found a suitable place to turn, a roundabout is always a good one. Finally back on the road that we should have been on to get us to the coastal road.  Now you’re talking – not very coastal and a yellow one on the map – yellow in case you are wondering means “SMALL”.  After negotiating a few small towns and seeing a sign post I exclaimed “Can’t we just follow the A13?”, so a quick change of mind and off we were seeking a wider road. So after what seemed an age, we had travelled 10 miles and we stopped for lunch in a lay-by.  We both looked at each other and said together “That was scary”, had a cuddle and all friends again. So back to the point “To Paeage or not to Paeage?” That is the question.  Whether tis nobler in the mind to suffer etc etc etc, it’s not just about spending the money, sometimes it’s about how stressful and scary the journey and how narrow the alternatives are.