Two Adventurers

November 16 2009

Well, so much for the haunted part. We awoke to find about eight cars outside so we  weren’t ‘home alone’ last night. And a quick stroll down to the dining room showed a petit dejeuner in full swing! After all of the usual juice, bread rolls, croissants,  yoghurt, fruit salad and coffee we were back on the Autoroute at a steady 125 kph heading for Paris. The max allowable speed was 130 kph but this didn’t stop the Michael Schumachers whizzing past at about 160 kph. However, they do use clear signals when pulling out, returning to the right hand lane and do not hog the fast lanes. The landscape was much the same a yesterday, flat but with masses of

trees lining the road. Some of these trees had  numerous large bird nests but no sign of their owners so don’t have a clue as to what type of bird put these together but boy, they sure had been busy. At this point the countryside was now becoming littered with Autoroutes, main roads (often two lanes each way), secondary roads and lanes. No matter where you wanted to go there would be a way. Another pit-stop for fuel. (This car is amazingly good on fuel for a 2 litre diesel. Overall we have done about 2,100 kms and used only about 117 litres of fuel which corresponds to around 5.6 litres of diesel per 100 kms). Picked up a more comprehensive map at the service station showing the approach to Paris in larger detail so we were able to pin-point our hotel which chosen because of its proximity to the Charles De Gaulle airport. Booked on-line, their special rate for 2 nights was only Euros 89. Our trusty navigator was able to take us directly to there without any drama and avoided the ‘excitement’ of driving through Paris.

Checked in and then had to decide whether we should hand the car back at the airport the day we leave or in Paris tomorrow as planned. Which would be less hassle? The airport, of course, and as there was plenty of the day left we set off to see how easy it would be. Easy wasn’t the word. This must be the worse designed airport in the world. There are five different terminals each with numerous sub-terminals. We would be leaving from No 2 and that is split into A,B,C,D and E!!!! Did we ever find where the car rental return for Terminal 2 would be, no, but we sure found plenty of other departments, dead ends, service areas, maps in glass cases at the side of the roads (which only added to the confusion) and car parks galore but NO car rental return areas. So we drove back to the hotel rather frustrated and shaken due to the density of traffic. Option 2 it would be!