Long slog

Got up at 6.30 and for the first time ever had cornflakes for breakfast before leaving. Why? Ah well, 54 départements are in curfew and that also means bars are closed. Also it is Monday, and finding the only boulangerie in the village en route might prove tricky. We drive through curfew land until well after lunchtime so better safe than sorry. House cleaned, bags packed, water off, shutters closed and we leave. With much sadness as this has been too short a stay and who knows when we can return. Poor little house.

Today’s route was via the Cévennes and skirting the Gorges du Tarn, via Rodez and into Curfew free Dordogne to Ibis Sarlat. Good weather to start - even sunny. You will know that I am not a huge fan of hills, even less a fan of edible chestnuts. However the Cévennes conspire to combine both into a glorious riot of autumnal colour. Every slope clothed in orange, bronze, gold, red with occasional clumps of vivid yellow. The default tree here is the sweet chestnut you see and its friends are birch and poplar. 

Roads strewn with fallen marrons - best place for them! Roadworks were omnipresent with half the carriageway carved away into sump ripping terraces. No quarter given by the oncoming road rollers either!

After going the (logically) ‘wrong’ way down the A75 in order to pick up the cross route to Rodez it started to rain and from then on we passed through torrential downpours interspersed with bright sun. Not much to report...cows, sheep, ploughed fields. Stopped for sandwiches and ate them up a farm track watching a kestrel try to get her own lunch. Then onward to Sarlat. Which is much bigger than I imagined. By now it was tipping down so we thought we couldn’t be bothered to tramp the streets in search of an eatery. Not on a Monday! So I dashed into a boulangerie and got bread and eclairs. Ah but then we saw a place immediately opposite the hotel that looked OK, so weakened. The bread will be fine tomorrow.

Food was nice and service good ... that is until it came to pay the bill....zzz. We realised after a while that we were not alone. Other diners were sitting wearily, one couple said they’d been waiting 45 minutes. Another chap opined that it was a pity Sarlat wasn’t under curfew because we’d all have had to get out by 9!

Now is there some sort of Apple Maps Convention here? The reason I ponder is that in the hotel carpark there are at least half a dozen white Subarus with roof cameras and the legend Apple Maps Image Collection. German and Spanish registrations.

A quick peek at Google (haha) reveals that Apple are doing France this year...

Lieux de passage des véhicules sur la période : juin à octobre, 2020

Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes

Ain, Allier, Ardèche, Cantal, Drôme, Haute-Loire, Haute-Savoie, Isère, Loire, Puy-de-Dôme, Rhône, Savoie

Bourgogne-Franche-Comté

Côte-d'Or, Doubs, Haute-Saône, Jura, Nièvre, Saône-et-Loire, Territoire de Belfort,Yonne

Bretagne

Côtes-d'Armor, Finistère, Ille-et-Vilaine, Morbihan

Centre-Val de Loire

Cher, Eure-et-Loir, Indre, Indre-et-Loire, Loir-et-Cher, Loiret

Corse

Corse-du-Sud, Haute-Corse

Grand Est

Ardennes, Aube, Bas-Rhin, Haut-Rhin, Haute-Marne, Marne, Meurthe-et-Moselle,Meuse, Moselle, Vosges

Hauts-de-France

Aisne, Nord, Oise, Pas-de-Calais, Somme

Îlele-de-France

Essonne, Hauts-de-Seine, Paris, Seine-Saint-Denis, Seine-et-Marne, Val-d'Oise, Val-de-Marne, Yvelines

Normandie

Calvados, Eure, Manche, Orne, Seine-Maritime

Nouvelle-Aquitaine

Charente, Charente-Maritime, Corrèze, Creuse, Deux-Sèvres, Dordogne, Gironde,Haute-Vienne, Landes, Lot-et-Garonne, Pyrénées-Atlantiques, Vienne

Occitanie

Ariège, Aude, Aveyron, Gard, Gers, Haute-Garonne, Hautes-Pyrénées, Hérault, Lot,Lozère, Pyrénées-Orientales, Tarn, Tarn-et-Garonne

Pays de la Loire

Loire-Atlantique, Maine-et-Loire, Mayenne, Sarthe, Vendée

Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur

Alpes-Maritimes, Alpes-de-Haute-Provence, Bouches-du-Rhône, Hautes-Alpes, Var,Vaucluse