A journey home from Chamonix, when you’re not in a hurry, can’t be complete without a diversion to Fontainebleau.
I chose Beauvais, a venue pretty close to the A6 (Route du Soleil) and with a very short walk in (50m).
I thought this was a new venue for us, until half way round the orange route Pete recognised a particular jump from one boulder to another. We took a photo so we could check our photos of holidays past… we had been there before, 11 years ago, on our first visit to Fontainebleau. I’ve no idea how Pete could remember a couple of boulders from all that time ago.
Anyway, we had a bit of a laugh, and a couple of hours later we continued our journey north.
The journey around Paris’ Périphérique Est was amazing, and not just for it’s views into the city including the Eiffel Tower and the Sacré-CÅ“ur. The flow of traffic was smooth and reasonably fast (for a city the size of Paris). Compare this to the M6… Of the whole (near) 1000 mile journey those miles on the M6 from Birmingham to the Lakes were easily the worst. Slow heavy traffic, and more road works than imaginable – it seems that every single mile of the M6 is cocked-up with road works! :angry: Even the M1 and M25 are way better than the M6, and French motorways (including the free ones around Paris) are a joy compared to it. How is it that we have such a key arterial road as the M6 in such appalling condition?
Presumably, it being in such “an appalling condition” provides an explanation as to why there’s so much maintenance/improvement work going on?! Think of how old it is – typically 50+ years and it wasn’t designed for the volume of traffic it sees.
Irritating and frustrating yes, but necessary. However, you’ll be pleased to hear that budgets for this year and the foreseeable future are essential zero, so you should have cone free journeys from now. Hooray! …and degrading carriageways, unrepaired safety fencing, information systems that fail and bridges that fall down.
By the way, why the detour via Blackpool?!
Ha ha – I should have got a stick of rock.
Pete is in danger of becoming a motorway maintenance fiend now 😈 . He nearly phoned you up to let you know about a rather dodgy looking bridge further down south.
Actually, the funny thing is, the worst bit of the journey I found was the bit between Stoke and Manchester, where there were no road works. It’s just the amazing volume of traffic and it always seems to take ages. Perhaps its a particularly boring bit of road?
Welcome home!
When we came back at 5pm the M6 was clear, and I cruised back at a steady 95. 😀
But I clearly saw Jon on the hard shoulder waiting to put the cones back out for your journey back Pete.. 😈 😈
I hear he’s somewhere in N Wales getting ready to bugger up your drive to Tremadoc!! 😆