Driving

The day I'd been dreading.  Planning to drive in France is easy, actually doing it is another story.  And things didn't get off to a good start.  We fluffed and fiddled around all morning and ended up sprinting to reach the car hire place (which is just a short 3.3km stroll away from the hotel) before noon, when it (and just about everything else) closes for lunch for 2 hours.

So, I arrive at Europcar (with fellow sprinters Daniel and Jeremy) at 11:58am hot, puffed, red-faced and in a flap.  Just the cool calm start needed for driving on the right side of the road while sitting on the left side of the car and changing gear with the right hand.  Thank god the pedals are in the right place.

So, off we go, with Steve saying right, right, just stay right, by the way you're in the gutter.  Me hitting the gutter and saying bugger.

Emergency stop - a supermarket car park for 4 quick laps and then back on the roads for aaaarggh, my first round-about, following nose to tail the car in front.  Luckily he was going the same place we were J

I am now writing this on day 3 of driving and I am an expert. Well not actually.  I'm not in the gutter any more and I've got the gear changes down pat.  Me and my little Peugeot 207 are getting on just fine.