Anyway up and out of the house by 4.30am, so we arrived at Dover port by 5.30am, only to be directed through the drug control section after amazingly not having any queues for passport control. Our door handles were swabbed and with nothing detected we were allowed on our route to our boarding lane. Ian wanted to suggest that they swabbed the rest of the car to give it a bit of a clean, and touch in the front bumper. Luckily he didn't as I could just imagine us being delayed!
Then on to ticket check in where they normally screen the car registration just as you pull up to get your booking details on screen. This time we were asked for our booking reference number. Ian started to search for it on his phone email while the lady had our passports. She then said she'd found it and asked if we were on a day trip coming back at 3.50pm. Ian was totally confused as we'd checked our booking details but luckily as we are a Flexi ticket it didn't make any difference. She amended our return from 18 April to 18 May and we were all good.
After a coffee and a short wait we returned to the car just as the ferry started to load. Once on board we settled down for a smooth crossing and a bit of breakfast.
Ian took the first leg of driving and started to rant when we'd only just left the port and the French police were stopping traffic for checks before we even got on the motorway. We couldn't work out why they had to block the road other than being infuriating. As we got through the blockage there was a huge layby they could have used 😡.
Once through this minor blip we stopped after an hour or so for Ian to change into t-shirt and shorts. I've stayed in 3 layers all day as it's not warm enough for me to get the shorts on 😄.
During my driving stint Ian just happened to look at our boarding card and realised the Lead Name was Ms E Foreman, whereas it should've been his name. Most peculiar. Then he noticed the car registration wasn't ours! Looks like there might be a few problems with the other Foremans who were also on our outward crossing as their day return has now been changed to return in a month's time thanks to the error made by the woman on check in🤔🤣.
Anyway we couldn't really do anything. At least we both have a Flexi ticket so if they turn up to board this evening to they'll be able to board.
By the end of today we've managed to complete our drive of about 400 miles. Mostly on toll free roads - other than by passing Rouen and Orleans which we thought was worth it.
We noticed that fuel prices have definitely gone up. Usually it's much cheaper in France and Spain than at home, but with the lowest price for diesel at about €1.74/l it was cheaper for us to fuel up before leaving home instead of our normal ruse of arriving in France with an empty tank. We hope the price is lower in Spain when we get there tomorrow 🤞.
After checking into our Premier Classe hotel room we walked next door to a restaurant for dinner. We're now very full and ready for about of sleep. Another early start with breakfast before we head off.
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