Camping holiday

We were having an afternoon snooze when Number Two Daughter called us to let us know that Number One Daughter was having a life and death crisis.

Of course we dragged ourselves into interested consciousness in a hurry, because we all knew that Number One Daughter, along with Number One Son-In-Law and Ritalin Boy, were all having a jolly family holiday in France in their own clapped-out camper van.

This has not been without incident already. Once they drove it into a height barrier, twice the exhaust has fallen off, and once somebody drove past them and knocked the mirror off. However these things are normal occurrences in the rich experience of owning a camper van, and not worth worrying about.

This one, however, was more serious.

Number One Daughter spoke to Mark in a complete state of flapping-about-panic, with semi-coherent ramblings about explosions and white smoke and cross French people.

It took some time and several phone calls before we managed to piece together the whole story, by which time they had managed to persuade their breakdown recovery people to rescue them, and the worst of the alarm was over.

It turned out that they were on their way home. They had had some engine issues en route to Calais, but were late, and had got lost a couple of times, and hence hadn’t really had the leisure to stop and contemplate the problems. However, when they drove into Passport Control the problems really started.

You will no doubt be aware that the Port of Calais has some issues at present with large groups of visa-free people camping there. These people, and there are quite a lot of them, are hoping to travel to the UK and settle there, despite an attitude from the border controllers which could not be described as encouragingly welcoming.

They have built themselves some makeshift campsites, and the message of absence of welcome is being reinforced by the constant presence of armed guards patrolling up and down the road to make sure that nobody pops over to the UK secretly, without a properly formal invitation from Theresa May.

Number One Daughter and her family, who are allowed into the UK, chugged up to Passport Control when suddenly their engine started revving uncontrollably all by itself, and white smoke started pouring out from under the bonnet. Convinced that an explosion was imminent, they dived out, but realised that Ritalin Boy had not made it out with them, possibly because of not paying attention: and they were obliged to dive back in to rescue him, and at which point the engine blew up.

Let me reassure you that of course none of them were hurt, however, I invite you to imagine the emotions of the several armed guards in the area, when they smelled smoke, and heard a woman screaming followed by an explosion.

Once the smoke had cleared they discovered that their popularity with the French border authorities was at a rather low ebb. The guards explained that they had thought that the port was under attack, and the queue behind them explained that they would like to get on the ferry, if only there were not a large and utterly clapped-out camper van blocking the way. All of them displayed all of the gentle patience for which cross French people are renowned world-wide.

In the end their breakdown service promised to rescue them, despite Number One Daughter suddenly having the horrified recollection that they had forgotten to pay their invoice, and their camper van was towed away to await repatriation whilst they trudged on board as gloomy foot passengers.

Mark has told them to get the camper van repatriated up to the farm, and he will fix it. Number Two Daughter and I have got a million pound bet riding on all of the useful things they are likely to have left behind in the camper van, but on the whole we were all just pleased to hear that they had arrived home safely, unshot by border guards, unexploded by boiling hot engines, and once again calm and stress free.

I do miss relaxing camper van holidays. I am looking forward to ours being fixed.

Maybe next year we can all go together.