Another day devoted to driving long distances. Today we covered over 440 kilometers, and are parked on a small farm near the Belgian border in the Ardennes region of France.
It was bright and sunny when we left Beaune, and unlike yesterday the drive was stress free on pretty quiet Autoroutes with mostly good weather. The cost was even less than we expected, now we play Toll Price is Right when we pull up to the toll booths. Today we both lost as we were both way over on our guess.
Initially I had picked an aire near a fortified village, but when we got there it was not quite what we expected so I looked for any alternatives in the area. By now it was cold and raining hard again so we were looking for somewhere a little more protected. The only thing that came up was a nearby farm that was said to offer two spots for visiting motorhomes. It was nearby so we decided to go take a look at it as we could always come back to where we were. When we got there we saw a place where two motorhomes would fit with signs in multiple languages welcoming visitors. It was cute and much nicer, but we could not figure out why someone would do this on their land. We went and knocked on the door of the farm and asked if it was ok, and were welcomed in French and told of course. He even asked if we wanted electricity, which was amazing, and very helpful when running the heater. This is truly a case of someone doing something extraordinary for visitors, I only wish I had the French to find out why, instead, all I could do was continue to thank him for his kindness. We looked to see if they were selling anything, but we saw no sign of anything for sale that we could purchase to help support them. As near as we can tell they do it out of kindness.
