Leaving the Loire this morning we decided to do a quick detour via a vinyard to buy another box of wine. we followed a winding road until we arrived in a pretty garden with a cottage opposite farm buildings. Madame answered the door and asked us to follow her to the cellar, which turned out to be her mother's house, deep in the woods, with a turreted manor house and cluster of pretty gites. A golden labrador wound herself round our legs while we tried the wines, Madame insisted we try before buying, so we now have the back seat full and a gentle clinking noise announces our change of direction.

Buoyed up by this success, the next interesting sign we spotted was to an ostrich farm. This was a few miles off the road, we found the farmyard and dodged the chickens running around to ring the bell. With hindsight it was probably just as well no-one answered, otherwise the cold box would be full of ostrich meat.

We've been setting the TomTom to avoid toll roads (cheapskates) but after our detours this morning we used the motorway from just south of Le Mans (detours in place as they're getting ready for the 24hr race) to Orbach. I was about to drive up to the Peage when I spotted a sign saying that cash payments had to be made on foot in a layby. Swung in, put the ticket in the reader, €14.60. Ouch! That would use up all our remaining cash, and getting more incurs a €10 fee. But, there was a card reader slot with a Visa sign, so we followed the instructions and put in our Spanish bank debit card. It was swallowed, along with the motorway ticket. Fortunately the lady on the end of the helpline had excellent English, and she told us to wait, she would be there in half an hour. 40 mins later a bright yellow Renault turned up with a helpful man who unlocked the doors at the back of the pay point and retrieved our card. Wec had to drive up to the peage and use this card. Well, it wasn't accepted. Fortunately this part of the motorway wasn't busy, but we still ended up with 2 lorries behind the yellow Renault while the man phoned our card details through. Daft to only have 1 exit!

Bear in mind that the reason we needed to turn off here was that we only had 20Km worth of fuel left & I wanted the loo, so we were very relieved to find a fuel station close to the exit.

Set off again, bowling merrily along, when the speed limit went from 90 to 70 to 50 in a very short space. I was doing 52 when the speed camera flashed, so will have to wait and see whether we're fined.

We're at tonight's hotel in Deauville, so no more driving events hopefully, we're about to go for a walk along the seafront and find our last French dinner. Will have to get used to cooking again!