Everything starts alright; the sun comes up, the birds sing and the bin man takes away the rubbish.

We set off through pretty countryside, up and down with trees bursting with new bud and as many buttercups as there are chins to wave them under.

At Magnac-Laval we call into Intermarche and refuel before we leave. The slope out of the fuel station is steep and catches the buggy rack. At the next turn there is no buzzer on the indicator so we pull into the central carpark and Ali fiddles with the trailer plug until everything works again.

While we are there, orange pick up trucks, full of road signs, pull in and the workmen start putting up Deviation signs and covering the road markers. As we leave the carpark we see that our intended road it 'Route Baree' so we must follow the deviation.

After 12 miles Ali decides it is completely the wrong direction and seems miles out of the way to join the A20, so we pull in and map our own route using 'yellow roads' [map colour for 'B' roads]

After turning round we reach the right roads much sooner but it all takes longer than expected.

Just before we stopped for lunch in a service area, we saw a brown town sign for Boussac, showing a large chateau.

Ali looks it up and finds there is a free aire so we decide to have a look. There is more lovely spring countryside on the way until we arrive at 14:30.

It's a five minute walk to the town centre although being Monday everything is closed. Beyond the town square we wander down to the river crossing, out through a little hamlet into more countryside. The sun is really warm and we find signs for the chateau but the path is too steep so we head back into town and find another road down to a bridge. The river is about 50 feet below while the chateau towers above. It's very square and utilitarian - no ornate turrets or crenallations - but imposing and impressive anyway.

We wend our way back to the van, use the service point and debug the windscreen. Some of the things that hit it today were like flying prawns!.

Then it's time to settle inside for a peaceful evening.

CD Track if the day: George Harrison - If you don't know where you're goin' any road'll take you there.

Dinner: Gino di Campo pizza base with Ali's topping of chorizo, onion and mushroom.