We left Llanarmon Yn Ial about 10am on Monday 2nd June and drove to Folkestone. We arrived at the Premier Inn about 4pm and had a meal in the Brickfield Cookhouse & Pub. We got up early the next morning and drove to the tunnel about 07:15 and were able to get on the 07:46 crossing. We arrived in France at 08:40 and got on our way to Nancy. We stopped for coffee and lunch on the way and arrived in Nancy about 4pm. We went to the Auchan Supermarket to fill up with fuel and then checked into the Ibis Budget Hotel. After a rest we went to L’Auberge restaurant for a meal.
We woke up to a cloudy, wet morning and although it brightened up for a while, it was mostly a wet journey through Switzerland and into Italy. We stopped for a coffee and pastry in Saint Maurice sur Moselle in the Vosges region where we have stopped before. There were no hold ups through the Gottard Tunnel but we met stationary traffic towards Chiasso. We arrived at Hotel Cruise about 5pm but we had to change rooms as the fan didn’t work and it was too hot. We had a meal in the bistro in the hotel.
After a good night’s sleep we left the hotel about 9am and encountered the usual busy roads, crazy drivers and hold ups around Milan. Eventually we turned off towrads Spezia and there was less traffic but more windy roads with several tunnels through the hills. But that was OK as the views were quite good. We stopped for lunch just before turning off fo Lucca and arrived at the apartment about 2pm. We collected the keys from a key safe after entering through a gate with a code. We drove into the garage and parked the van and then found the door to the apartment. After unloading what we needed we went for a walk to find a shop to buy milk and Italian plug adapters. We also got the train tickets to Pisa for the next day. Later on we walked towads the walls and into the city and found a nice restaurant where we had bruscheta and tortellini.
