At 8am....
By 4pm....
We decided to chance a Channel crossing on spur of the moment then immediately began to panic slightly. I suppose one of the characteristics of the past eighteen months has been the way mundane things that we once took for granted suddenly became problematic or worrisome - what exactly constituted 'local' in the first lockdown, the moment your daughter asked if it was ok to give you a hug, a moment of panic in a bus queue in Cornwall when everyone bunched together. These trigger points are personal, depending upon your pre-pandemic habits and predelictions. So for us booking a ferry to France should be routine, we first crossed the channel together in 1977, since then there has been only one year when we didn't, in most of the others we made multiple journeys.
Continental travel has been complicated by a double whammy, Brexit then the pandemic. When we travelled to Tuscany last October we were still in the Brexit transition phase and largely unaffected by changes to border and customs arrangements. Since the brief flurry of articles in early February about Dutch customs officials seizing British travellers' Waitrose ham sandwiches, post-Brexit border arrangements have received little attention; unsurprising really, since so few of us were able to travel.
I re-read the Gov.UK guidelines, they were confusing and contradictory. Basically you cannot take dairy, meat or plant-based products into the EU, but fish is OK. That seems simple enough, but it is unclear if this applies purely to fresh produce or if dried ingredients or processed food is affected too. "How do we stand with this?" Gill enquired, holding up a tub of dried oregano. Just to muddy the waters even more there is a statement in some of the guidelines about items for personal use are allowed up to a 10kg limit. Would this be policed on arrival in France? We would only find out when we arrived, but just to be on the safe side we ditched our dairy, fruit and veg. resigning ourselves to heading straight from Dieppe port to the nearby Auchun.
These restrictions don't seem to apply on the return trip, but stricter duty free rules concerning alcohol and tobacco do. We worked out that between the two of us we could still bring forty eight bottles of wine back, less than before, but hardly Draconian.
The post-Brexit customs arrangements are a tad confusing, however they are perfectly straightforward compared to the miasma of Covid travel rules. Firstly there is the ever changing advice coming from the UK government, then whatever regulations are in force across the channel.
Grant Chapps finally caved and changed France from amber plus status to simply amber. Gone was the need to quarantine when we return, all we needed was to pay the extortionate price tag for a 'day two test' (£60 each). Some cowboy operation by the name of 'everything genetic' (note fashionable lower case logo) claim they will have a PCR test whisked to us by courier the day after we get back home and the results returned withinin 48hrs. We shall see, the press is full of stories of outraged travellers whose promised tests failed to materialise.
In comparison getting into France promised to be relatively straightforward. Complete one simple form confirming you are Covid free which is easily available on the French Government website, print out your NHS App vaccination certificate, present them at passport control and away you go. Would it really be that simple?
We would see, spurred on by a wave of excitement and possibly over confidence I booked a ten day return Newhaven/Dieppe. Moments after the deed was done I re-read the UK government guidelines, I had missed something, we needed to take a PCR or lateral flow test in France within two days of our return date and present the results on arrival in the UK. Google to the rescue, a simple search for 'covid testing in Seine Maritime and Somme' produced a list of pharmacies and labs in these departments, addresses, phone numbers, opening times, types of test on offer, all conveniently translated into English. It's not often that you feel grateful for France's love of bureaucracy, but right now it feels preferable to the chaotic Del boy approach to testing in the UK. Will it work as well when we get there as it promises on paper? We shall see!
The motorways south were slow as sludge, the boredom relieved from time to time by monsoon style downpours.
Our theory was proved correct the moment we arrived at Newhaven docks, the car park was almost empty, one caravanner, and two other motorhomes.
A few others turned up around 7am and we all duly formed an orderly queue to catch the morning sailing. The boat was not even a quarter full.
Nevertheless it did take longer than usual to board. DFDS required an identical form to the French 'déclaration sur l'honneur' but couched in less legal language.We handed over that, our UK covid pass and our passports, it took a minute or so more than in the past, not an issue in Newhaven with only four sailings a day, but at Dover or the tunnel all those extra minutes would soon add up. Especially if there were a few folk like the young couple in the small hatchback in front of us. Their entire boot was filled with an enormous St Bernard and there seemed to be some problem with Bruno's pet passport. I felt sorry for them when after five minutes of conflab between various officials they were directed to the side. We did not see them on board.
Our moment came, up the bumpy ramp onto the vehicle deck, then up five sets of steep stairs (slowly, we are becoming the annoying elderly ones huffing and puffing towards the passenger deck). Soon the white cliffs of Sussex slipped away and five hours of tedium followed.
Disembarkation definitely took longer than it used to, gone the cursory glance at your passport and a laconic Gallic hand gesture to proceed. Our NHS Covid pass QR code was duly zapped, 'déclarations sur l'honneur' perused, passports scanned then date stamped. I felt a pang of sadness, finally after six years of argie bargie and prevarication my freedom to wander around Europe as I wished vanished with this simple action.
Still it was exciting after almost a year to drive out of the port, more exciting in fact than we anticipated as I took the wrong turn and inadvertently drove the van right through the narrow streets of old Dieppe.
Eventually the sat nav sorted us out. Once we were wandering the aisles of Auchun stocking-up on all the things we had been told were no longer allowed to take from the UK to Europe everything seemed quite normal.
n fact there had been no attempt whatsoever at the French border to check on what was in our fridge, not even posters or leaflets about the changes. Let's hope it stays that way. It's good we made the leap to go abroad, aside from anything else it provides a dry run for for the longer trip planned for ltyer in the autumn. Hopefully by then some of the sillier rules about testing the fully vaccinated will have been abandoned. It feels good to be back; Europe is our second home and always will be.
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