He's back!

A late start, then off we set for l'Aéroport de Dinard-Pleurtuit to collect M. The country returns to work and school tomorrow after a 5 day break, so the Route National N12 was as busy as I`ve ever seen it - at least in the direction leading out of Brittany which was the way we were going. Alice and I started counting the number of cars from outside our departement. I stopped counting at 30, but Alice carried on for a while.

80% of the cars (no commercial traffic) were registered outside of the Côtes-d'Armor. Even with the new French registration system, all cars still carry the departemental number on the right of the registration number. Of those 80%, very few were from other Brittany departements. The overwhelming majority were from outside Brittany, and many from outside France (we saw cars from Belgium, Spain, Germany, Holland and Latvia - as well as Britain and even one from Jersey).

On the west-bound carriageway, the traffic was much lighter, but I guess it may get busier later in the day with Bretons returning from their breaks.

We had time for a quick drink and snack at the airport, before M landed, right on time.

Whilst Alice and I were waiting for M to collect his luggage, I noticed a defibrillator (which should maybe read "défibrillateur") on the wall. I guess I thought of it as a typical example of French health and safety. In this case, the equipment is there, but instructions/warnings appear to be in English, and you are advised to telephone 911 - which is of course the US emergency number. Here, you would call 15 (or 112) for medical emergencies (18 for fire, 17 for police - or 112 for everything). However, la Croix Rouge française were out in Paimpol yesterday, demonstrating CPR to the public :-)

This photo shows a very un-busy airport terminal, complete with Guernsey flag of course.

Our journey home was less traffic intensive, but as M pointed out, the roads in Guernsey are terribly congested - and small - by comparison. I think that will bother me more than anything else after our return home.

The cats, and especially Softy was very pleased to see M.

Alice quickly got going on the Lego motor-bike that M brought back, and I`m afraid I quickly succumbed to the cheese and onion crisps!

After that brief respite, I set to un-packing M's case, then got going with Mum's folder of corrections, things to add, and things to move around in her book, as brought back by M. All while he rested. He summed up our fundamental difference....I am "now" and he is "later" :-)