The forecast for Friday was that it would be ‘orribly ‘ot.. just the kind of weather for driving four or five hours, not! The diagram I pinched from la Depeche showed it wasn’t going to get much cooler as we drove east.

But it had to be done. We thanked our hosts and I gave Monsieur the bottle of Cahors, representing our department, that we’d finally tracked down in the Co-op (only local wine available in the wine shops) as a thank you for sorting my suitcase saga.

The road south towards Bordeaux was fairly empty and we went through the first peage with only a sight hesitation before our gismo beeped and the barrier went up.

I need to explain to those who don’t know that French autoroutes are mostly toll roads. Our nearest one is free for a good stretch of its overall length as it was built on the route nationale thus offering no alternative. But most are not. Many years ago we signed up to the telepeage system which saved all the hassle of stopping to get a ticket at the first peage and then the hunt for said ticket and search for change at the following one. It was better when bank cards became acceptable but, as Mr McGregor is the kind of person who huffs and puffs in supermarket queues, always convinced another till is faster, it seemed less stressful to register to pay monthly and stick the little gismo on our windscreen and sail through the guichets of the telepeage.

A few years back it got even better for himself when they introduced the 30km an hour ‘guichet’/gate. You just need to slow down, gently roll forward until you hear a beep and the barrier lifts…and you’re away. Except at our second peage of the day there was no beep and therefore no raising of the barrier. With a car behind me there was a moment of ‘what the hell?’, or my worst nightmare!

‘It’s not there’ suddenly interjected my husband from the passenger seat. And, indeed, there was no gizmo on the windscreen. He started rummaging on the floor and in the little central pocket (full of pens, mints, decheterie pass…etc) while I began tentatively reversing hoping the car behind us would to!

It was a yellow car (utterly irrelevant) but it did slowly move backwards..and thank goodness it was just the one! As I stopped sufficiently out of the way for him to use the guichet, I got out to join the hunt and to apologise. But the elderly couple in the yellow car just mouthed at me fiercely and waved their arms before smoothly carrying on. Well, I tried!

Meanwhile the passenger footwell was a tip but still no sign of the gizmo. But then I saw it, or rather its perky ‘BIP&GO’ logo caught my eye. It had lodged itself under the handbrake so invisible from above until I stopped and pulled up the brake. Clearly, or so we decided, the heat had loosened the connection with the windscreen, probably the reason for the delay at the first peage when it was probably already dangling..

Fortunately there were only a few more peages for the entirety of our journey and Mr McGregor held it up as an offering to the driving gods and the telepeage computer each time and we made it home…without upsetting any more yellow car drivers!