Ok, first of all I'd suggest going down the M3 to Portsmuff and getting on the overnight boat to Cherbourg. DON'T bother booking a reclining chair as I don't know anyone who has managed to fall asleep in one. You are better off heading for the (empty) restaraunt and grabbing a double sofa. Get a blanket (and something to block the lights out) and drift into the land of nod.... Then in the morning grab a cuppa of P&O tea from your 'bedroom' bar and it's so foul it'll guarantee you'll be wide awake. And the bogs are just outside the door for the essential morning vomit.
Then it's off to Rennes/Nantes/Niort/Saintes/Bordeaux/Pau. Extra points if you can kick over one of the black wooden cutout Gendarmes lining the road. I particularily liked the one which had had it's head blown off with a shotgun! If you do stray onto the Peage, there is a myth that they can tell if you have been speeding by checking the tickets' time. Well the kiosk staff won't but my dad HAS seen the GD's checking and pulling people over for kicking and a fine. Stick to the N roads as these are like our best A roads and then some. DO NOT speed through villages as this is where the GD's lurk and if you speed here they will pull you over for said kicking and on the spot fine. TOP TIP: if you can stick a Scottish 'Ecosse' sticker (know what I mean???) to the back of your bike you're less likely to get a tug for minor stuff. Fact-backed up by many peeps. You see the French love the Scots cos they both hate the English. Word is that the GD's are lurking around Calais looking for English plated bikes/cars to give a tug and kicking. You have been warned... If you have any form of radar detector don't even think about taking it with you as they have a very dim view of these and it will be destroyed and you will be escorted back to whence you came minus £500. Oh, and you won't be welcome back for a while...
Anyway, back to the mission: I camped at a place just before Roquefort on the D932. I took the D224 on the left and got onto the D24. But this place was spooky as hell itself, complete with bats, owls and 'dogs' howling thru the night. Cheap though...
From Pau take the N134 then turn left onto the D934 towards Laruns. This takes you on a very scenic route over the Pyrenees with just a small tunnel at the very peak. If you've never been down that way it really is breathtaking when you come around a corner in a village and suddenly you can see the Pyreness in the far distance heading off to both sides as far as you can see. When we went there were GD's in their favourite form of transport (dark blue van things) on one side of the tunnel and the Spanish GC's on the other side with cocked Heckler and Koch MP5's. My dad did his very English "Hello" and they grunted us through. Obviously looking for something ETA based me thinks... A coupla hundred yards down the road was the type of big police car they used to knock that bank robber off that R6 months back....
