History

At a certain age comes a time that you look back on your life and you’re not sure if you’ve made the right choices and lived your life the way you wanted to. For the four of us this was the reason to take a chance and say goodbye to family, friends, jobs and houses and immigrate to France.

You make a start and before you know it you’re thousands of problems, but also many beautiful experiences richer. We note April 1997. Talking about this and that, the subject of my brother’s dream to start a campsite in France always re-surfaces. The comment “Keep dreaming, you’ll be 80 and realise you’ve never done anything about it” makes a change. Bets experiences three of the most difficult days of her life.

Then the phone rings in the home of the Loohuizen’s and my brother says to my 6 year old daughter “tell mum there’s a man on the phone who wants to come with her to France.” The decision is made and at the end of August we’re seriously looking for a nice spot. Dame Blanche is what we’re looking for, says our negotiator in the Netherlands. Unfortunately he has never seen the spot, as the moment we make our plans known, we find out at campsite in that location is not allowed.

On to an existing campsite in the Dordogne, nice, but unfortunately there is a football stadium in the middle of it. The fact that when it rains half the campsite runs under water doesn’t help. Disillusioned we make our way back home, stopping at a by friends known estate agents. He quickly takes us to a location of 10 hectares, small fish lake, big shed and 2 homes. The grass, the brambles, and the nettles are meters high, and it is with great difficulty we get to a door or window to take a look inside. This is where the mice and a pine marten have made their home. The terrain itself hasn’t been kept in years or seen a lawnmower since ages.

We look at each other, scratch our heads, and try to walk round the fish lake, despite all the weeds. With a view of the house at the lake we make a decision. THIS will be the place we will set up our campsite. In October we return to sign the necessary papers and then the date for the move is set.

On the 10th of August 1998 we leave the Netherlands behind and make a fresh start in St Saud. Our two girls of 7 and 9 have another 3 weeks of school holidays, but then awaits them a French school. We are now 11 years on and the campsite is a reality. We run the campsite with the help of our now grown daughters and enjoy despite all the ups and downs our existence in France.