The Adventure begins | VAN LIFE | FRANCE & BELGIUM | Le Shuttle

This week I leave my Narrowboat behind and move full time into my camper van to experience Van life. I link up with a fellow solo female traveller and we head to folkestone to catch the Le shuttle train through the Eurotunnel to Calais, France. We explore Dunkirk and the Operation Dynamo Museum before driving our camper vans to Ypres, Belgium where we head to Menin Gate to hear the Last Post being performed.

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Thank you so much for watching. If you are new here, I’m Heidi and I live aboard my Narrowboat The Rum Wench and travel the UK’s Canals in search of Adventure. After selling my house to experience an alternative lifestyle I bought a canal boat and a camper van which as a solo female who loves to travel, gives me the best of both worlds. I have recently got myself a new addition to the crew, a fabulous companion – my little rescue dog Bonny who is an absolute joy and the perfect First Mate. I also work full time off grid from my tiny home and trade at canal festivals as The Narrowboat Pirate aboard The Pirate Boat.
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If you want to know more about LIVING ON A BOAT, CANAL RULES or WHAT I DID BEFORE BOAT LIFE then please watch these two videos:


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So just a few days ago I left my canal boat  home in a safe secure morning for two months   because I’m going to swap boat life for Van life myself and my little rescue dog Bonny   have joined forces with a really old friend  of mine Sandra and her two golden retrievers  

We’ve got matching Vans they’re both really  old 23 24 years old and we’re going to take   these to Europe but last night we stayed  in this wonderful location in Milton keynes   it’s right by the canal but it broke up the  journey from my parents drive where I store  

The van to get to folkestone where we’re catching  the Euro tunnel we’re going under the sea to   get to France so it was a lovely place it was  like a halfway point to stop and it was lovely here  

Last night it was a nice relaxing place  but there was no dogging so that was all   good anyway I’m going to make a quick brew and  then we’re going to be setting off to get to folkestone so we have just driven in the most horrendous  weather on the motorway really strong winds and  

It was peeing down with rain I can hardly see  but I’ve just stopped at our services now we’re   only an hour away now and there’s a few things  that I need to do one is before I go to France  

I have to put this on my window screen and it’s  a crit air sticker and this is to do with your   emissions and all you do is you go online you fill in  a a a doodah and they send you what it is for your  

Vehicle so mine’s number five cuz it’s a really  old vehicle but you get done if you haven’t got   one of these so I’m going to stick this to my  windows screen now because I forgot to do it  

But obviously you got to order this before you  go so make sure you leave enough time to get it   receive it and the other thing I need is one of  these I’ve got one for France and one for Spain  

And these are for the tolls because obviously  our steering wheels are on the wrong side and   I haven’t got electric windows I’ve only got  windy ones so it means me having to get to a  

Toll the booth will be the opposite side so I’ve  got to then get out so it’ll be a bit of a faf   whereas these you can just go straight through  the tolls it just goes beep and you go through  

And then it just charges your bank charges  your card so yes got them just to make life easier   so this took about 2 weeks to come when he ordered it online   and it was only about £5 including the postage  but you only need this in low emission zones  

However we’ve got no idea what route we’re taking  so we just wait to make sure we didn’t get caught out so that’s the crit air sticker stuck on  I’ve put my toll thing in the window as well  

Bonny’s had a Wee we’re going to crack on now  try and get to folkestone it’s already about   an hour away and then we need to do all the pet  stuff I have to get my animal health certicate all  

Signed and sealed and delivered and all that so  then we can then progress into France wo hoo bonjour so we’re here now in the channel tunnel  queue we’ve got to go and sort the pets   out so it’s a little bit complicated  Bonny but Bonny the French Bulldog  

Is going to France she’s barking at the  car next to us I hope your French is good Bonny so I got my boarding pass on my  phone ready to go and all these people   here either going on holiday or  going to their homes abroad oh  

It’s so exciting goodbye England  and hopefully some nicer warmer weather there it is so I’m heading  off now to the pet reception it’s exciting that was stressful, I know it’s bit of a palaver but we’re here at the pet reception  

Now we’ve got to go and check our little  doggies in well say little Bon’s little   but Sandra’s got two big un’s haven’t you  Sandra I’ve got two big un’s yeah and dogs whey hey! so the good news is Bonny’s just passed  through the pet reception perfectly fine all  

The paper was in order everything was good  she was so well behaved I was so proud of   her but there’s massive disruptions now loads  of things are delayed so and I think a lot of   the ferries are delayed as well which is causing  Havoc here so we’re waiting now we should have  

Been boarded by now onto the Euro tunnel going  under the sea on a train but we’re not we’re   just waiting to be called so I don’t know how  long it’s going to going to be I think it’s  

Going to be a late night tonight and we’re  going to be getting through on the tunnel   into France driving on the wrong side of the  road in the dark late not knowing what we’re   doing I’m actually [ __ ] myself it’s part  of the adventure is it anyway I’ll give you  

An update if anything happens I’m going to be her ages think so after about a 2 hour   delay we’re now on the way through passport and  security control so yes so hopefully we get  

Through the dogs are all fine it’s us now and  hopefully I don’t get a strip search oh there again they’ve just sent us to the inspection Lane oh   so I don’t know what that requires  I hope they don’t find my stash of rum I think they want to come in the  Vans now

You come inside?   cheers thank you they didn’t want to check my  rum supplies it was just my LPG gas everything’s good You don’t want to bloody  gas explosion in that tunnel do you oh my God we’re going onto  the train to go underneath the sea

Hey it’s a bit tight  it’s tighter than a Nun Chuff this so I’m on the train that goes  underneath the sea I need a wee now so once we’ve  got into our positions we had to turn the engines off   so I’m currently in the tunnel and I tell

You what it’s a good job we got a good bra on  because it’s very bouncy in here keep wiggling   about it’s brilliant underneath the sea we’re  in a train under the sea I can’t get over that   it’s amazing you’ll probably see it best with the  plastic plant there cuz that’s uh banging around  

Yeah when the Vans are rocking don’t come a  knocking chance to be a fine thing Bonjour, Welcome to France o la la   so good morning everyone we are now in France and we arrived  really late last night in the dark we found  

An amazing Park up on the park for night  app so it was free yeah and it was about   40 minutes from here and it was right by  the river it was lovely I saw some boats  

And it was just lovely to wake up next to  water we have now come to DunKirk and we’re   going to go around now this amazing Museum  yeah there’s a big huge cannon behind me so thanks to Operation Dynamo  over 330,000 men were rescued on these  

Beaches and from the port of Dunkirk in  9 days and because they couldn’t get the   big ships because it was too shallow they  ended up sending hundreds and thousands   of little boats Little Ships wow and all the  equipment and everything was left behind on  

These beaches and claimed by the Germans  just amazing isn’t it amazing piece of history This is Bonny’s first  time especially with me being on a beach I just   wish the weather was better and I was in me  shorts and t-shirts yeah wrong time of year  

But we’re on the beach in Dunkirk how cool so we’re just about to set off to  find our park up for the night it’s been   really lovely here in Dunkirk though we went  to the museum we’ve walked along the beach it  

Was very blowy but gorgeous and we also found  a little Sculpture Park so we walked around   with the dogs but now time to head off and find  tonight’s Park up Au revoir France and Allo Belgium so we’ve just crossed the border  from France into Belgium and it’s not like  

You have to go through passport or anything  the good thing about Europe is it’s just all   open borders but I’ll tell you a little bit more  about this place that we’re at and why we came  

Here a little bit later but first I just tell you  a little bit about Sandra that I’m traveling with   she’s one of my long-term friends she’s one of  my boating Chums but she took her boat over to   Ireland a few years ago and she’s currently  single-handing solo the Irish waterways and  

Having an absolute whale of a time but we’ve  met up with our little camper an to go on this   big European Adventure so obviously even though  we’re both solo female Travelers we are doing a   lot of it together and we’re going to be  meeting some other solo Travelers on our adventures

So we parked up in a place  called Ypres I think it’s pronounced   and it’s just into Belgium and we’ve stumbled  on our exploration across a lot of Christmas   Market and even though Christmas has  already happened there they celebrate  

It for longer don’t they yeah they’re big on  the 12 Days of Christmas here so everything   continues till about the 5th 6th of January so we’ve got the chance to go now and have   some mulled wine some Belgian food at a  real Christmas Market in January come on

So we’ve just come here cuz  something very special is about about to happen so today we’ve just been to hear  the last post at Menin gate and this   is done by the last post Association as a  tribute to the Fallen from World War I and  

It’s been happening since 1928 365 days of  the year even happens Christmas day in New   Year and the police actually stop the traffic  coming through the gate just for the ceremony so we had a lovely time watching the  last post and we’ve come back to the Christmas  

Market for a little bit of a mulled wine so cheers  everyone cheers we’re enjoying this Christmas   thing so much in January that we’re thinking of  Tomorrow heading further into Belgium because   there supposed to be a massive Christmas Market  at Brugge so that’ll be though in next  

Week’s video so if you have enjoyed this video  please do give it a thumbs up subscribe down   below if you haven’t already and also a massive  thank you to this week’s pirate crew and for all   those for watching liking anyway that’s it guys  take care and I’ll see you in the next video