Back to Iberia: What Slowing Down Through France Taught Us

The Pause Ends, and the Wheels Point South Again.

We left Germany for Iberia again after three and a half weeks. The journey had been interrupted, and now it was time to pick up the thread. This time, we made a conscious decision not to rush.

No highways. No toll roads. Just the smaller routes through France. It added time, and in the best possible way.

Backcountry in France

The landscapes opened wide, flat agricultural plains giving way to gentle rises, a monotony that was somehow comforting. Then they would narrow again as we descended into one small town after another, the road tightening between ancient stone walls like entering a memory. Long straight roads that seemed to belong to another era, lined with brown stone houses whose windows held darkness or amber light depending on the hour.

Quiet streets where a parked bicycle or a cat sunning itself on a doorstep felt like an entire story waiting to be understood. And those little alleys, they spiralled back from the main road in ways that seemed to defy geometry, as if each had been carved out by centuries of feet choosing the easiest path rather than the straightest one.

Many of these places had a slightly morbid charm. Not ugly, not depressing, just old in a way that makes you feel their history. The weight of it. Shuttered shop fronts with faded signage underneath, hints of what used to be: a butcher, a café, a general store. The church bells would ring sometimes as we passed through, out of proportion to the size of the villages, as if ringing for a congregation that no longer quite existed.

And everywhere, tri-colour flags. In almost every town. Some faded and fraying in the wind, others bright and new, but all present, a quiet insistence that these places, no matter how small, still mattered.

What also struck us again was how camper-friendly these places are. In every second town, it seemed, there was a free aire or a simple campground tucked away near the edge, often behind the church, beside a war memorial or near a small field where locals walk their dogs in the evening. Practical spaces, unglamorous, but welcoming in a way that felt genuine rather than performative. France makes life on the road easy in a very unpretentious way.

Compared to February, though, something had changed. Back then, we were often the only foreigners. The quiet towns felt ours alone. Now the free campgrounds are filling up with German and Dutch campers, the communal spaces growing louder and busier each evening. Washing lines strung between vehicles, the smell of different dinners, conversations in three languages drifting across the field. Spring is clearly bringing more people back onto the road. And we are among them again.

It Feels Good to Travel Again.

Being back on the road means more than moving from one place to the next.

It means getting our routines back. Searching for campgrounds, reading the apps and the signs, the small negotiation of finding a spot. Doing laundry inside an Intermarché during a lunch break. Shopping for groceries in unfamiliar shops, learning the names of vegetables in French, deciding between the salted butter and the unsalted. Finding water, the careful practice of it, the pump that works or doesn't, the tap that emerges from the ground with cold, clear water or warm and rust-coloured. Solving the small logistical questions of everyday life. Where we'll sleep. What we'll eat. How we'll fill our tank and keep moving.

That is Everyday Life for Us.

Not the highlights, not the perfect view, not the big arrival. The routine. The repetition. The little tasks that make this lifestyle work. They ground us. They give shape to the days. Each repeated gesture, pulling the water hose from its storage, folding the camping chair, checking the tyre pressure, becomes the music of our days. And after the pause, it feels good to have that rhythm back. The road becomes familiar again, not in its destinations but in its patterns.

What Grounds You in Your Everyday Life?

Maybe it is the weekly Toastmasters meeting. Maybe it is weekly beer with the neighbors while watching football. Maybe it is the hike in the black forrest every Tuesday. Maybe it is grocery shopping, walking the dog, or your morning coffee before work.

Whatever it is, those small repeated rituals are often what holds life together.

Explore. Dream. Discover.