I agree, wonderful, warm, happy people! I was so proud that I learnt Danish, just sadly lost it over the last 25 years!!!
Iâm a firm fan of Sandi Toksvig.
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I had to provide a test 3 weeks ago returning by land and it had to be a PCR test. I am certain that requirement wonât have been reduced.
Additionally on returning I had to provide a signed printer paper attesting I did not have any of a long list of symptomd of Covid.
Importantly on that same sheet I.had to promise I would self-isolate 7 days on return and get another PCR test in France at that 7 day point. Which I duly did.
Annoyingly the PCR test is free in France but only to those who have a Carte.Vitale or Social Security number. Mine still stuck in the interminable French works not issued so got charged 62 euros for it. Even the homeless get Covid test free in France due to covid being a public health issue. But even the homeless must have a Social Security number! welcome to French administration.
Attestation find under âattestation internationaleâ google.
Beware entering by car you are bound by curfew. So only allowed to be travelling 0800-1900. Train and plane travel is exempted from curfew if you have a completed âderogation couvre-feuâ with you. Ferries/boats travel from them is also not allowed in curfew so only 0800-1900.
Doesnt matter if they probably just forgot to exempt travel to and from ferries as you just might be stopped by an enthusiastic police offer bingo 135 euro fine.
For all the occupants in the car 
Crikey OâRiley! 
. An estate agent in Valencia is beavering away trying to sell my flat. My neighbour reports lots of visits. One day one of them will stick.
VLC to Hendaye is do-able in a loaded van under 8 hrs so that bit should be okay.
I too have a temp S.S.#, paper attestation. I canât for the life of me understand why it doesnât operate in the same way as a CV. It states âthis is to confirm you are now etc etcâ.
The brown forms for RVs with the MT donât turn round in any hurry. Two weeks for one (2x RV) and ten days another and still no refund.
Well. Good exercise for the leeetle grey cells and a charming place to be but why? Even the ticket collectors on the local CPH trains speak English.
Maybe they wanted a native speaker of Strine to really get to grips with Eng. 
Thoâthey may have been disappointed you werenât called Sheila!
On the Ameli site (if you have managed to open an account with a temp number?) there is a bit where you can get an estimate for how long your refund will take. Somethings, like transport, can be many many weeksâŠ
Every account I have read on attempts to set up an Amelie a/c with a temp number has failed.
And why should that be? Like the âprovisionalâ nature of the health service âattestationsâ it flies in the face of common sense.
Itâs perfectly sensible Chris as it allows you to proceed with medical treatment etc while all the ducks are being put in line behind the scenes. Just because itâs different from the UK doesnât mean itâs wrongâŠ
I am not comparing it with UK. I am making the point that these âprovisionalâ attestations should provide the service that the attestation declares is now valid - up and running.
What ducks behind the scenes are being aligned? What is it about an attestation that makes it a diluted version of âthe real thingâ when the attestation itself confirms that one had been accepted into the health service.?
It is, as my erstwhile MT commented with a wry face âFranceâ.
The medical treatment may be second to none - I hope I can put the moment of proof of that of for years. But the dilatory performance of the administration system can not be denied.
Thatâs a pain, and an illogical one to boot.
What are you supposed to do having rolled off the ferry in Ouistreham at 06:45??
Mind you, it wil probably take more than an hour to get through passport control and douanes at present so I suppose it could be moot.
Beg pardon the hours you are allowed to travel by road start at 0600 not 0800. Was my typo. Running to 1900. if going or coming from train or plane or, IIRC, bus, then if you are carrying a completed derogation couvre-feu paper or phone, you are covered.
Unfortunately as they are not supposed to give discretion then if you are stopped and ferry isnât in the legislation I would say better than even you will get a fine.
Since when have gov officers managed logical thought?
After All travelling down a motorway during unsociable hours is what risk? When I used to do the red eye trips it would be unusual once the ferry travelers had split up you would be lucky to see more than 2 cars on the whole journey to Tours. Where is the evidence that in your own vehicle tranmission will hapen.
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Iâm inclined to agree, but there would be an increased risk if your vehicle broke down and outside assistance was needed to recover it.
But that applies to any car journey.
I believe it is a result of running a national system regionally.
So you take all your bits of paper to your regional office, and they do their regional thing. It is then sent up the chain for assessment, and for us this usually mean to Belfort where they deal with UK foreigners. We then get a bit of paper and our dossier is sent off to the national centre to be turned into a plastic card.
At each stage of this process as you go up levels the numbers that are being dealt with at any one time increase. So your local office may have a few handfuls of new applicants from the local area and can turn things round relatively quickly. Belfort will have many bucket loads, so somewhat slower especially if a wave of applications that swamp resources. And then when your battle-worn dossier arrives at the national centre it will be among many hundreds of others, perhaps thousandsâŠand there is no urgency as you have your bit of paper so probably donât commit many staff resources to it.
And a lot of these staff will be off sick with Covid.
Patience. It will happen. One day.
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Ditto John, she was/is a good choice replacement for Stephan Fry (another fave of mine) QI.
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Thanks Sue. That is the first time I have seen a coherent explanation of the process and why it takes so long.
That it could be done in a more efficient, expeditious way is neither here nor there. It is the way itâs done in FR. 
It figures. It ties in with what I now understand the function of the Mairie to be: a local functionary charged with ensuring policy handed down from Paris is applied on that patch and all other patches.
And that there is little or no âlocal governmentâ. Simply a pyramid of establishments enacting the will of âParisâ
I understood that long distance transport / getting off ferries was included, it certainly was until recently.
was it ever thus Chris⊠I recall when we first came to France and needing to register our FR car in our name (in the halcyon days when you could do it at the Sous PrĂ©fecture). All the advice given to us rookies at the time was âwhen going to see them, take a book, not just any book but a BIG bookâ. As it happened, we arrived just before lunch so were seen in triple quick time and sent on our merry way with Carte Grise in our hot sticky little hands 