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AROUND a thousand travellers from Ireland and Britain are reported to have turned a French retail park into a holiday camp over Easter by parking their caravans there.
Heaps of rubbish were said to have been left at the site after 200 caravans descended on the central city of Clermont-Ferrand.
A traveller called Tom, from Scotland, told The Sun: "We're here to celebrate a friend's wedding."
Businesses said customers had been scared away while a restaurant boss whose toilets were used said: "They used us as a public convenience."
In February, another travellers' encampment caused controversy, when villagers in West Sussex were ordered to move their cars so police could escort an extra-wide mobile home to a site.
Residents found notices on their windscreens telling them that if they did not move their vehicles, they would be towed away at the owners' expense.
Police were escorting an extra-wide mobile home to a site that had been ruled illegal but was subject to a planning appeal.
Two caravans had been occupying the site at Three-Cornered Piece in nearby East Harting since 2009 after travellers from a village 15 miles away moved in on a Bank Holiday weekend.
