Truth and Consequences

OK, now the dust has settled for a week or so, time for some truths and consequences ;-)

Truths:

1. Met great people and made good new friends - Hiya Guys! :-)

2. The trip was an absolute blast and highly recommend it to any petrol head

3. The track day was awsome and the sound of the V8 wailing at 5,000 rpm was subperb!

4. As many of you that know me, I have a rather bad back problem - amazingly, during the 3000+ miles that we covered, I had no back problems at all during the week ! :-)

5. The Tiv is, in reality, too fragile for the journey - in particular the immobiliser :-(
I'll just have to find a car more suitable for this type of journey next time....

6. Things of note on the car:

• Immobiliser problem (several times, always inconvenient)
• The passenger side seat belt stopped working after the track day
• drank about 5 litres of oil over the 3,000 miles
• Apparently, when changing gear, the car is pushing as small amount of oil smoke out of the exhaust
• er.... the front damage....

Consequences:

A. The repair bill to the Tiv is looking to be about £3,000 all in

B. within 24 hours of being back in the office, my bad back returned - something to be said for having good chairs at the office thinks me

C. More track days please :-)

D. I need another (3rd!) car for track days and EuroBlast type travel

There's likely to be one last post on this blog - once I've got the Griff repair sorted.

In the mean time, I've already put my name down to go on the next track-masters event - the track day at Goodwood in November...

Here's to the next time ! :-) /Mark

Reality Bites

Arrived back in the UK and reality hit pretty much immediately...

1. Awful road surface (I can hardly hear myself think on those damn concrete surfaces)
2. Huge volume of traffic that simply won't get out of the way
3. Very high petrol cost at the Maindstone service station
4. Rubbish choice of expensive, stale sandwhiches at the service station also

And speaking of service stations in the UK. Why, oh, Why are they so dirty, smelly, unfriendly and unhelpful - totally unlike all the ones we've used over the past week. Just don't ask about the state of the gents toilet at the petrol station. God Damn, who'd been in there before me WTF!?

Home in a couple of hours travel on the M20, M25, M3 and M4 - yes I know it's an odd route but the Sat Nav said so (and we know we can trust that don't we..not)

Even more reality - unpacking (and, yes, the Tiv refused to start again to put her in the garage) and washing a load of clothes. Also could not avoid starting to think about work tomorrow... :-( The final reality is that I need to start counting the cost of the trip and the upcoming repair bills. Will keep you updated on this as things develop.

This trip is one that I'd recommend to any true car enthusiast, however don't underestimate how tired you will be - it's a real test of stamina for both car and driver. It showed up the weak points in both ;-)

See Ya Later... / Mark

A Champagne Celebration

What a way to finish this epic journey around Europe. Today (14 June) we travelled from Luxembourg to Calais via the Champagne countryside of France.

When we left the city, I once again needed fuel; the short range of 200 miles is, I have to admit, a bit of a handicap for this type of travel! The first open station we found was one of the automatic ones - but with the new twist that only one pump could be used at any one time. I started filling the car.... the others decided to high tail it to the "next" petrol station. OK in principle - in practice I never saw another open petrol station on route until joinging the A26 North of Reims (some 130 miles later!!). Point to remember - in Luxembourg, Belgium and France the non-motorway petrol stations are CLOSED on Sundays ... which is OK as long as you don't need to make a long trip ;-)

Things weren't helped by a) turning the wrong way down the A13 towards Metz (Germany) rather than the needed direction of Petange (France). Easy mistake, honest - that took my slow morning brain 2 to 3 junctions to realise and then turn the car around.

Damn, another mistake! At the first junction in France, I needed to turn right towards Reims but missed the turn by trying to overtake a campervan.... turn round yet again!

Never saw the rest of the group on the roads through Champaign either.

Not to worry - the fact that I had the (very good) route directions on my lap and was driving energetically to try to catch up. What a great route - through classic French country sides and little villages (that were apparently inhabited only by stray dogs). Route included such evocative names as Saint Georges, Vouziers, Pauvres and then off towards Reims (which I by passed by following the sat nav straight to the A26).

Once again the car needed feeding - and anticipating another failure to start again due to the ongoing immobiliser problemette, I determined to stop at a motorway services and have a bite to eat. Incidentally, the French certainly do motorway services with much more style (and better food!) that we ever manage in the UK (more on which in later posts...). I'd been at the services for about 10 minutes when amazingly the rest of the gang appears in convoy behind Mr Ahlin. How I got ahead of them I'm not sure - though from what they said, I think that a major detour was undertaken to find fuel... it's France on Sunday remember ;-). We sat and chatted for a while - I then determined to kick on and reach the Channel Tunnel. Thank goodness the car started first time and I pootled over to get petrol. You may now think that the car would then not start...... but no! first time again and back on the M-Way.

POWER....!

Passed lots of obviously Le Mans types on their way home, but saw no cops (not even at the Peyage). Seems that we were very lucky, as Stormy has said that others coming up the other route to Calais (the A28 rather than the A26) were stopped and ticketed by the Frenchies...

Some rain (first in days) about 90 clicks from Calais - on went the roof in a quick pit-stop (where there were a few other brits in rag-tops doing exaclt the same and on went "Smooth Running" CD that Ralph gave me - a great collection and totally suitable for the final journey homewards - thanks again Bro' :-)

Calais with out incident and checked into the train - started to wait for the others but was called forward onto an earlier train and thus missed the opportunity to say a proper farewell and thanks to all the guys. Guys, if you're reading this, just want to say thanks for the excellent company over the past week - and thanks to Mark, Stormy and Hugh for the great (and patient) organisation.

A couple of special mentions:
Keiffy - "I wish I could fly, right up to the sky"... yes you can ! ROFL
(young) Phil - keep eating those tyres ;-) and thanks for carrying the roof over the days!
Tony G - hope that the credit cards turn up!
Stormy - "Anything can happen in the next half hour" FAB!

Truly a great experience! Now for home. /M

At Last in Lovely Luxembourg

And so we come to the last evening together – in the fantastically lovely city of Luxembourg. Stormy and some of the other guys have been here before and thus took us to a restaurant in one of the main plazas in the city centre. Entertained both by a very hassled waiter (who really didn't want to put 7 tables together so that all 15 of us could sit together – well done to the conciliator Martin for making it work!) and by a local brass band. One oh-so-near moment of the day was Martin asking of the band leader whether the band knows the theme to Thunderbirds.... the answer was yes but not possible to play as they didn't have the music with them that evening. Damn. The running joke of course this week has been the resemblance of Stormy to Scott Tracy ;-)

The restaurant was probably the best we've eaten at all week – great local beers and excellent food – highly recommended if you're ever in Luxembourg (though I can't recall the name of the place myself).

Sunday brings the drive through Champagne to Calais and the home. Onwards!

Immobiliser Woes And Stopped At The Border

Now here in Luxembourg – arrived probably about 2 hours early due to the continuing fragility of the immobiliser system for the Tiv. Once again, in the hot weather and doing long hard driving the body temperature of the car gets to the point where, once stopped (eg for petrol) then I can't get the car going again for up to half an hour. Today, this problem has happened twice – once in a service station outside Strasbourg and once here at the hotel in Luxembourg. This is now officially pissing me off :-(

To give you a flavour of the travel between Interlaken and Luxembourg, here are a couple of points:
1. Don't try to stop off the main highway to find petrol (I stopped at Thun and it took me 15 minutes to find a petrol station. This was early in the journey so the car was cool and started first time after getting fuel – at least that is a positive

2. Don't try to cross into France from Switzerland with an obviously damaged car. I was stopped and pulled to one side – the French border guards then proceeded to question me ab out the damage to the car and perform a general search for money/goods/drugs etc. Another 15 or so minutes lost. Also, the Mitsubishi Crew passed me as I was standing there – they were waved straight thru'. Damn. One positive point – due to the time stopped and in the shade, the car at least started first time when the guards let me free!

3.When you own a car that is has this petulant immobiliser, don't stop unless you can take a 15 to 30 minute break!

All in all, I lost about ¾ hour to the rest of the guys as they moved into Germany to start the WRC stages. No doubt they are enjoying these as I write! :-( I had to make a decision on continuing to the WRC stages or coming straight to the hotel – obviously I chose the latter, as I'm here now. The prime reason for this change of plan is that I would have had to stop for fuel at some point before getting to the hotel, if I had gone on the WRC routes – and, of course, the car would be unlikely to start for a while.....

At least the Tiv is now in the underground parking here at the Parc Bellevue hotel and should thus be reasonably cool soon.

Looking To Luxembourg

Today involves a quick blast to the German border and then back roads (WRC stages apparently) to Luxembourg. Expect some dramatic driving again ;-)

Into Interlaken

And so now we're here at the Hotel Neuhaus in Interlaken – a lovely lakeside hotel surrounded by mountains. The fun and laughter continues over evening drinks and meal – discussing the days events and swapping stories on the drives – cool :-)

Quote of the week has to go to young Phil, on asking about going to further mountain passes tomorrow morning said: “these passes, do they go up-hill?” .