Ypres and Brugge New year 2011

Still feeling fat and bloated from Christmas and Boxing Day we set of on the 27th to Belgium with the usual support crew Andy and Lorraine.


Our first stop was Ypres , also known as Ieper , which was only about 50 miles from the exit of the Euro Tunnel.


We stayed on an Aire ( up market Gypsy site for motorhomers ) which was about a 10 minute walk from the centre of town, which we did on the first evening.

Ypres is a beautiful historic looking town with lots of beautiful old Churches, Cathedrals and buildings.     This is quite surprising considering that  the whole town ( every building ) was destroyed and flattened in the 1st world war and was completely rebuilt between 1922 and 1926.

As luck would have it the builders, some of whom were British, must have had access to the original town plans as it was rebuilt to replicate the destroyed town.  A very good job was done as you can't tell.

We attended the very moving last post which takes place at 8.00 pm every evening at the Menin Gate on the edge of the town . Every square inch of this huge gateway is inscribed with the thousands of names of the Commonwealth Soldiers who died in the Great war defending the region.

The town was beautiful and as usual we ended up in a bar drinking a local brew.

The next day Andy and I went on an organised Battlefield Tour of the area with Salient Tours. It was excellent.    I was truly ashamed of my appalling knowledge of the great war. We visited several Battlefields, Dressing Stations and Memorials. Although fascinating it was also quite a sad experience when I discovered the true, yet unbelievable, numbers of casualties and needless deaths on both sides. Our Guide Chris was excellent and this tour is well recommended.

The following day we all set of for Brugge , another 50 miles and parked up in another Aire just outside town. We have been to Brugge several times before but always discover more every time we go.

On New years Eve we went into town to join the famous celebrations. On the way in we started to doubt we had the right day as it was deathly silent and nobody was about. We even wondered if Belgians even celebrate New Year. When we got right to centre of town we discovered a moving trail of people like ants all heading towards the square so like dutiful sheep we joined the lines and headed for the celebrations.

Luckily we managed to set up camp in a bar on the edge of the square and only joined to 8000 or so drink splashing ,singing and dancing crowd just before midnight.  We are not great at being drunks so after about half an hour the decision was made to head back to camp for a "Cup of Tea ". We walked about 1 mile to get on a bus that took us straight back the the square were we had started. Oh well, even monkeys fall out of trees. Bladders bursting and feet aching we got back to camp about an hour later.

I would recommend Brugge and Ypres as great destinations, we had a fantastic time and look forward to returning soon.

The day we have been waiting for. " Retirement"

For a very long time many conversations in our house have started with the words " When I retire we will.... or After I retire we could......."

Well It's only gone and happened.     At Midnight on the 30th of November 2011I became officially unemployable.     Unemployed.

To mark the occasion I decided to have a small celebration with just close friends and family.     

My Arse.

This plan started to escalate out of control and within no time the aim was to have a retirement do to beat all other retirement do's . The venue was important, we needed to get a location that nobody had had before and had the WOW factor.

There was only one place in London that could possibly meet these requirements

The Tower of London      Yes the real one by the Thames,           No I'm not joking.

As luck would have it being in the Police does have it's advantages in that you not only get a fantastic Public Service Pension ( thank you ) but you do get to meet loads of great people and this included several Yeomen  also known as Beefeaters.  Strings got pulled and calls made and within no time a great friend called Ken had the Tower of London Social Club booked and even kindly  offered to lay on a mini tour of the tower  and a private viewing of the "Ceremony of the Keys"




Behind the scenes Pat and the girls started doing secret things and ordering the food. I sent out the invites and managed to get hold of loads of people who I hadn't seen for years as well as the usual crowd from Training, a Bethnal Green and Romford.

The night was brilliant.    All the guest were told to arrive at the gate at 7.30pm for Ken's tour.

I couldn't believe it when I went to the gate , they had only gone and turned up. Anything for a free drink and a sandwich.

My friend and former boss, John Bennet, clearly turned up with the wrong speech.   I still haven't got a clue who he was talking about but who ever it was sounded like a great bloke.    Many thanks John.




Pat looked fantastic and ran around all night being the perfect hostess.

Stephanie and Chris gave a few words claiming  that I was a great Dad. ( probably after money ).
Chris did suggest that my greatest achievement was in fact himself.

Rachael, bless her, managed to locate every embarrassing photograph I have ever had taken and get them blown up so that everyone could have a laugh at my expense.  ( My day will come girl  )

Everyone was so kind and I will miss all of them ( whose names I am already struggling to remember )

Special thanks to the the Barkingside Witches ( you know who you are ) for running around behind the scenes and making it a great night.

The Tower of London has hundreds of years of history behind and now it can add " Neil's retirement do" to its list of events.

The end of an Era.... Phase three begins

Germany again and Willy's Treffen 2011.

We decided to go to the Dusseldorf Motorhome show at the end of August.

What an event. Luckily for us we weren't looking for a Motorhome because if you were you would have started to bleed from the ears.  There were thousands of them.

Sadly non of them were British which is possible a symptom of the poor quality we produce. Very Sad.

Anyway, we spent two days there and only got around one of the 10 or so halls, but we saw what we went for which was all the trade stands for Motorhome components and equipment.

After leaving Dusseldorf, which was an experience in itself we drove to Mendig to attend "Willy's Treffen " which as an annual event named after its founder Willy Janssen who was a bit of a German Globetrotter.

The event was held on an old army training camp and was packed to the doors with hundreds of Beardy Weirdy  people and their trucks. Lots of camp fires, eating and soap dodging going on.

One bloke even turned up with a projector set and screened a film against the side of his truck.

We struggled to get a plot ad as we arrived first we tried to secure three plots for our friends Sandie and Karsten and Ellen and Perry.

Sandie and Karsten turned up first in their beautiful blue Mercedes 1113A with an Ormocar Cabin on it.
We then heard from Ellen that they were also bringing two other friends in their vehicles , Luckily just as they arrived they opened up another camping area so we all manged to get places.
A great weekend and loads of interesting ideas, trucks and people .

We stayed an extra night more than the rest of the group then set off for Cochem on the Mosel.






Cochem was a very pretty town, right on the river . We took the scooter down the Mosel to Zell which was another beautiful Town on the river.

Most of you Will already know that we are intending to have a truck built in Germany ( to travel the world ) so decided to pay the constructor " Ormocar "  a visit in Hauenstein .

We spent a whole day with Peter, the owner and thrashed out loads of the detail of the cabin we are having built.

We finished up with the long drive back to St Omer in France were we had a great morning in the town going around the markets and then into a festival in the park were we listened to a french orchestra playing Glen Miller hits. It was all a but Deja Vue as we had attended the Twinwood festival only a couple of weekend before , which was all about Glen Miller.

Pat also had a chat with some guys who had dedicated their entire lives to growing Cauliflowers. They even dressed like them with green capes and cauliflower hats.

We met up with Andy and Lorraine for the evening. We did all laugh when Andy got himself in a panic because Lorraine told him she had found a leak in the water tank.

Andy finds a leak in his water tank.

 Blighty the next day

Oh well , can't wait for the next trip.

Twinwood Festival Bedford 2011.

This was a new event for us, but one that Pat and Lorraine were looking forward to.

The festival over the weekend 27th -29th August takes place and the Twinwood Airbase which is the American base that Glen Miller flew from on his last flight.

As a result of his un timely disappearance, the entire base has been turned into a working museum dedicated to him and the 1940 Airbase life style.

The event revolves around the fashion, music and dance of the era and everyone dressed up.

Pat and Lorraine and Irene dressed as Land girls , Andy Myself and John wore overalls and went as mechanics.

The music was fantastic, with the John Miller band in attendance.

The highlight had to be the dancing, mainly American Swing Jazz  styles and the popular Lindy Hop. The halls were full of vibrant colours and the happiness radiated from the dancers.

We met a dutch couple called Ruddy and Nanda who were Lindy Hop experts but despite all their patient efforts none of us could pick it up.




A very nostalgic fun weekend, which I would recommend to you.

Bad Kissingen Overland Vehicle Show, Germany.

Most of you who know us will know by now that we are completely obsessed with building an overland vehicle and travelling around the world.

Unfortunately there aren't that many Brits with the same idea but we have discovered that Germany is full of like minded people and most of the companies who make the vehicles and parts are based in there.

A short while ago pat joined an Internet based club  ad we have had one meeting with them earlier in the year and we arranged to meet up with them again at the annual festival and show at Bad Kissingen.

The show was fantastic and we camped in a local town area along with about 2000 other vehicles cramed in.

We met up again with our friends Sandie and Karsten and went to a club BBQ on the Saturday night.

Here we had the great fortune to meet Ellen and Perry who have   become great friends and  will hopefully become fellow travellers..

Here are some pictures of the event.

The Second Whirlwind Tour of Europe

This time we decided to shrug of the stalkers and we told Andy and Lorraine that we were going to Germany to see a large Overland Expedition Vehicle show at Bad Kissingen in Germany .

We met with Lorraine on the way to the Chanel Tunnel and wished her well on their trip to Lake Annecy in France a few days later .

Well we went to the show which was brilliant ( See additional Blog entry ) then caved in to Andy and Lorraines begging  that we should join them so we drove from Germany to Annecy to catch up with them.

Joking apart the location they were staying at was fantastic and right on the banks of the lake.

The cheeky cows even managed to sweet talk the owners into letting us share a plot to save money.



After leaving Annecy we drove to a small town called Rochefort St Claude in the Jura Region of France.This town is famous for its Smoking Pipe Factories ( and respiritory diseases )

Wow. This is an area a that we haven't been to before and it was fantastic. The scenery was stunning and we had a few peacful days there at a Minicipal site on the banks of the river called Camping Le Martinet.

The water in the river felt like it had just flowed off a glacier and was painful to stand in so in true team spirit we decided to get in and see who could last the longest ( seconds ). Pats role was to record this on camera, a task that would ordinarily take about 1 second , but on this ocasion Pat appeared to have lost the ability to work the camera and we had to repeat the task about 4 times to get the shot.

We then meandered back north stopping at fabulous places such as Dole, Lac Giffamont and Challons.

Our last stop before the  Tunnel home was at a great Aire at Arques near St Omer in France.
One day a year in Arques they have a festival that includes a massive Rock Concert in a large Sports Stadium. This event is incredibly loud and goes on until 3 am.

You Guessed we picked the right day and parked near the Stadium. ( No sleep for Pat and Andy that night )

Brilliant Holliday 

Round up of Smaller Events.

On the 12th may we celebrated my birthday with a weekend in the beautiful grounds of Clare Priory in suffolk with the EEDA

On the 27th May we went to Thetford rugby Club for a joint meet between motohome Fun and the Honda Blackbird Club. This involved a nice ride out on the motorbike to Wells next to the Sea.

And on the 3rd june we spent the weekend again with the EEDA at Borough Waters , Southminster for a fishing weekend ..... Caught Nothing.

EEDA Cockney Night Kelvedon Hatch

We really pushed the boat out this weekend 5th-8th May and travelled all the way to Kelvedon Hatch ( 3 Miles ) to take part in a Cockney weekend. I think that Pat was probably the only one who was raelly quallified by birthright.

Loads of Fun, Pie, Mash and Jellied Eels etc.



Lorraine and Pat had been collecting buttons for this event and Lorraine created some great outfits .