Friday 5 July 2013

Trip to Belgium and France - Day 1

At last ! The holiday starts!

I left the house at about 09:00 in light rain for the ride to Hull. About 20 minutes later the rain suddenly got heavier and that was the situation for the next few hours. On some parts of the M74 motorway, the spray was so bad that traffic had to slow to about 50 mph (80 km/h) due to the lack of visibility. The rain lessened by about the half way mark, and just before Scotch Corner (which isn't a corner and is nowhere near Scotland), I spotted Terry G stopped for a rest in a laybye. We headed off together and the rain eventually cleared. I had a great feeling when I saw the first roadsign for Hull, and at that pint the sun came out! This really felt like the start of the holiday.
We arrived at our meeting point, a Sainsbury's supermarket, had something to eat and wait for the others. Soon after, Donnie, who was travelling with us and attending the Bikers' Classics, but not staying with us arrived, soon followed by mr combo.
Time ran on but the others hadn't appeared, so we filled with fuel and made our way to the ferry terminal. It's only about 7 miles (11 km) but seems to take forever due to heavy traffic. When we got to the terminal, the others had gone straight there due to running late, and the sun had become quite bright and actually hot!!

The group is:

Me – Skorpion Traveller
Terry G – Skorpion Tour
Gareth – Sachs 800
mr combo – Triumph Tiger 955
Stuart (not my brother) – Triumph Tiger 800
Terry D – Kawasaki ZZR 1400
Donnie – Yamaha Diversion 900

We were soon loaded onto the ferry and found our cabins. There was a slight 'excitement' when mr combo thought he had lost his keys, but he'd left them in the bike and Terry G had taken them.
Once at sea it was a typical ferry voyage. Sitting about chatting, eating and drinking until it was time for bed. Tomorrow we'll be in Belgium!




Sticker I made for the trip

And continuing what I started last year, here's 'Song of the Day':



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