Touring Quick Trip To France This Week

Went down to France on Monday and came back Thursday. On and off torrential rain on the way down to the B&B in St Pol sur Ternoise and the same on the way back to Shaw, Oldham apart from a glorious sunny and warm first 25 miles after getting off the ferry at Dover. Other than that the weather in Belgium and France was mainly dry. We visited Ypres - Tyne Cot, Menin Gate and the Yorkshire Trenches and Dugout on Tuesday then on Wednesday we went to Vimy Ridge. It was my first time at WW1 sites after doing Normany WW2 many times and the thing that struck me most was the fact that so many graves contain unidentifiable bodies.
On a lighter note I suppose the highlight of the journey home was my mate putting diesel in his BMW 1200. We managed to cadge some plastic tubing off some heating engineers parked up at the adjacent Little Chef and siphon out as much fuel as we could. Filled up with unleaded, started it, it chugged, blew out lots of smoke, clunked and died if you opened the throttle. Eventually by just letting it tick over, it cleared and took throttle. So it was back on the road and stop every 50 miles and top up with unleaded.
First picture is my baby roast chicken with a hint of turmeric, salad and chips, very tasty.




Me at Vimy Ridge Memorial


The B&B


Bike store



Two very dirty bikes

 

No we didn't take the student led tour but I think we should have. In fact I didn't laugh at all at my mates mistake it was deadly serious as I'd asked my wife to get in a double thickness sirloin steak, some mushrooms, tomatoes and chipping potatoes for my tea. So I was focused on getting home for that. Imagine my disappointment when I got home and the fridge was empty.