{"id":5106,"date":"2017-08-13T20:50:39","date_gmt":"2017-08-13T20:50:39","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.kiwihoods.com\/?p=5106"},"modified":"2017-08-13T20:50:39","modified_gmt":"2017-08-13T20:50:39","slug":"back-to-england","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.kiwihoods.com\/?p=5106","title":{"rendered":"BACK TO ENGLAND"},"content":{"rendered":"

The ferry ride back to England was smooth sailing and we arrived in Portsmith around 1pm.\u00a0 We headed to Weymouth to drop a couple of bags of our gear off with Michaela and stayed the night. The traffic was dreadful and we could see miles of traffic jams in all directions in the small stretch we travelled.\u00a0People here blamed holiday traffic, but we didn’t think there\u00a0were many vehicles that looked like they were on a holiday jaunt.<\/p>\n

After a lovely walk downtown in the morning along with brunch we headed off to Horsham.\u00a0 I had to pick up medication from\u00a0 a pharmacy there.\u00a0 We stayed the night at our favourite old campsite in\u00a0Slinfold as we were quite late\u00a0to be\u00a0going any further north.\u00a0 In the morning we consulted a mechanic we had gone to a few times about the vans performance but was difficult without him spending time on it.<\/p>\n

It is Wednesday and we headed north as we have a classic bike meeting to get to in Donington for Scot to see from Thursday.\u00a0 It was raining and cold – great for summer! but that wasn’t the issue.\u00a0 On the M25 in typical fashion there was a bad accident or accidents and we were stopped for a long time.\u00a0 We should have been able to travel the 150 miles we were going in around 3 hours but it took us about 8 hours. Unbelievable.\u00a0 After having nothing but smooth flowing traffic, immaculate roads\u00a0and no hassles in France for over 2 months this was really irritating and we will really be glad to leave England.\u00a0 It is overcrowded and the roads are some of the worst in any of the 28 countries we have travelled in Europe.\u00a0 We think they have huge problems here and I really don’t know how anyone has a life as most of it would be spent travelling to and from work in horrendous traffic. At one point Scot went back onto the bed in the back and read for a while since the engine was off and we had nowhere to go.\u00a0 And at least we had a loo on board!<\/p>\n

I hadn’t pinpointed anywhere to stay for the night so when we were in a likely area I looked up a small farm site.\u00a0 We drove there along really narrow laneways, but when arriving it was heavily padlocked and there wasn’t anyone around.\u00a0 I hate that.\u00a0 So we found a clubsite to stay and arrived there to settle for the night. The problem with a motorhome in England as there are very few places you can stop on the side of the road to free camp, so often there is no choice but to find a club or camp site to stop on.\u00a0 We left the next morning after dismantling the bed and cleaning the van as we had a couple of fellows wanting to see the van to buy it\u00a0in this area. I put the van on the market on a facebook website dedicated to motorhome sales as I hope there will be less scammers on it since it is a secure site.\u00a0 We stopped in a service centre\/fuel stop near Nottingham and the first fellow came to see it but I think he wanted to buy it to resell on.\u00a0 Then we headed off to see the 2nd guy after he finished work at 5.30.\u00a0 After about 10 minutes of chatting he said he would buy the van.\u00a0 We are glad we now have a buyer and we will finish our last few weeks in Scotland, travel down to Wales and then drop the van off to him.\u00a0 We were feeling very relieved to say the least.\u00a0 Now we can concentrate on what we have left to do.<\/p>\n

Leaving this fellow we headed to a hotel site right next door to Donington races as they have a large camping area as well.\u00a0 Not bad value with all facilities for only 22pound a night.\u00a0 It was nearly 9pm so we celebrated our van sale with dinner and a drink at the hotel.<\/p>\n

Donington classic bike races was on the whole weekend.\u00a0 I won’t go into detail although Scot would but essentially it is the probably the largest collection of old classic bikes and side cars\u00a0in the world and they not only show them, they race them.\u00a0 We found the kiwi team amongst many other country’s teams and what do you know my brothers business Aliweld sponsor them.\u00a0 All quite amazing really.\u00a0We had sun the first day and rain the 2nd which was a shame, but we say enough for Scot to come away happy.\u00a0We stayed until Saturday lunchtime when we had to leave as we had a house sit back in Wayboys looking after Buddy and Mini Moo Mouse whom we have looked after twice already.\u00a0 Buddy is like Freddy’s twin, they are so alike it’s uncanny.\u00a0 We have been here in Warboys for a week and we leave on Tuesday morning 15th August\u00a0coming up and head up to Scotland.\u00a0 Next blog update will be a bit later on since we will be doing very hard travelling each day through Scotland. Forecast for the next 2 weeks RAIN, RAIN AND MORE RAIN \ud83d\ude41\u00a0 TEMP 11deg to 17deg maybe warm for Scotland….lol.<\/p>\n

On the 26th we will be at the Edinburgh Military Tattoo – for my dearest Mother.\u00a0 I know she will be with us in spirit.<\/p>\n

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