Category Archives: old cars

Saturday 4th June 2016 – THAT WAS DEFINITELY THE CORRECT DECISION …

… to come here and find the quietest room in the hotel, without a doubt. Although it took me ages to drop off to sleep (I remember seeing 01:00 come up on the clock) I was absolutely, completely and utterly stark out when the alarm went off at 07:45. I didn’t feel a thing. I didn’t even have to go for a stroll on the parapet either. It was the best night’s sleep that I have had for months and my only regret was that there wasn’t more of it because I could have slept for a week.

I’d been on my travels too – to the garage at British Salt (the right way round too this time, not a mirror-image like the last time that we visited it) at Middlewich where I was repairing, of all things, a huge pile of amplifiers, speakers and the like. I’d gone into work early when there was no-one about and because of there being no-one about, I cracked on and by the time everyone came in, I’d done most of the stuff. My father came in, saw the pile of work and started to say why each appliance was difficult to do, and how each problem was insurmountable, to which my reply at each instance was “it’s fixed already”. After all, anyone can do a much better job when there are no interruptions and no negative vibrations floating around the place, as we all know.

I had a couple of cups of coffee this morning at breakfast too – the first time that I’ve had coffee for well over a week. I’ve steered clear of it because of my … errr … upset stomach but that has settled down for the last few days and so I wanted to give it a try. I would have had mint tea but there was none of that available at breakfast, so coffee it was. And it wasn’t really a good idea because I’d tell you what happened except that you are probably eating right now.

After I’d spent some time doing some work, I packed up and left to continue on with my journey. Now that I’ve been reunited with my telephone I can show you where I stayed the night – and the night two weeks or so ago.

My room is the one that has the open door on the top right – right at the end of the corridor at the highest part of the building. As I said, it really was quiet in there and I’ll have that room again.

By setting the SatNav to “shortest route”, I went a very merry and mazy way through some beautiful by-roads where I was suddenly decanted into the town of Guise.

This is the entrance to the magnificent castle of Guise and those of you with long memories and have read reams and reams of this rubbish will know exactly why this is the only photo of the place that is appearing on these pages.

The answer is that, quite simply, as you might expect, I arrived bang on the stroke of midday, just as they were closing the place up for lunch. Everyone knows that the lunch break is sacred in France – so much so that when Marshall Petain (whose grave we visited on the Ile d’Yeu in 2013, you might remember) was appointed as Generalissimo of the Allied Armies in the middle of the desperate retreat of 1918, he is reputed to have asked for just two things to save the Allies from disaster – a free hand with the army and two hours off for lunch.

Many of you will have heard of Guise, of course. Mary of Guise was the wife of James V of Scotland and mother of Mary, Queen of Scots.

That wasn’t the only thing that was interesting about the town. On the by-pass on the edge of the town was this magnificent diesel locomotive – a shunter by the look of it, parked up on the site, one assumes, of a couple of demolished houses which have been fitted out to make a raiway setting.

I liked the artwork on the wall of the house in the background. It was superb.

I wish however that there had been a plaque to tell me what was the significance of the display. I hate being left in the dark.

Next stop, seeing as I’m in the vicinity, is the Commonwealth War Graves cemetery in Etreux. This is where scores of members of the Royal Munster Regiment are buried following a spirited rearguard action at the crossroads by a battalion of the regiment on 27th August 1914, to hold up the German advance while the main body of the British Army slipped away.

The claim to fame of the cemetery is that it is the burial place of Lieutenant CEV Awdry, said to be the half-brother of the Reverend W Awdry of “Thomas the Tank Engine” fame.

Leaving the Aisne behind us, we cross into the Nord and arrive at our destination, the town of Bavay, or, to be more precise, Bavay la Romaine.

And it deserves its name too because it was formerly the Gallo-Roman (you must never say “Roman” in France. The French do not accept that the Romans brought civilisation to the French, insisting that Gaul was already civilised long before the Romans arrived. It’s “Gallo-Roman” and I’ve seen some impressive uproar when people forget) city of Bagacum.

The city is situated at a major crossroads of routes in the northern part of the Roman road system and is home to some of the most impressive Roman … "Gallo-Roman" – ed … ruins in Gaul.

What we are looking at here is part of the Forum – the central market place of any Roman … "Gallo-Roman" – ed … city and impressive it certainly is. It’s always been known that there are Gallo-Roman remains here – stuff has been dug up for centuries – but someone digging in a cellar in the 18th Century found himself decanted into the subterranean crypt of the temple and this started everything off.

German shelling of the town in 1940 uncovered many more remains and once the war was over, excavations started in earnest.

Our cellar-digger painted a picture of what he saw and it shows a beautiful Gallo-Roman crepi with painted designs, but all of that has long-since been washed away over 250 years of exposure to the weather, which is a shame because it really did look quite magnificent.

I spent all afternoon here having a prowl around, totally immersed in everything that was going on all around. It really was €3:00 well-spent (yes, I’m not ashamed to claim the Senior Citizens’ discount now that I qualify for it).

No-one was more surprised than me to notice that the time had suddenly advanced to 16:30 in the blinking of an eyelid and I hadn’t even noticed. I shall have to get a wiggle on.

Back on the road, I didn’t travel very far before coming to another screeching halt. Despite all self-propelled road compactors (or rouleau compressor as they are called over here) being called “steam rollers” in the vernacular, this really IS a steam roller.

It’s an Alberet, works number 1012, from the factory in Rantigny in the Oise and I don’t think that I’ve ever encountered one of this make before. It’s here parked on the edge of a haulage yard by the side of the road, inviting a photo-opportunity.

It’s not really an old car but we’ll class it as that seeing as how we don’t have a more suitable category.

So now I’m holed up in another Premiere Classe in Feignies, just outside Maubeuge. No internet (thank heavens for the mobile phone) and disinterested staff, which is a shame.

But it’s much better than a standard “Premiere Classe” that’s for sure. it has all inside rooms rather than outside rooms for a start and they are 3 times bigger than standard.

I’m having my money’s worth here tonight.

Saturday 10th October 2015 – MY QUIET WEEKEND CONTINUES

I had a nice relaxing night last night in my motel room doing not very much at all. At least I had a really good sleep and a nice warm shower this morning.

And by the time that I was ready to leave, the rain was on the verge of stopping but we were having a really high wind and that was depressing.

First stop that I made after driving through the Appalachain mountains was at the small town of Matapedia.

Apart from the town itself and its position on the junction off across the river and into New Brunswick, the interesting thing about the town itself is the railway station. The railway line that runs from Halifax to Montreal along the coast passes through here and, much to everyone’s surprise, there’s a passenger service

But as you can see, the passenger service, run by VIARAIL, runs just once per day (and then not on Tuesdays).

And the station looks like it too. The building is almost derelict, the woodwork is rotting away, it’s overgrown with dust and weeds, and the rails are rusted. It’s really in quite a deplorable state but at least it’s here. Any complaints and a demand for an overhaul, and VIARAIL will probably just pull the service.

And it seems that I’m not the only one to be concerned by the lack of attention that VIARAIL is paying to the Atlantic provinces, and that’s good news.

There’s an organisation called Transport Action Atlantic which seems to be involved in revitalising rail transport in New Brunswick and this organisation seems to be doing something here at Matapedia as you can see here.

It’s not that the aims of this group are utopic – far from it – it’s just that the organisations with which it is dealing is so intransigent that any form of negotiated agreement is impossible. But nevertheless, I wish them luck.

I found a road that led down to the head of the Baie des Chaleurs too, so that I could take a photo of it.

There’s a good view of the Sugar Loaf mountain over there to the right, and the huge pulp mill at Atholville in front of it.

I stopped at Campbelltown to use the internet at Tim Horton’s and then to do some shopping at Sobey’s. And then I was off into the mountains to the western side of New Brunswick

And what do you think about this then?

I can’t remember when was the last time that I saw one of these in the UK, never mind North America. It’s a Hillman Minx, badge-engineered as a “Sunbeam” and dates from the late 50s or very early 1960s and it’s as rare as hens teeth.

But I’ve been saying quite a lot that in the space of 20 years Britain went from selling its cars all over the world to not even being able to sell its own cars in its own country. It’s probably the most dramatic collapse of industry in the whole of the history of the world and has contributed to the decline of the UK from a major world power to an insignificant offshore island.

Seeing vehicles like this in isolated corners of the world just goes to underline it.

I ended up in Perth Andover at a little motel. I always spend my last night on the road in a motel so I can clean and tidy everything. This one is nicely-situated just off the highway near a pizza place (so I can use up my vegan cheese) and I can wash all of my pots, pans and crockery in perfect peace.

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Sunday 27th September 2015 – I’M LOOKING FORWARD TO THIS.

Tonight, I’ll be sleeping in a real bed, in a real room, with full central heating too.

And what’s more, I’ve just stood for half an hour under a nice hot shower and I’ve changed my clothes and had a shave too. I even look human now, and you know how difficult that can be.

So how did all of this arise? The answer is that it’s a very long story.

This morning, I awoke to a torrential downpour of rain and the black sacks with the insulation in were sopping wet (although the insulation itself was dry).

And we had a small amount of condensation inside the truck cap, but considering how wet it was outside and the fact that I’d been cooking inside last night, I’m not surprised by this. The small amount of condensation was quite acceptable.

I hadn’t gone 5 kilometres when the metalled road ended. And while I was on the dirt road, the heavens opened and we were drenched in snow. It had been warmer in my little bolt-hole, but it wasn’t like that just here. This looked quite ominous for the rest of the journey. I wasn’t very optimistic.

Anyway, the dirt road only lasted for 15 kms or so and then we were back on the metalled road again. And I do have to say that in the dirt bit, there were men and machines, including an asphalt layer, all lined up. It looked as if today’s task (had the weather been better) would be to finish the gap.

And hats off to Strider too. I’ve been moaning about his excessive fuel consumption too (and to be fair, it is excessive) and I’d loaded up with 40 litres of extra fuel just in case I needed it. But we pulled in to the Ultramar petrol station in Happy Valley with the gauge just going into the final quarter. Not even the orange warning light, never mind having to refuel.

But I do have to say that the benefits of the new road are readily apparent. Whereas in 2010 when I was here, the difference between a litre of fuel here and a litre of fuel in a more-populated area was $0:34. Today, the difference is just $0:06. That says a lot.

After a coffee and an internet session at Tim Horton’s, I went for a good wander around.

First stop was to see what was happening with my old car – the one that I saw last year. It’s still here, looking definitely the worse for wear and it doesn’t look as if it is going to last for too long if no-one gives it any attention.

It really is sad

I went as far eastward as it was possible to go by road, and then went off for a wander into the bush to see what I could see in there.

This is the bay of Goose Bay, at the head of the Hamilton Inlet, and there’s a lovely sand bar just here in the bay. The beaches really are nice in Labrador. And in the background are the mountains over which I’ve driven this last couple of days.

This wasn’t all that there was to see either. There’s also a tent here in the woods.

There’s a really big Innu community around here and there are casual encampments all over the place. Although the First Nation people have adopted more modern building materials (I saw a hut made of OSB draped with a tarpaulin) the traditional itinerant lifestyle is quite important – and quite right too.

There was nothing doing at the quayside at Goose Bay and so I went on to North West River for a good look around. North West River is the farthest north town in Labrador that is possible to reach by road.

I was here late one evening last year and so this time I intended to have a better look around, even though the weather was dreadful.

And this is where our story begins.

I found a museum – the Labrador Interpretation Centre – and much to my surprise, it was open. That doesn’t happen very often.

I spent hours there chatting to the very friendly woman in charge, and we talked quite a lot about the interaction between the First Nation people and the Europeans.

“It’s a shame that the other museum in the town has closed for the season” she said. That has everything that you would like to see, including all of the papers from Mina and Leonidas Hubbard” … "he set out from here to explore the interior of Labrador 100 years ago and died of starvation – his wife set out 2 years later and completed his work" – ed …
“I’d love to see that” I said. “What a tragedy that it’s closed”.
And so after another long chat, I wandered off to look at the museum, and she came hurrying after me “I’ve spoken to the curator on the phone. If you can be there at 09:00 he’ll let you in for a private showing”.
Well, badger me!
“I don’t suppose that you know anywhere where I can stay for the night?” I said rather optimistically. My last night around here had cost me a King’s ransom, and that was 5 years ago.
She wandered off and came back again 5 minutes later.
“The B&B is full unfortunately, you won’t want to pay $115 at the motel here, but there’s a room free, with communal facilities including washing machine, in the old Grenfell Building. That’s $45 a night”.
Do bears have picnics in the wood?

She said that the best views around here were from the top of Sunday Hill, and so Strider and I went off-roading up the mountain.

It was worth the effort because the view from here was stunning as you can see. And it would have been even better had the weather been kinder to me. It was a really excellent place to eat my butties.

And hats off once more to Strider because he made short work of our little excursion up the mountain, even in just 2-wheel drive. If only I could seriously improve his fuel consumption!

So here I am. In Wood Cottage, or Woods Cottage as I’ve seen it sometimes described. Built in the 1920s, it was first the boarding house for schoolkids at the High School who had come from the outlying settlements, and was later an Old People’s Home. I’m warm and comfortable, I’ve had a hot shower, a nice mug of coffee and all of my washing is now in the tumble drier. I’m going to make some food in a minute and then I’ll be off to a nice comfortable bed.

You just watch the house burn down!

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Sunday 13 September 2015 – SO THAT WAS MY NIGHT …

… in my rather overpriced motel.

It trades heavily on its superb view of Mount Jefferson just across the road, but today I couldn’t even have my money’s worth of that, because of the hanging clouds that we were having (it IS just like home, isn’t it?).

We’d had rain during the night – not much of it but enough to generate this weather phenomenon, and so there I was. But at least there was a coffee machine in my room and I could have a good shower and change my clothes. And I had had a good night’s sleep too. So much so that I’d been on my travels again.

I’d been doing something in some kind of home. Firstly we’d been off somewhere to check on an abandoned house and in there we ound amongst other things a lively ginger kitten. It took straight to me and so I brought it back with me to thins home place.
Back here I had to prepare a bath for some residents but was interrupted as my father (whatever was he doing there) needed to use the bathroom. And then he couldn’t find any toilet paper so I had to hunt around for that.
Another one of my jobs was to water the motorcycles that were growing in pots. You had to start off by using heated water and then continue using tap water when the heated water ran out.
Meantime, this ginger kitten had gone missing in the house and no-one knew where it was.

But talking of being on my travels again, I didn’t go very far before I was sidetracked.

You all know what this is because you’ve seen one of these before. It’s a Nash Metropolitan, made by Austin (and called the Austin Metropolitan in the UK) and was the first car sold by an American manufacturer to be made 100% outside the USA.

It’s either e series 3 or a 4 (you can tell by the chrome stripe) and it’s fitted with the BMC Series B engine. 20,000 genuine miles from new on the original engine, this baby.

And as I said a few days ago, what went wrong with the British motor industry with in the 1950s and 1960s they were selling cars to half the world, and 20 years later, they couldn’t even sell cars in their own country?

And that’s not all either. How about taking this home in the hand luggage?

It’s a Ford Fairlane Crown Victoria sedan, fitted with a Fordamatic gearbox and it has the most magnificent interior that I have ever seen on a car.

This has to be one of the most beautiful vehicles that I have ever seen, and I’m in love with it. It sums up the 1960s USA completely for me. I didn’t enquire as to whether it was for sale, or ask the price because it would certainly be far, far outside my pocket.

I didn’t move on far – just to the town of Gorham.

There’s a mainline railway here, which might be the famous Montreal – Portland line, built before icebreakers could keep Montreal’s harbour free of ice in winter, so that Montreal’s commerce could have a winter outlet.

The passenger service here has long-gone, but the good inhabitants of the city have recruited a collection of locomotives and rolling stock, including this Baldwin 0-6-0 which dates to 1911 and which worked previously in a factory in Massachusetts.

It had a restoration in 1990, so we are proudly told, but this restoration seemed to be the usual North American restoration of slapping everything all over with black bituminous paint to hide the rust and hoping that no-one will notice.

You can see what I mean by looking here at the framework of the tender. The wood has just totally rotted away here to leave absolutely nothing at all and this is just completely dreadful.

On good authority I am told “The steam locomotive was built as New England Gas and Coke n°4, the company later became Eastern Gas and Fuel, and ran in Everett, Mass adjacent to Boston from 1911 to the 40s. It was significantly rebuilt during its life to what you see now and for a while was part of the Steamtown USA collection. Allegedly the tender is from B&M mogul 1435. It was sold off when the collection moved to Scranton and has remained in Gorham ever since. As built, it very closely resembled Baldwin #26 at Steamtown”

And thanks to Alden Burns for the info

And just look at this diesel power car. You can see even from here that several of the metal panels have been replaced with wood and the wood has rotted away just as much as the metal has. There’s notmuch of either left.

Now I have seen some dreadful attempts at preservation here in North America, but I do have to say that here in Gorham is the worst that I have ever encountered. The kind of stuff that is on display here brings shame upon its owners. It really is appalling.

And so from here I set off once more, continuing my route eastwards, missing out on Berlin and Peru but passing by Mexico and into Maine, and occasionally having a few more attacks of the Jimmy Ruffins.

At a certain moment I was passing very close to the watershed between the Atlantic and the St Lawrence basins, and there was the most astonishing view from a peak on the ridge.

It’s a shame that the weather wasn’t better to enable all of you to enjoy the view because, like most views from the camera, it was much more magnificent than it looks on the photo. It wascompletely spellbinding.

I wasn’t alone here either. A couple of German tourists were here too and I ended up having quite a chat with them for a while.

It reached 18:00 – time for me to call it a day and so I started to look for a place to park. And at 18:02 I found te perfect place – a little hardstanding behind a hedge right by the river. And had I had my bed in Strider organised, that’s where I would be now. But you can’t stop at spots like this with a tent.

There was a camp site further along the route but he didn’t take tents. However, he did point me in the direction of a free wilderness camp site about half an hour down the road and I eventually found it.

It’s extremely primitive, to say the least, but it’s free, which is what I need after my motel last night. There’s a nice spot in the corner by the stream and that’s where I’ll be staying tonight.

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Monday 31st August 2015 – BANE OF BRITAIN DOES IT AGAIN!

With having arrived early at my motel yesterday, I knuckled down to have a big washing session of all of my undies. And having done that, I hung them out to dry.

And then I drove away from my nice friendly motel this morning, and left them all behind. Ahhh well!

And so we’ve spent all day today having a major touch of the Jimmy Ruffins. Almost everywhere that I’ve been today, I can safely say that “I’ve passed this way before”. Whether it was yesterday, whether it was in 2014 when I was driving from Albany to Clinton, or whether it was in 2013 when I was on my way from Presque Ile to the Hudson Valley.

In fact, regular readers of this rubbish will remember this place. It’s the Oxford Plains speedway and I stopped here for lunch back in 2013, witnessing a training session of racing saloon cars.

And this was also where I stopped for lunch today, unfortunately without the accompaniment. And it was a late lunch too – 16:30 in fact – today. And that’s because I was really busy too.

I’ve visited a pile of RV dealers, I’ve met some really nice and helpful people (and a few people who just couldn’t care less, which just goes to underline that fact that customer service in the USA seems to be going backwards, not forwards, in many places) and yet I’ve not found a single slide-in camper to fit the Ranger. Plan B is looking more-and-more likely as time draws closer.

But my day has not been without its interesting moments. Here lying on the grass verge at the side of a forest road is this really beautiful Packard saloon of the 1940s.

It’s surprisingly complete too. The radiator and grille are missing and one or two other small things are no longer there, but all of the rest is still there, including the beautiful interior. This would be a fairly simple restoration project and wouldn’t take up too much time to put right

And near the town of Livermore we encountered some major road works where a bridge seems to have collapsed.

It’s not the major road works that were the most interesting part of this, but the fact that the road surface is just like Upper Labrador, and that brought back a few memories.

We had some excitement too about half a mile further on down the road. There was a team of stop-go-board people at another part of the roadwork, and they succeeded in creating a log-jam of traffic as they managed at one point to back up the traffic from the traffic lights right into their roadworks, so that nothing at all could move and we were stuck there for ages while they tried to sort everyone out.

There’s also a chain of supermarkets in this area, called Hannafords. Here I went for some shopping this afternoon and not only do they have the best bread that I have encountered on my travels, they had a selection of vegan food that was second-to-none.

From this point of view, North America is looking up. You may remember that even Dysarts, the big truck stop and transport café at Bangor, now has vegan and vegetarian options. Mind you, having seen the vegan food on offer in other countries and how much more choice and variety is available these days, it’s probably the fact that it’s France that is falling farther and farther behind. France really needs to get its act together if it’s to catch up with the rest of the world in the matter of vegetarian and vegan food.

Saturday 29th August 2015 – I’M NOT DOING VERY WELL …

… trying to find a slide-in camper back for Strider, but I’m doing my best and having some dreadful luck.

Having had one of the best night’s sleeps for quite a long while I was up and about ready and eager to go at all of … errr … 05:30 this morning. It just goes to show you the benefit of an early night and a good bed.

Mind you, I might have been ready to go, but I doubt if anyone else would have been, and so I spent a good couple of hours catching up on stuff on the computer and on the internet and also made a list, in distance order, of places that I need to go to in order to find out about campers.

By 09:00 I was ready for the off and first stop was Oakfield for some fuel and breakfast. Strider’s fuel consumption has improved a little too, which is good news.

Breakfast, including coffee, came to $3:07 but seeing as I had no loose change, I offered $4:00. “I just love your accent!” said the woman on the checkouts, passing me back $1:00. “No need to load up your pockets with change”. It’s the first place that I’ve ever been to where the staff have tipped the customers.

The RV place at Medway told me more about this camper that they have on offer. It’s 1997, been sitting on a park site for God knows how long and they want $3,000 for it. And there are no accessories with it. We arranged an appointment for “after 16:00” to go to see it, but I shudder to think what it must be like.

I drove on down to Bangor as there were three places to visit there. One of them had nothing, and seemed quite uninterested about the situation (so much for US business techniques). The second one, Harveys RVs, still had listed in the inventory the one that I was originally offered, but which had been sold from underneath me. I reminded the salesman that it was still up there on the list, “but it’s sold” said the salesman. “But we have a couple of new ones you can look at”. Now I understand the sales technique. Quite simply, it seems to be to “get people onto the lot at any price”.

The third one, which I visited on spec, had something extremely interesting and we spent an hour or so going over it. And I would have driven away with it too but when we came to measure up, it was 3 inches too wide and about a foot too long. That was definitely a major disappointment to me. Mind you, they did have a brand-new one that would have fitted on a pick-up smaller than mine and which weighed about half of what any other would weigh, but it wasn’t a fold-down top and in any case $20,000 is much more than what I want to pay.

Still, we had a really good chat for ages, helped no doubt that I was the first person in North America to recognise the photos of his Pride And Joy and correctly identify it as a Mercedes 190 Ponton. This kind of thing helps to break the ice at parties.

Home Depot came up trumps yet again. I need a new Ryobi plus one circular saw (which would have cost me $69:00) but they had a starter kit of saw, basic drill, charger and lithium battery at just $79:00. And a pack of two lithium batteries came to just $49:00. Things are definitely looking up in North America from that point of view.

All the way back to Millinocket afterwards to find this camp site and I must have driven around every dirt track and mountain trail in the whole of Upper Maine but with no success as far as this camper went. This was something of a wasted journey and I was quite annoyed about that. The road was exciting though and didn’t ‘arf rattle my teeth, but I can see the benefit of decent all-weather tyres on a 4×4, instead of high-speed road tyres on a town car, when driving on dirt tracks.

So I headed south on Highway 11 back to Bangor, on one of the nicest roads that I have ever driven. A new, refurbished black-top with scenic views, lakes, and lovely bends and you’ve no idea how much Strider loved the trip.

I had the speed limiter set to 55mph all the way down here and it really was an enjoyable drive, but Strider has a tendency to wander a little around the road, I’ve noticed. I’ll have to have a look at the dampers – maybe one or two need changing perhaps which is hardly surprising giving the battering he’s just had.

Brownville in Maine came up trumps, and for several reasons too – not the least of which being this gorgeous steel girder bridge across the river. It could do with a coat of paint of course, as well as all of the power lines that surround it pulled down so that I can have a decent shot of it, but I still think that it’s quite good nevertheless.

And where I had stopped to take the photo was on the corner of “Railroad Street” with an old sign directing me to the “railroad station”. What more can any man desire?

There’s quite an important railway junction here, with three lines merging in a triangular junction. I did notice a building that might have been a railway station but it was festooned with US flags and “Private Property” signs – clearly the home of Republicans, and so I wasn’t going to risk a bullet in the back of my neck by photographing it, such is the paranoia and the fear gripping most Americans these days.

But from the other side of the tracks, braving the “private property” and “no trespassing signs”, I could take a photo of the busy goods yard and tell you that the station is on the other side behind the railway wagons.

Upper Maine is noted for its lumber industry and there is ample evidence of that all over the place, especially here at Pleasant River where there is the biggest pile of timber that I have ever seen. It looks much more impressive in real life than it does on film.

In the foreground is the finished product – wood for the building industry all cut and planed, and shrink-wrapped to keep out the damp and for ease of shipping. All of this of course might explain the busy railway goods yard at Brownville Junction just up the road.

There were lots more things to see too but the light had gone by now and it was going dark. I’ll have to come back here another time.

But I had noticed that I hadn’t seen a single motel all along this road and so I headed for Bangor. And by the time that I arrived at Bangor in the pitch black, I still hadn’t either.

As for a motel, a cheap cat-house wanted $99:00 for a room so we can forget that, and so I headed to Dysart’s truck stop for tea. And much to my astonishment, Dysarts now has vegetarian and vegan options on the menu.

They also had nice, thick artisan-type blankets at $9:99 and if I’m going to end up sleeping some nights in Strider, there’s no time like the present to make a start. It beats $99:00 in a cheap motel.

Friday 28th August 2015 – HERE’S STRIDER …

… all loaded up with a huge domestic fridge and a big cooker, and in a few minutes we are off to Sharp’s, the metal place just outside Woodstock.

I’m taking my leave of Darren, Rachel and family and heading off into the hills. I mean – I’ve been here 10 days and that’s not like me at all to put down roots like this.

At Sharps, there was nearly a lot more metal hauled into the yard as I failed to see a dark purple car against the dark vegetation background as I pulled out to go across the road. That was rather embarrassing, to say the least, especially as I had something of an audience watching me.

Anyway, having done that, I went down the road and to the border with Great Satan at Houlton. Crossing into the USA there took ages with the queue of traffic (but nothing like what it took to get into Canada the other week) and just for a change, every single one of the border guards was friendly, cheerful and helpful. If all border crossings could be like this one, travelling would be a lot less stressful.

However, just to prove that little of the underlying spirit of the USA has changed very little, while I was there, four people were chosen from the queue to receive closer attention

me – with a foreign passport
a black guy
a long-haired hippy-type
an oriental family

Still the same old stereotypes, so it seems. But as I said, even though I was selected for closer attention, it wasn’t a stressful experience by any means – just a friendly chat.

In Houlton, I struck lucky yet again at Marden’s and it made me wish that I hadn’t spent that monay at Canadian Tire the other day because they had everything that I needed there and at half the price too. But this is the thing with Marden’s – their stock is very much of the moment. It’s all bankruptcy, liquidations, fire sale stuff and it comes and goes. You can’t ever rely on them for having anything.

I fuelled up Strider as well, and I’ve come to the conclusion that his fuel consumption isn’t as bad as I was fearing. I let him run quite empty, to a rather depressing 425kms (not enough for Labrador) but to refill, it took 15.4 US gallons – about 55 litres. It’s still not very good, but at least I know what to expect.

Consequently, at the Walmart at Presque Ile, where I went next, I picked up a second 20-litre fuel container, just to be on the safe side.

And here, I struck lucky too. 2-tonne trolley jacks on sale at just $18:86. Anyone who has tried to jack up a vehicle on a dirt road with a sill jack (as we did in 2012 out in northern Quebec) will know the value of having decent tools and equipment for tyre changing. I could have done that job in 20 minutes, not three hours, with decent equipment.

Back on the road again, I didn’t go far. Just as far as Bridgewater in fact

This is a 1919 Mack fire truck, “used” here in Maine at a fire depot until 1960. Then it was converted to a tow truck but was never used and was simply laid up, until the present owner acquired it.

And I said “used” in inverted commas, because it’s done a verified 1900 miles since new.

Never mind shaft drive, this is chain-drive – in fact twin chain drive – as you can see.

It’s a 4-cylinder engine, displacing 600 cubic inches, and has a belt-drive clutch, which is bound to make for exciting motoring on the modern highway. And it does run too – in fact the owner takes it out to park it on the verge every morning and then brings it back inside at night.

You all know where this is though – it’s at the place where they have the scrap Rolls-Royce that has featured on these pages in the past. And he also has a 1925 Dodge Brothers (NOT a Dodge) convertible, a 1924 Renault, a 1910 Panhard-Levassor (and we spent ages discussing the merits and otherwise of sleeve-valve engines) and, would you believe, a Kawasaki motorbike with an Isuzu 4-cylinder 1700cc diesel engine fitted.

I couldn’t take a photo of it because they were still “work in progress”, but I’ll be back here next year to see how he’s getting on.

Not I’m in a motel just off the highway going south. I’ve had a shower, washed my clothes, and had beans and chips for tea. Now I’m ready for anything.

Thursday 27th August 2015 – WHAT A STORM!

Totally terrific. Lightning, thunder and the most astonishing rain that fell in just 10 minutes. And the worst thing about that is that I had left Strider’s drivers-side window open and so at least on the way home I washed my underwear.

I had a disturbed night, with something of a record of having to leave my bed – and I blame this half-litre of thirst-quenching drink that I had had with my tea. And I also slept through the alarm clocks too and it was 08:30 when I finally rose from my stinking pit

I’ve said … "and on many occasions too" – ed … that there was an old Canadian Pacific railway line that came up to Centreville from Woodstock and I’ve been following its path in a desultory kind of fashion.

There’s a road near here called Avondale Station Road and I’ve had a wander down there on a couple of occasions looking for the station site without success.

But having tracked down the route using aerial photographs I’m pretty convinced that this is the track bed of the railway, although the station site is well-overgrown – to such en extent that it’s not clear on which side of the road it would have been.

From here I headed off to Woodstock again and ended up having to go on a marathon detour almost to the USA border due to roadworks. And I met my bus from the other night too while I was on my travels around.

I ended up at Walmart looking for clothes and some guy in a wheelchair thought that it was fun to get in my way whenever I was trying to pick something up. Eventually I managed to reach something, and he made a remark like “Why didn’t you ask me to move?”
“Because I used to be married – I’m used to people being difficult”.

But I did have another piece of good luck in Walmart. A small lightweight 1/4 – 3/8 drive socket set at $9:00. This toolkit is building up slowly.

At Tim Horrton’s we were once again surrounded by Miltonists. About 10 staff on duty, one of whom was at the drive-in, another of whom was at the counter, a third was making wraps and as for the rest, “they also serve who stand and wait”.

After my coffee I went round to see Zoe’s shop and for a chat to see how she was doing. She could be doing better of course, but it’s hard to tell a 21 year-old about your 40-odd years of sometimes-bitter experience. They would much rather make their own mistakes. And then round to Sharp’s to see if they would take the scrap metal that we have (they will).

I went back to Centreville along the road on the eastern side of the Saint John River.

It’s not a road that I travel very often and so I don’t know all of the good views, but here’s a stunning viewpoint from a few miles south of Hartland. We can see the Saint John River of course, and in the background we have the wind farm up on Mars Hill in Maine, USA (my plot of land is to the right of the hill).

In the centre of the photo is the bridge that took Trans-Canada Highway version 2 (or is it 3?) over the river, but in front of this you’ll be able to make out the world’s longest covered bridge at Hartland.

My way back to Rachel’s took me over the river and back via Lakeville where there’s a car body repair shop. He always has some interesting stuff there but as he’s one of the best body repairers in the region his output is far too good to be suitable for these pages.

But there are always exceptions to this, such as this absolutely wonderful Mack Thermodyne B61 of the early 1950s.

It’s been stood for ages but he’s managed to make it go, however the water pump has failed. He says that it’s up to the owner to source one, and he wishes him good luck. The plan, I imagine, is that once it’s running he’ll restore it, and I’ll love to see it when it’s finished.

Hannah was supposed to be ringing me up to give her a hand to mow the lawn but she never did, and so I popped by to see how she was doing. But she had done it all on her own without my help and now she and her friend Journee were making a beer-pong table for her party tomorrow night. I went on to the shop and waited for closing time.

And this was when the storm hit.

Later in the evening Darren and I loaded up Strider with a huge fridge and a big stove. On my way round to Great Satan I’ll be heaving them out at Sharp’s.

Tuesday 18th August 2015 – LAST DAY IN MONTREAL

Last night’s sleep wasn’t anything like as good as the previous night’s, but that can be explained by the fact that as soon as I came in last night, I drank about a litre of spruce beer.

Being on my travels didn’t help matters either. I’d spent much of the night in the company of a young person who was having gender issues. He or she had half-undergone the hormone therapy necessary to change sex, but then had had a change of mind and not only stopped the treatment but was changing back. This led on from here to me taking a taxi – one of mine as it happens – to go to a white house somewhere. The driver was completely new – I was his first customer – and the journey was interesting to say the least, including undertaking another driver at a road junction and overshooting the destination. The driver said “well that was a bit of a disaster, wasn’t it?” to which I replied “don’t worry. We all have to start somewhere”.

So after breakfast I cracked on with some more work on the computer and this took me right up until 11:00. I had my airport shuttle booked for 11:15 and didn’t want to miss it, so I made sure that it arrived on time by pouring myself a full cup of coffee at 11:14 precisely. Works every time!

It took 5 minutes to get to the airport from where this hotel is, and I spent the time helping out a couple of people who needed to travel into the city. There was a 747 bus already in at the stop and the driver took 10 minutes to sort himself out, during which time a woman with three kids came onto the bus. She told them to sit down “as it’s going to be a long ride”
“And if I know anything about Montreal bus drivers, a wild ride too” I added.

And sure enough, off we shot and arrived at the coach station at the rue de Berri just 35 minutes later, shaken but not stirred.

Ten dollars it cost to leave my bag in the consigne, which is quite expensive, but then imagine what it would have cost in time and so on to go all the way back to the hotel to pick it up and then lug it all the way back here through the city later this evening. This had to be the sensible option – the hotel shuttle to the airport and then the 747 bus directly to the coach terminal.

And I can’t believe this but in a Dollar Store just round the corner from the bus station as I continue my stroll down rue St Catherine Est I find exactly the right adapter for the Swiss electrical plugs. That’s an amazing find, and something else to add to the travel bag

This is a beautiful little street isn’t it – a pile of beautiful little houses down there and some typical Quebec maisonettes of the type that you see in all of the urban areas.

Balconies and open staircases – must be beautiful to sit outside on them on a lovely summer’s evening but it must be hell, absolute hell in the middle of a Quebec winter trying to get to your front door.

But why I stopped was to look at the corner of the street at this new building is that it’s the site of the Ouimetoscope.

That was the very first cinema to be opened in Montreal – in January 1906 in fact, and the following year was rebuilt to be come the largest cinema in North America at the time.

There’s some kind of scheme going on here in Montreal at the moment – what they call the Piano Publique. They have dumped a load of pianos about in different parts of the city and are encouraging people to sit down and play them.

This guy isn’t too bad at all as it happens. I could sit and listen to him for quite a while, but I just don’t have the time.

Look at this gorgeous art-deco building here on the corner of St Catherine and Alexandre Deseve, at 1560 rue St Catherine Est. There’s been a “Club Sandwich” here in the past as well as an Irish bar and the Hotel Bourbon.

It’s the Complexe Bourbon, quite a favourite spot in the city in the past, and at one time was up for sale for $8,500,000, but that was several years ago. It looks as if it will be pulled down before its much older and what a shame because it’s beautiful.

This church was formerly the Sacre Coeur de Jesus down at the end of the rue Alexandre Deseve.

The church doesn’t function as a church any more and the big house at the side, the ancienne Presbytere, is now a centre d’accueil pour les jeunes en difficulte – possibly the Association les Chemins du Soleil which is situated, according to a poster that I saw plastered about the church, at 1155 rue Alexandre Deseve.

At the parc Charles Campbell, a lawyer and philanthropist of the 19th Century who left all of his money to create parks for children to amuse themselves in the open air, they are having a Neighbourhood Fair tonight, with entertainment, food and all kinds of stuff going on.

And you might not be able to see him but there’s a guy sitting in that tree just there pulling that banner up at the far end of that rope.

I had lunch at the Subway down here, asked once again if i wanted cheese with my “nothing but crudites”, and ended up by dropping half of it on the floor and making a huge mess everywhere.

But after lunch I strolled down to the metro station to tale the train all the way down to Honore Beauregard, the end of the line

That’s the view down rue Sherbrooke est down towards the famous Olympic Stadium and its leaning tower. Anyway, I’ll walk down here for a little while, the old Chemin du Roy, and see what I can find, if anything.

Right by the Langelier metro station is a Motel le marquis. Cheapest room is about $80 – not too bad, I suppose. I’ll have to remember that.

And from here I caught a bus that took me all the way down the Boulevard Langelier towards the Galeries d’Anjou.

That’s all of the big buildings near the end of the autoroute at the junction between Highway 40 and Highway 25 there and the Galeries d’Anjou are somewhere to the right of that.

And I’ve found the Value Village! Furthermore, it’s 30% off on Tuesdays for senior citizens! Spend! Spend! Spend! But I could only find one book and one CD that interested me. Rather a waste of a senior citizen’s discount if you ask me.

Canadian Tire have tents at $29:99 and $34:99- that’s the three-seater one which is 7 feet wide so my bed will fit in there quite comfortably whereas the cheaper one is only 6 feet at its widest and that might be a struggle. Then we start to get into the realm of big tents after that. I mean, why would you have a tent to sleep 14 people? I don’t even know 14 people, let alone 14 people with whom I’d like to go away on holiday, but then they do go in for big families in Quebec.

In rue Jean Talon I’ve just seen the rustiest cars that I’ve ever seen, any of mine and the Cortina parked down my field since 1997 included. I didn’t take a photo of it because it isn’t the polite thing to do but it’s so rotten that the windscreen is about to drop out – the whole windscreen surround including the roof corners have just gone. Makes that grey Cortina look good and that’s stood in a field for 18 years.

And it’s suddenly occurred to me what I haven’t seen at all ever since I’ve been in Canada on Saturday, and I haven’t seen a cat.

This is the sports ground at the rue Jean Talon and way over there behind the floodlights in the distance and across the motorway behind it is the motel where I stayed the very first night that I was ever in Canada.

But what had caught my eye was the drinking fountain so I had a good wash to cool me down, filled my cap with water and stuck it on my head. All of the cold water ran off down the back of my neck and believe me, it was the best feeling that I had ever had.

I got to see one of the new Transits from close up and I reckon that there are differences to the European ones inside. In fact there seem to be quite a few differences so I wonder what has happened here that the differences haven’t been carried forward, because it is reasonabily impressive.

There’s no model designation on it either, which surprises me – just a ” Ford”, and made in Kansas City judging by a sticker on the windscreen. Body number begins 1FT(or 2)NR1CM

There’s a little process of gentrification going on in the rue Jean Talon – it’s been a bit down-at-heel in places but in other places there are bits of building going on and it’s all starting to look quite nice

These new bank buildings are on the corner of the Boulevard Viau and rue Jean Talon and are typical of what is going on all around here

I walked on quite a way past Viau, past Pius IX and past a couple of metro stations and by this time I was starting to lose interest. Time was slowly passing on, the only pizza places that I has passed (I really fancied a pizza tonight and I had my cheese all at the ready) were these ethic places full of grease, and I was hot, sticky, exhausted and footsore.

So I hopped onto the metro all the way to Snowdon where I still didn’t find the pizza that I wanted (and I had my vegan cheese all ready too) and eneded up back at the falafel place at the Cote-des-Neiges, for want of anything better.

It was just outside here that I met my first traditional bus driver. There was a bus stop just outside the restaurant and there was a bus just pulling up. I asked him if he was going to the Snowdon metro station down at the bottom of the hill, to which he replied that I was facing the wrong way – the station was just “back there”. And then he drove off.

The station “back there” was in fact the “Cote des Neiges” so I don’t know whether he was having a mental blank or whether he was just being difficult. Anyway, I trudged back up to the Cote des Neiges metro station and went round to the coach station.

Having rescued my suitcase I ended up chatting with two women, one aged 84 and the other aged 91, who were regular bus travellers, even at their age. They were off to visit their third sister somewhere in the USA. This passed the time quite nicely until my bus pulled in, and then I was off.

We went over the Cartier Bridge and then into Longueuil for more passengers, and then we were off. I curled up on my seat and dozed off to sleep.

-2

Friday 14th August 2015 – ZURICH IN THE RAIN

Having crashed out at some silly times like 22:00 last night, and having slept the sleep of the dead, I was up and about, all bright-eyed and bushy-tailed, by 06:00, admiring the view from my hotel window. And a nice warm shower quickly brought me round into the Land of the Living.

By 06:30 I had finished watching the film that I started yesterday, then edited all of the photos, uploaded them onto the web and then brought my blog

up to date, all by 08:30.

I’ve had a good breakfast too – I’m not sure at all that there will be something for me to eat on the plane to Zurich and while I’m now in possession of a fruit loaf and some biscuits (as well as a bottle of water), thanks to the Carrefour Hypermarket in the gallery down the road, on these kinds of journeys the plan is to eat when I can.

I’ve uploaded a pile of radio programmes to the laptop too, to refresh the radio library, and with a few other things that needed to be done, I was out of the hotel and gone by 10:45.

At the station (the other side of the station) there was a tram already parked at the platform ready to go to the airport so even though there’s a €1:00 supplement (on what is already a steep fare) for tickets bought on board, I wasn’t going to hang about. A bird in the hand … and all of that.

Lyon airport is something of a maze, and to make matters worse, you have to look long and hard for a baggage trolley. I couldn’t find one, and at first I thought that they simply didn’t have one, but I later saw someone at the check-in with one so they must exist somewhere. But the terminal is big, clean, light, airy, and there are not too many people about. At the baggage check-in, I didn’t even have to queue. There was an assistant waiting for me.

Even the passage through “security” was relatively stress-free, although the woman at the scanner had a good moan about my camera. I think however that that is more to do with the fact that she was of the moaning type, rather than for any other good purpose.

As for our plane – well, what can I say? It was nominally a Dash 8-400, built by Bombardier in Canada, but you don’t need to be an aircraft expert to recognise this for what it is – a Vickers Vimy.

Orville and Wilbur Wright were at the controls, Ameilia Earhart was sitting at the back, and I had to move Glenn Miller’s sandwiches off my seat. That’s the kind of plane that it was.

I shan’t say much about the flight. The events speak for themselves. We had to wear our seatbelts throughout the entire flight and they refused to serve tea and coffee at any moment during the flight. All of the kids were screaming during the flight, and one or two of the adults were too. Not for the faint-hearted, this particular flight.

And as for the landing – well, we didn’t actually land. It was more like we were shot down over the airport. But even that didn’t deter the passengers, many of whom rose from their knees to give the pilot a round of applause – presumably to celebrate the end of the flight

And it was here that everything started to go wrong. I was waiting for over an hour for the hotel shuttle bus to arrive, which it never did. And no-one answered the hotel telephone. Eventually, another hotel bus driver told me that there wasn’t one for the Ibis Budget Hotel. He offered to take me for 20:00 CHF

However I’m not easily taken in by this kind of thing and I walked down to the bus station. Here, one friendly river with whom I had quite a chat with whatever German I could remember. He sent me over to the 510 bus an while the driver was a little on the grumpy side, he put me off at the right place and pointed out the way to the hotel from there – all of 50 metres.

At the hotel, there’s no electrics for guests. All of the sockets are these two-pin mini-continental sockets and you need to buy an adapter – cost 10CHF.

We had a few words about that, and at the end of our debate she finished with "is there anything else that I can do for you?"
Well, she was in her early 20s, long blond hair, a nice shape, but I remembered where I was."No thanks. You’ll probably want me to pay for it".

When the rain stopped (did I say that it was p155ing down?) I walked back to the airport for a recce. I ended up walking past the car park for a hire company. And here parked at the back was an old Land Rover snowplough that had clearly better days.

In fact, this is quite a rarity here in Switzerland. There are all kinds of old cars in the country but mostly quite expensive and fully-restored. I can’t say that I have ever seen a vehicle in this kind of condition lying about like this.

Yes, I really did walk back to the airport. It took me all of about 15 minutes. And I’m glad that I did because it gave me an opportunity to photograph it

I discovered that a 24-hour ticket would cost me 13:20CHF to cover all of the zones that I need to get into the city, and so I duly did. Had I done that earlier, instead of paying the bus driver for the single journey, I would have been quids-in. But you have to pay to learn.

I found an all-night supermarket, lots of water, and a main-line railway station where, inter alia a train goes every evening to Budapest. I made a note of that. But I’ll tell you something – I was astonished by the number of beggars (mostly young, fit types) loitering in the streets.

Another thing that I noticed was that allbut one of my night-time images of Zurich didn’t come out. I’d gone into the city with the intention of trying out the camera on the phone at night in an urban environment, and the result has not been succeesful. The daytime ones work fine as you can see, because everything to date has been taken with that.

And on the way in, I noticed at the Haldenbach tram stop an imbiss type of place so I leapt off the tram (such are the advantages of a 24-hour tram ticket) and yes, they did indeed sell falafel.

So I’m fed and watered and ready to bed. But I’m struggling to come to terms with Swiss prices.

Thursday 13 August 2015 – FOR THE FIRST TIME IN MY LIFE …

…I’m ready well in advance of time to go.

Well, I’m not. I have been looking for three days for the $200 that I drew out of my Canadian Bank before leaving last October, so I’m having to go without it. And now I know why I drew it all out too. My Canadian bank card expired back in May!

So I hope that my European cards work, otherwise I’m going to have a couple of problems.

Mind you, it was touch and go that I got here in time this morning. I’d been out in Eastern Europe in a city that straddled the border between the East and the West. I was in the east with a party of people (as it happened, people with whom I worked in Stoke on Trent) and we were in a coach or a train that wasn’t moving but the seats were comfortable. Anyway, who should turn up but Nerina, with her Afro haircut of the early 90s. She sat next to me and ended up sharing my bunk, and I could see all of the people looking around and quizzing each other as to who she was.

I asked her how she had made it over to here – did she come by rail through the East, because I was interested in the trains that she might have seen, but she had come to the railway station in the West and walked across the border, which disappointed me.

So first job was the washing up. And that was when I made a startling discovery – that I had brought some water up last night to do the washing-up, and then left it on the side and went to bed. I’m definitely getting old, aren’t I?

And then there was the beichstuhl that needed emptying, cleaning and refilling, such delightful jobs that I have.

I’ve also cleaned the waste bins and isn’t that a first?

Liz came for me and we went to the mairie to pick up a Certificat de Domicile but as I expected, it’s closed for the holidays. I must remember to ring up on Tuesday! I did meet Valentin there though, loading up the Commune’s little van. We had a good chat and it seems that he’s re-signed for Pionsat this year, and that’s good news! I’ve no idea why he went to play at Terjat.

Liz and I went for coffee in the brasserie opposite the station.And while we were there, this interesting Piaggio APE pulled up just opposite.

I had a brief chat with the owner but he didn’t say very much. But he didn’t mind me taking a few photos of it (it’s always polite to ask).

It brought back a few memories of the Piaggio APE50 that we discovered on waste land in Brussels and which now resides – or it did, the last time that I heard anything about it – in Stoke on Trent

Here’s my train – a little single-unit diesel. I’ve not been on one of these before. But it’s nice, clean and comfortable – a far cry from anything that you find on the rails in the UK.

And we set off bang on time too, which is another far cry from life on the rails in the UK. And one thing that I like about France – “we regret that the toilet on board the train isn’t functioning. If you need this service, please make yourself known to the guard who will arrange for a longer stop at one of the stations that we visit”.

Mind you – I was half-expecting that we would be offered the possibility to pull up on the main line at a suitable hedge.

I didn’t realise that there were two railway stations in Montlucon – but I do now!

The line to Riom is what can best be described as “bucolic” – what one writer once wrote as a “merry, mazy ramble” across the Auvergnat countryside. I’ve advanced about 25 kms but it’s taken me an hour and a half and about 90kms to do it.

At Riom it’s pouring down – a real torrential downpour – and my train is bang on time. And then this is where I realise that it’s lunchtime and for once in my life I’m caught without a supply of food about my person.

By the time I reached Vichy it had stopped raining, but it had started again at Tarare.

First stop at Lyon was at the Subway for a very late lunch. And it was at here that we had the usual Subway dialogue-
Our Hero – could I have a 12-inch with nothing but crudités?
Serving Wench – do you want cheese with that?

There are trolley buses in Lyon these days – I hadn’t noticed that before. It seems that all of this “obsolete” transport of the 1950s – trams, trolley buses – was not obsolete at all. In fact, it was a hundred years ahead of its time. And it seems to be doing its work here in Lyon too because the streets are much less crowded than any other European city that I’ve visited recently.

As for my hotel, it’s 5 or 10 minutes away from the station. It’s modern and clean and tidy, with all of the services to hand. I had a lovely vegetarian pizza (I always bring my own cheese) for tea. It seems that this idea of flying out of Lyon, at least to here, is paying off in spades.

And as good an idea as it might have been, it could be even better too, believe it or not, because there’s a cheap budget hotel – the Athena – with rooms at €58:00, actually built into the station block. A walk of about 50 yards.

I shall have to look closely into this, but not tonight because although it’s only about 22:00, I’m crashing out.

-1

Saturday 4th July 2015 – NOW THAT WAS A REALLY NICE …

… afternoon at the swimming baths in Commentry. Glorious hot weather, I was all sweaty, what more could I say?

The sides of the pool were open and people were disporting themselves on the terrace and on the lawn (picnicking allowed) and the pool was packed out. So much so that I was going up and down the pool in one of the swimming lanes.

I was there for well over two hours too which is something of a record. But then again, there was so much to see. Ohh yes – I can still chase after the women at my age. I just wish that I could remember why.

And why was I all hot and sweaty? That was because I’d been mauling about half a tonne of tiles and cement about.

Caliburn is now loaded up with tiles for the shower room. You can see in the photo what I’m having. I’m not having those joining pieces though. I’ve bought some “different shades of grey” mosaic tiles, the type where you can cut the string with scissors. That way, if I start from the bottom with the darker tiles and start from the top with the lighter tiles, the gap in the middle can be filled quite easily without the aid of a tile cutter.

Quite astonishingly, I’d been around all of the usual places, done two laps around Brico Depot and loaded up Caliburn by just 11:45. Having the Dawn Chorus wake me up in the morning is an excellent idea. I even had time to go and buy the glass for the window above the shower room door before they closed for lunch.

A trip around LeClerc (where I remembered to change the empty gas cylinder for a new one) and round the Auchan, and I was away from there by 13:45 and in the pool at Commentry by 14:30.

I’d seen a few old cars on my travels too. This is a Unic pick-up that I saw at a tyre-fitting place in Montlucon on my way around.

Unic was a popular French car-maker before World War II, and many of the taxis that took the French troops to fight at the Marne were Unics. After the war, the company was taken over by Simca, for whom it was the commercial vehicle arm.

In 1968 the marque was sold to FIAT and in 1975 was incorporated into the IVECO mark.

You can tell by the FIAT- like badge that This pick-up is from the period 1968-75 and so it’s doing really well to be still on the road and working. and I do have to say that I was impressed by the bodywork repairs on the cab corners, but you have to resort to tricks like this with such a vehicle, as I imagine that body panels are almost non-existent.

The second interesting vehicle that I saw today is almost certainly older. This is one of the Chenard et Walcker vans that were sold by Peugeot as the D3 and D4 series from 1950 to 1965 when the model was replaced by the J7.

This os one of the later ones, as you can tell by the snout at the front. The very first models were powered by a 2-cylinder flat-twin two-stroke motor but that quickly gave was to the 4-cylinder four-stroke engine out of the Peugeot 203 and later the Peugeot 403. The 4-cylinder engines were too long to fit in the body, hence the snout.

It is possible to tell whether this is a D3A, a D3B, a D4A or a D4B, but not by me at this distance. Still, it’s pretty old and quite an interesting curio.

All of the roads around Commentry were closed for repair and so I had to come back through the town. This took me past the Market Hall, the first time for ages.

I remember the market hall as being a dreary, dingy place when I first came past here years ago, but they seem to have done it proud with a programme of modernisation. It looks so much better now that ever it did before.

So that was my day – another expensive one, but loads of interesting vehicles and a lovely day at the baths. i’m off for an early night now to make the most of it.

-1

Monday 18th May 2015 – AS YOU MIGHT EXPECT …

… we had something of a slow start this morning. After my long drive of yesterday and my bad night’s sleep thanks to the Swiss Highway Patrol, I was in no mood for an early start.

Nevertheless, I did heave myself out of my stinking pit at something like a reasonable hour and after breakfast I set to work.

And the result of today’s efforts is, quite frankly, in the words of the old poem three-fifths of five-eights of … errr … badger all.

Anyone reading this rubbish will recall that the laptop that packed up on my voyage is my second Acer Aspire. The first one has a broken screen and a smashed keyboard where something fell on it (but despite that, this is what I’m using regardless, with “cut-and-paste” for the missing letters and manoeuvring the workspace around the screen, which shows you just how resilient they are, not to mention the five hours battery life) so the idea was quite simple – two identical machines so just swap the hard drives over.

After about two hours, during which time I realised that despite the outer casing being identical, they are far from identical inside and not even the batteries will swap over. Moving the disks produces the error message “No bootable device detected” even though the disks are both being picked up by the BIOS.

Acer’s technical help was interesting too. On their live chat system, I had a brief discussion with a “technician” who then copy-pasted a huge long screed about “you need to send your machine in for repair. Please send us £50-odd to open a file for you, and then we will send you instructions”.

So much for that.

The ultimate solution to the problem is a new machine. And there was an Acer Aspire – a more up-to-date version of mine – for £219 which by the time I’ve added the £50 for the file, the cost of a new hard drive, the labour for the installation and the postage and packing is mere peanuts.

So that is that. Meanwhile, any tips for hacking the information out of the old failed drive would be much appreciated.

On that note I went down to the Intermarche in Pionsat to buy some food seeing as how there is nothing here to eat. But badger that for a moment – here’s something exciting.

You can tell by the louvred bonnet that this is one of the earliest Citroen 2CV’s, and the deckchair interior goes to prove it too.

And while I was having a good look around, the owner came out. None other than Marianne’s friend Francois Legay, who has quite an interesting collection of old vehicles.

This Citroen is a 1952 model and is about 98% original. The seat material, the cooling fan and one or two other bits and bobs have been replaced, mainly due to the difficulty of resourcing the original parts.

There’s a 375cc engine in there, air-cooled of course, and flat-out, downhill with a following wind the car might just manage 70kph.

So that cheered me up somewhat, and I went off quite happily to do my shopping.

Saturday 16th May 2015 – IN SWITZERLAND

It’s taken me long enough to find a ferry on this journey, but nevertheless here I am.

This is the ferry across the Bodensee, or Lake Constance for the English-speakers amongst you and it sails from Friedrichshafen in Germany to Romanshorn in Switzerland and I am about to make my triumphal entry therein – the first time on this journey.

The waterfront is quite modern too, and unashamedly so. and not the result of wanton vandalism on behalf of the civic authorities but wanton vandalism on behalf of RAF Bomber Command in World War II.

Not that too many people can have too many complaints about that for once (although they might protest at the lack of accuracy) because there are at least two good reasons why the town of Friedrichshafen was a legitimate military target in World War II.

And indeed not to mention World War I because the first ever bombing raid in World War I took place here just a matter of a couple of weeks after the start of the war took place here and given the primitive state of the equipment and navigation, was a stunning success that matches anything that the Dambusters could come up with in World War II.

We’ll be going for an inspection of these two legitimate targets in due course.

But it took me ages to arrive at the Bodensee as I was being continually interrupted.

This is a suspension bridge over the River Argen. according to a sign at the bridge, it was built in 1896/97 under Kaiser Wilhelm, and that shows you just what a really big man he must have been because the bridge really is quite impressive.

Today it’s flanked by a railway bridge and a modern pre-stressed concrete road bridge, but this one outshines them all.

The village of Eriskirch a little farther along the roa was full of surprises, and this is just one of them.

It’s one of our old friends a wooden covered bridge. We encounter dozens, if not hundreds of these on our journeys around North America, but Europe has its fair share to offer as we have seen in the past, and as we shall indeed see again before we are much older. I would have gone for a wander through here, but it was closed for repair.

And that’s not all. Eriskirck also came up with a Ford Cortina Mk V too, excet that this is a mainland European version called the Taunus.

This was parked in a yard with half a dozen other noteworthy cars. I gave it a good going-over and I reckon that a good weekend’s work would have this back on the road. There didn’t seem to be much wrong with it and it was solid in all the suspect places

It’s amazing the things that you encounter on your travels but seeing this flying over me as I travelled further west reminded me of what I was doing down here in the first place.

And that’s just a baby too. could you imagine something maybe five or six times as big flying over your head, because that’s what used to happen in World War I when these monsters were legendary.

Yes, well done that man. It is indeed a Zeppelin and here on the outskirts of the town of Friedrichshafen are the headquarters of the company.

On a Bank Holiday weekend it was expecting too much for me to be able to go for a trip around, much as I tried, but I had a nosey about instead.

And my hat went off to the intrepid pilots of November 1914 who flew here in rickety string and canvas biplanes who managed to fly here from France and hurl a bomb into a Zeppelin shed, even if they didn’t manage to accomplish very much

I did say that there were a couple of legitimate military targets here in Friedrichshafen. The second one was the Dornier aircraft factory here.

Dorniers were known mainly for their seaplanes and they were built and tested down on the waterfront, hence the bombing raids down there. They also made bombers, the Do-17 and Do-217 but manufacture of those was dispersed throughout Germany

The only aircraft here from before the war are those that have come from elsewhere, such as the flying boat which, if we are to believe the registration number on it, is that flown on the Amundsen expedition to the North Pole in 1925 but which I strongly suspect is a replica.

No Do-17 though – not even a replica and I found that very disappointing. I can understand there not being a real one, although if they made an effort they could certainly find some bits, but no replica is a shame.

Back on the ferry now and I forgot to take any details of the boat upon which I was sailing, which isn’t like me at all.

Anyway, it was a boat that looks very much like this one. This is sailing in the opposite direction to us and while they might not look very big, they are ten times bigger than the Hatteras Ferry boats that sail across the Hurricane belt in the Carolinas.

I’m back in Germany again and that’s the River Rhine just there.

The town in the background is called Diessenhofen, a beautiful little walled town that is first recorded in 757, although there are considerable remains from much earlier than this, even as far back as the Stone Age, and a substantial Roman hoard was discovered here.

To cross the Rhine is a substantial covered bridge, and this was part of the secret of the wealth of the town – the tolls that were generated by people wishing to cross the river.

Today though, there are no tolls, and not even a border post, despite Switzerland not being in the EU. I simply wandered across unchallenged.

But why I crossed over back there was so that I could cross back here. That’s the border and the Rhine is behind me. Theres a little finger of Switzerland that is north of the Rhine, near the village of Ramsen and this was the favourite spot for escaping prisoners of war to cross the border from Germany, where they didn’t have to contend with the Rhine.

On the German side of the border here, the guard was asleep and in the Swiss hut, the place was deserted. And the border was so unguarded (well, relatively, anyway) during the war that one escapee passed through and out the other side where he was recaptured, without even realising that he had been in Switzerland.

Ive come here to see the Rhine falls at Schaffhausen. This was somewhere else where I came on my honeymoon with Nerina and with it being mid October, the river was fairly low.

This time of year is the peak time to see the falls as the last of the snow melt roars through and it certainly was impressive from up here.

From close to, while they may not be as impressive as the Niagara Falls, they are certainly as good as anything else that Europe has to offer and it’s well worth the trip to come to see them, even if you do have to fight your way through the participants of a bus trip from the local mosque.

But be warned – it’s quite a hike back to the top again so I was glad that it was late evening when I passed by here.

I now try to find some accommodation for the night and I’m not very successful. I forgot about the Bank Holiday weekend and everywhere is either full or closed.

I do manage to find an old Renault van from the 1920s, in a very sorry state, so it isn’t all doom and gloom, despite the fast-approaching night.

In the end, I give up and head for the autoroute. There will be a rest area there and I’ll sleep in Ccaliburn tonight.

-2

Tuesday 12th May 2015 – I KNEW …

… that if I looked hard enough, I would be able to find some evidence of the previous occupants that had not been ethnically cleansed from the city of Zatec.

There were in fact a couple, some easier to find and easier to see than others, and here’s the most obvious one

I strongly suspect that the German writing on the walls over these shops may not be the original.

It seems that once again I’ve stumbled upon a film crew – this one from Czech Television and a corner of the town has been cordoned off while they film some kind of costule drama here. They’ve picked a nice part of the town to do it in because it is relatively unspoilt down at this end.

that’s more than can be said about this part of the city.

I mentioned yesterday that the Economic miracle hasn’t penetrated as far as here yet, and there are parts of Zatec that look very sad indeed. Several buildings at this end of the city look as if they were abandoned during the ethnic cleansing of the region and never taken over by new inhabitants

The city is quite historic however, dating back to at least 1004 when the first mention of it was made.

It sits on a hill, on a promontory overlooking the river valley, and was walled and fortified. There are some of the fortificiations still remaining, as well as a couple of the city gates.

There are also a great number of Comecon-styled blocks of flats, but we’ll gloss over those.

Here’s a surprise though. As well as the usual German discount supermarkets we have a British supermarket chain operating in the Czech Republic and with a branch at Zatec too.

I went in there to buy my bread and fruit for the day and ws surprised to be asked for my club card. I wonder what she would have said had I produced it.

The drive down south was beautiful through some lovely scenery and picturesque towns and villages.

This is the town church in the town of Prestice and it’s just one example of the hundreds of photos that I could have taken had I had the time.

I saw several Soviet-era lorries too. Most of them were on the road so I couldn’t photograph them.

This one, which I think is a LIAZ, was conveniently parked up in a field while I was stopped at some roadworks, of which there were plenty along my route.

No old Tatra cars though, and that was disappointing.

Here’s my lunch stop, at Jeseni in the Sudeten Alps. And you can see why the Sudeten Alps were vital to the defence of Czechoslovakia – it’s not possible to move a squadron of tanks, never mind a division, through here in any kind of order.

It’s no wonder that the Nazis stirred up the Sudeten Germans to such an extent, in order to have a fifth column making a “peaceful” takeover of the region, but it beats me why, knowing that their country was doomed from the start, why the Czechs didn’t make a fight of it.

A guarantee from France and Britain of the security of the rump of Czechoslovakia was totally worthless and I’m sure that the Czechs realised that.

Here I am in tonight’s stop – the town of Tittmoning in southern Bavaria.

In fact you can’t get much more south than this because if you turn left and go down to the bottom of the slope you arrive at the Salz River and across there on the other side is Austria, and I shall be wetting my feet in Austria later in the day tomorrow.

Tittmoning is a beautiful little walled town with a huge and impressive central square, but it also has something or a sinister reputation.

There’s a castle here too just like at Colditz, and just as in Colditz, it was a prison camp in World War II. But not for the military (well, there were some soldiers here at very first) but for civilians – British civilians in fact because although not many people know this, part of the United Kingdom fell into German hands during World War II and many British civilians were mistreated during the war.

Tittmoning was the home for 5 years for British male civilians from the Channel Islands who were considered unsuitable to remain in their homes during the German occupation, and was in fact a halfway house to Buchenwald, where several did indeed end up as the war progressed.

EPIC HALL

The Poisoned Pen (or Poisoned Chalice, more like) – or my relentless struggle against reality

Category Archives: old cars

Saturday 4th June 2016 – THAT WAS DEFINITELY THE CORRECT DECISION …

Saturday 10th October 2015 – MY QUIET WEEKEND CONTINUES

Sunday 27th September 2015 – I’M LOOKING FORWARD TO THIS.

Sunday 13 September 2015 – SO THAT WAS MY NIGHT …

Monday 31st August 2015 – BANE OF BRITAIN DOES IT AGAIN!

Saturday 29th August 2015 – I’M NOT DOING VERY WELL …

Friday 28th August 2015 – HERE’S STRIDER …

Thursday 27th August 2015 – WHAT A STORM!

Tuesday 18th August 2015 – LAST DAY IN MONTREAL

Friday 14th August 2015 – ZURICH IN THE RAIN

Thursday 13 August 2015 – FOR THE FIRST TIME IN MY LIFE …

Saturday 4th July 2015 – NOW THAT WAS A REALLY NICE …

Monday 18th May 2015 – AS YOU MIGHT EXPECT …

Saturday 16th May 2015 – IN SWITZERLAND

Tuesday 12th May 2015 – I KNEW …

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