Tag Archives: eric hall

Tuesday 14th October 2014 – THIS JET LAG THING …

… is still affecting me and I’ve no idea why. Last night, it was 05:00 when I finally went to bed. And had Terry not telephoned me at about 10:30 to come round and pick up some things from here, I would probably still be in bed even now.

But anyway, seeing as I was up, I was up and I had a leisurely breakfast and watched a film on the DVD – Rio Bravo, one of my favourite Westerns and another one in which the actors are more intent on having a good time than they are on focusing on the script and the stage direction. Of course, it’s the kind of thing that only good actors can get away with.

This afternoon, the clearing up started and by the time that it went dark, I had no fewer than 10 bin-bags of clothes prepared for recycilng. And that’s not all either as there are three dustbins full of clothes in the barn plus a few items of clothes elsewhere. I can’t believe how much rubbish that I’ve actually managed to accumulate here – there’s even stuff that I remember buying in the UK before I met Nerina, and that’s 30-odd years ago. Still, it’s all ready now to be transported to the local clothes recycling bin.

Something else that I can’t believe is that despite all of this, there still doesn’t seem to be very much difference in the amount of space taken up in here. It’s as if nothing whatever has been moved or emptied. But then my tidying up is always like that. If it looks any different from before, it’s usually that it’s more untidy, with having to move all kinds of stuff around in order to get at what i’m looking for.

I rang up Rosemary as well in the evening. On Saturday I’m going to be taking all of these unwanted clothes to Montlucon and to do some shopping too, as it seems that I’ve run out of oats and things like that. Rosemary is always game for a wander around the shops so I invited her to accompany me, which makes a nice change.

And then I finished off the vegan lasagne that Liz had given me in a doggie-bag the other day. That was tea, and then I settled down to see what was happening in the big wild world.

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Monday 13th October 2014 – WE WERE RADIOING TODAY

Yes, it didn’t take me long to get back into the routine, did it?

And with a reasonably-early night I managed to be up and about by 10:15 too, without the benefit of the alarm. And that gave me an hour or so to do a few things around here first.

Many of you who read the rubbish that I write elsewhere will know that I have a thing about clouds and how they reflect the skyline underneath when passing over mountainous areas.

clouds reflecting skyline puy de sancy puy de dome franceThis was quite apparent today as you can see in this photo of the Puy de Sancy taken from my favourite little spec at the bird-watching site near St Gervais.

We’ve had a fair amount of rain just recently so the sky is quite humid. Here sure enough, the moisture has condensed where the air has had to rise up over the mountains and formed clouds that reflect almost exactly the skyline underneath.

We had more vegan lasagne for lunch and then went off to Gerzat to record the Radio Anglais sessions for Radio Arverne. And just for a change, everyone was ready and everything passed off without incident. We were in and out in just an hour and 10 minutes.

While we were there, the weather had changed and we were in the rain on the way back. Liz gave me a doggy bag of leftover vegan lasagne and ginger cake, and I came back here to plot my next move.

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Sunday 12th October 2014 – WHEN WAS THE LAST TIME …

… that you have heard of someone waking up at 16:30 in the afternoon? Well, you’ve heard of it now.

There are three reasons for this.
Firstly, jet-lag counts for a lot of it, even though I’d tried my best to deal with this
Secondly, I should never have had that final cup of coffee at Liz and Terry’s. That didn’t help
Thirdly, with the internet back on, I had a lot to do and I ended up being somewhat carried away.
As a result of all of this, I had the dubious distinction of hearing the alarm clock ring to wake me up before I’d even gone to bed to sleep.

Dawn had long-since broken when I went downstairs to switch off the inverter and take the statistics. There was a high wind blowing too and the big wind turbine on the barn was going round like the clappers. That’s always nice to see. I wired in the 12-volt immersion heater too before I went to bed. If there’s any surplus energy, I want to lay my hands on some of that for sure.

On waking up, I wasn’t sure whether to have breakfast or lunch. Anyway, I decided on breakfast, which saves me having to look for extra bread for Monday.

And then I started on the tidying up – or at least, some of it. I decided while I was away that I need to be much more ruthless here with the stuff that I own and that I’m never ever likely to use. There’s reams of stuff that is simply junk and needs to be disposed of. And there’s other good stuff too that is never ever going to be used and I could generate some income from that if I stick it on the internet.

There wasn’t much time to do very much however, as you have no idea how quickly it’s going dark these days, sO it’s not even correct to say that i’ve made a start.

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Saturday 11th October 2014 – BACK TO THE DAILY GRIND

I was on my travels again last night, and it was once more with the guitarist/singer and drummer with whom I played for a couple of years in the mid-70s and who have been featuring rather a lot just recently in these pages.

We were in a pub in Liverpool sitting at a table waiting for things to happen before we went on stage and who should come and sit next to us but John Wetton. He’s a bassist/singer of no little repute, having appeared in several supergroups of the 70s and early 80s and though while he’s not on my list of top-10 bassists, I was still relishing having a good chat with him and maybe even getting him onstage with us in some capacity.

But for some unknown reason, the other two were being rather abusive and offensive to him and after a couple of minutes he left. I was quite upset at that because it’s not every day that one has the opportunity to be in the intimate presence of a superstar.

With all of those issues having been dealt with, I heaved myself out of my stinking pit and set about making breakfast. That wasn’t as easy as it might have been either, because I couldn’t remember where the coffee was, and I couldn’t remember which glass I used for my orange juice, all that kind of thing. It’s astonishing how, after just 45 days away from home, how much of my old routine that I have forgotten.

And talking of being back in the routine, once breakfast was out of the way I sat down and started work on the next batch of Radio Anglais stuff. And happy that I’d dealt with the shopping issues yesterday, I could have a really good whack at it. Three or four hours of uninterrupted work and I’d written four programmes – a mere 2774 words. When you can find the rhythm, it’s easy to understand how it was that people like Enid Blyton and Earl Stanley Gardner could knock off 5,000 or 6,000 words in a day on a consistent basis if they could be totally uninterrupted (except for someone serving up mugs of hot coffee on a regular basis too).

By now though, the weather had cleared and the sun was shining. That was something that was quite uexpected, but welcome nevertheless. We even, just for a fleeting moment, had an overcharge of electricity and I wish that I had thought on and reconnected the 12-volt immersion heater.

Later on in the afternoon, I went round to Liz and Terry’s. This was to rehearse the radio programmes because Liz is going to be busy tomorrow, and we also had a lovely vegan lasagne followed by vegan ginger cake. You’ve no idea how well Liz and Terry look after me.

Back home, I did a few more things on the computer and, just as I was about to settle down for an early night the internet suddenly sprang back into life. I restarted the computer and settled down to something of a long night. I had plenty of work to do.

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Friday 10th October 2014 – I MUST HAVE BEEN TIRED LAST NIGHT.

10:45 when I heaved myself out of the stinking pit, and had the ‘phone not rung downstairs at that time, I would probably still be there now. Terry said that he had never known anyone sleep that long, which just goes to show that he’s clearly not kept himself up-to-date with these pages, and that he’s never gone two days with just a fitful doze or two in between. But then again, my lifestyle has always been somewhat extreme compared to the norm, I suppose. Not many people would put up for a minute with what I do just for pleasure.

After breakfast, we had a long chat about things around here and when Liz came back we had lunch. Then, on their way to see Rob and Julie, they dropped me off here.

Caliburn started with just a glance at the ignition key – good old Caliburn – but we are having some issues here right now. I have (once again) left the fridge plugged in permanently while I was away, instead of in the overcharge circuit, and so with the bad weather for the last three or four days that they have had here, the batteries are right down. And with the forecast weather for the next few days, there won’t be much chance of topping things up for a while so I’ll be on short rations again. I really must remember to sort out the fridge properly each time that I go away. I did exactly the same thing last year, you might remember.

The battery in the laptop went flat after a couple of hours’ work and so I was wondering how to charge it up. By then of course, it was late afternoon and in the pouring rain I wasn’t going to be doing much else so the idea came to my mind to go to St Eloy to do my shopping. It would fill in the time this evening, save me a journey tomorrow, give Caliburn an airing and also charge up the laptop. Problem solved. Wasn’t I glad that I had bought that 12-volt charging lead a few months ago?

At LIDL I met Amondine from the Anglo-French group. She was there with her children doing her shopping and we had quite a chat. All in all, at the shops, I spent €21 for a week’s supply of food. That’s much more like old times.

Back here, the internet is down, so I discovered. Dunno what has happened here. I just did a few other bits and pieces and went for an early night. I’ll resolve this issue tomorrow.

Or maybe some other time.

I dunno.

But as Barry Hay once famously said at a concert at Scheveningen Beach, “I’ll tell you one thing, man. It’s good to be back home”.

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Thursday 9th October 2014 – WELL, I WAS RIGHT ABOUT ONE THING.

I missed the connection at Brussels.

And not by 5 or 10 minutes either, but by a whopping couple of hours too. It took all night to evacuate this ill person and her baggage and we were about a couple of hours late before we took to the sky.

The flight itself and the food were excellent but the in-flight entertainment was rather rubbish. There wasn’t a single film that I was interested in seeing. On the Sports Channel however there was the World Cup semi-final between Brazil and Germany from 2014- the match where in a devastating spell of just 6 minutes half-way through the first half the Germans totally demolished the Brazilians.

At Brussels, those of us with onward journeys to attend to had to regroup in order to see what they airline had in store for us. For me, they could move me onwards to Paris via … errrr … Frankfurt am Main. That was clearly out of the question. However, there was one person who was flying on to Lyon and so that gave me an idea. When I was at Montreal I heard them call an Air Transat flight to Lyon and while I’m not overly impressed with Air Transat, I still put into the back of my mind the idea to go around to the airport at Lyon to see what I could see and to spy out the land.

This seemed like the opportunity and so I made the appropriate noises at the airport staff. There was indeed flight to Lyon but at 17:00 in the afternoon, meaning that I had 5 hours to kill. A meal voucher for €16:00 to compensate me in part for the inconvenience meant that I could have a meal but even that voucher only made a slight hole in the price of the meal, prices in Belgium being what they are. But nevertheless, the choices of meal here seem to be better than what was on offer when I was stranded at Paris Charles de Gaulle last year.

zaventam brussels national airport belgium october 2014For the rest of my stay in Brussels, I also took the opportunity to go for a wander around the airport, inside and outside. It’s been a long time, 9 years in fact, since I’ve been here and there was a time when I was here a couple of times a week, back in the good old days.

So braving the horrendous weather outside, because it really was bad outside, I went for a look around.

zaventam brussels national airport belgium october 2014There have been some tremendous changes to the airport in this time. Outside, there’s an enormous amount of redevelopment and much of the old building is being swept away and replaced ith more modern stuff.

There have been even more changes inside the place. A huge programme of expansion has taken place with all kinds of new terminals and departure gates and I do have to admit that it is quite a significant leg-up from how it all used to be in the past.

The plane to Lyon was one of these small 70-seater things with about 40 passengers on it. The flight took a quite reasonable 75 minutes which wasn’t bad at all, even if there was no special meal for me. That came as no surprise seeing as how I’d chopped and changed from one flight to another – it can’t be helped. I was glad that I had had a meal at Zaventam. And descending into Lyon through a thunderstorm, we were being tossed around like a cork on the ocean. Not for the faint-hearted, this descent.

Lyon was a very nice airport, quite modern and up-to-date, and the tram connection to town, quite shockingly expensive at €15:70, was nevertheless straighforward and direct, to right opposite the main railway station in town. No issues whatever with this at all (apart from the cost of course).

The ticket for the train to Riom cost a mere €16:00 with my senior citizen’s railcard (and that puts into perspective the astonishing price of the tram ticket) but there was a wait of 100 minutes for my train. No mind – it gave me an opportunity to look around outside the station. In the square behind the railway station there were all kinds of food shops, including a Subway sandwich store so I grabbed a foot-long vegetarian and orange juice there – that was tea sorted out.

Further investigation revealed that just a 10-minute stagger away from here is one of these Premier Class tourist hotels. A modern unit-type hotel with en-suite facilities.

So the verdict on Lyon as a departure point for Montreal? Well, even if the only flight offered is an Air Transat service, then I am no longer going to struggle all of the way out to Paris Charles de Gaulle. Apart from the tram fare, everything else that I would need is right here in front of me at Lyon, much more so than at the airport hotels in Paris. There will also be a saving of over €200 on my travelling costs and that, dear reader, is all that you need to know.

The train to Riom presented no problems whatever, and Terry was there to meet me at the station. Liz and Terry offered me a bed for the night, for which I was extremely grateful, and I was out like a light. It had been a long day.

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Wednesday 8th October 2014 – HAD IT NOT BEEN …

… for the driving rain that started to pelt down at about 05:00 this morning, this would have been another one of the best nights’ sleeps that I have ever had, for I was well gone. Another one of these totally painless nights.

motorway service area highway 40 repentigny berthierville quebec canada september 2014Regular readers of this rubbish will certainly recognise this spec, that’s for sure. This is the motorway service area between Repentigny and Berthierville, the one that’s on an island in between the two carriageways and I’ve slept here on a couple of occasions in the past.

So wide awake at something like 06:30, I sorted out a great pile of paperwork and that took me up to about 08:30. Then I headed for a coffee and an internet connection to upload everything to the web.

Once all of that had been dealt with, I went off to my storage unit and carried on with part II of the tidying in there. Rather cramped it might be, but there’s enough space for three or four more large storage boxes, if I am so inclined, although it is my intention to reduce rather than increase the quantity of stuff in there.

I also spoke to a couple of salesmen. One of them is selling these factory-built wooden houses and the other one is selling tents that pop up on the back of a pick-up, both of which could be extremely useful in the future as far as I am concerned.

From here, it was off to the car wash where I had the very … errr … interesting spectacle of watching two of the workers fight each other. Quite animated they were too, and it gave me something to do while I waited for the Dodge. And for just $30, they made it look as if it had just come out of the showroom. I’ve always been impressed with their service.

However, the tape that I had been using to hold the insulation onto the windows left all of its traces behind. That meant a trip to Home Depot and the purchase of a cheap paint scraper. Just $1:95 and half an hour’s elbow grease and you couldn’t see any of that either.

At the airport, handing the Dodge in was quite painless, as was (just for a change) passing through the border inspection. And it was here that our problems really began. The strong gale-force winds had slowed down the aeroplane on its inward journey and even by take-off time for us, it still hadn’t arrived.

It eventually turned up and we all rushed aboard, but someone was then taken ill and had to be evacuated and their luggage removed from the ‘plane. That looks like my connection at Brussels going up the chute and we’ll see how we sort it all out from here.

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Monday 6th October 2014 – IT’S A GOOD JOB …

ferry st lawrence riviere du loup st simeon quebec canada september 2014… that I wasn’t planning on going over to the Charlevoix. I pulled into Riviere-du-Loup just in time to see the ferry to St Simeon steaming out of the harbour.

Mind you it would have been nice to have been on it, but frankly I hadn’t given the matter any thought at all.

And yes, I’m now back on the road having a leisurely drive back to the airport at Montreal. I can’t believe that my time in North America is drawing to a close already.

I was up early and that gave me an opportunity to say goodbye to everyone here. I’ve been here in Centreville for over a week and that’s not like me at all. Normally, there are places to go, things to do and people to see, but I seem to have gone to ground this year.

I had some recording work to do for Rachel and then went up to the tyre depot to say goodbye to everyone there. And then I hit the road.

The Trans-Canada Highway took me up to the mountains where I stopped for lunch (and a little doze in the sunlight too if I were honest) and then down to the shores of the St Lawrence. At Riviere du Loup, I bought a new storage box to replace the mangy cardboard ones that I’ve had since 2011 and also a $100 telephone recharge. That’ll keep my number active for 12 months by which time I’ll (hopefully) be back. It was extraordinarily difficult to have the phone accept the payment and in the end I had to telephone customer services. That’s not like me, but I suspect that the touch screen in the telephone is on its way out.

I drove along the autoroute following the southern shore of the St Lawrence, but leaving at Riviere-Ouelle for a tofu ice cream (we’ve talked about these before) and then back on the highway. As it grew dark I came to a rest area and this will do me for the night. Rachel had given me the rest of the curry and so that did me nicely for tea, and then I watched a film before having an early night – my last-but-one in North America for the moment.

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Sunday 5th October 2014 – ANOTHER DAY OF REST

Or, at least, it should have been. But Amber had a couple of friends around for a sleepover and so round about 07:30 we had a herd of elephants stampeding around the house. And as I sleep underneath the TV room, then by about 07:31 I was wide-awake. So much for my long lie-in after yesterday’s efforts.

By about 10:00 everyone else was awake and we had a nice, long breakfast brunch en famille and once we had finished (and it wasn’t a five-minute affair either) I did … errr … absolutely nothing at all except have a hot shower and help Rachel with a few tasks around the house. And in return, Rachel made me a delicious curry for tea, and that went down well.

Well, that’s not really true. One of the girls brought a cake-making set for Amber – the type that you cook in the oven in small cups, put sticks in and then pour chocolate over the top. Amber had some difficulty melting the chocolate and so I became involved. A bain-marie and some cold water and I made quite a good liquid chocolate for her cakes.

That was everything, and I was in bed by 22:30 for an early night. I can’t say that I didn’t deserve it. I have to be up early tomorrow.

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Saturday 4th October 2014 – A LONG DAY

We wawoke with the dawn all stiff and cold, with the weathe rhaving broken and it was now pouring down with rain. But, quite surprisingly, we hadn’t felt a thing through the night and slept the sleep of the dead.

The cafe place was however open and so we went for breakfast, the whole point of sleeping on the car park. And the cafe did us proud too for which we were both grateful.

A 5-minute drive from there took us to Weare, New Hampshire, and this was where the engine needed to be. We arrived just as they were opening up at 08:00, which was what we had intended. Half an hour saw the engine off the back of the truck and another half an hour saw it stripped right down (it’s nice to watch professionals work and the key to all of this is that they have their workshop spotlessly cleean and all of their tools right to hand and isn’t that a lesson to me?)

It turns out that a big-end shell had seized onto the crankshaft and in a high-performance racing engine at 8600 rpm, a broken con rod was inevitable. The broken rod had thrown itself around the lower part of the block and the sump and damaged just about everything that there was to damage.

While Darren was paying his respects to the engine, I was taken out for a walk by the owner’s father. he has a collection of vehicles from the early 1950s and he spent a delightful hour or so showing me around his vehicles. I really was in my element there and I was having a really good time, even if Darren wasn’t.

We stopped back at the cafe for lunch on our way back and then in the driving rain headed for home. A stop for tea at Dysarts just outside Bangor and then another refuelling at Oakfield. A relatively-painless crossing of the border saw us back here at 22:00 (don’t forget there’s a time difference of an hour between Eastern Time and Maritime Time) and that’s one more project accomplished before I leave.

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Friday 3rd October 2014 – WE WENT TO NEW HAMPSHIRE THIS AFTERNOON

Darren had to go down there this afternoon after work to take the engine of his pulling truck back to the makers so that they could have a look at it.

However, he had suffered a slight welding flash last night and that makes driving uncomfortable in the sunlight, especially as there’s a 200-mile stretch between Houlton and Portland in Maine where the road is full south-east and the bright setting sun is in your face for the entire distance. Consequently, a second driver was required for that leg, and I was the only one not doing anything.

I’d had a bad night too, so I ran a few errands here and there, and then crashed out in a layby for an hour or so. I may as well use the free time profitably.

We were held up at the border by the US Border Patrol, as anyone reading these notes might have prophesied. Apparently the engine is classed as “commercial goods” as “it can be used to generate income”, hence an import tax was required. What income it could generate with two con-rods sticking through the sump became a matter of quite some considerable discussion.

Apparently anglers who cross the border with fishing rods, and golfers with golf clubs, and anyone with a car or van might now be liable to a US import tax now – all these items are capable of generating income. And what about a man who crosses the border with a woman? There is an enormous number of street corners in the USA after all and so the income-generating potential is enormous.

But the USA customs officials were intransigent and that was that. But whatever is going on in the USA? It’s almost as if they don’t want people to come to their country to spend … gulp … a good deal of money … … in their country.

We fuelled up at Oakfield and then I took the wheel for the 200-mile dash down the highway. A big Chevy C5500 with a V8 6.6-litre Duramax diesel engine. It’s the biggest thing that I’ve driven since I had a tour bus, and all the way through the rush hours of Bangor, Augusta and Portland too. And I managed it without hitting anything and killing anyone too.

Once it was dark, Darren retook the wheel and we drove a little further on to a shopping mall just off the highway where he met a few of his friends for a chat, and then we continued on along the old highways, passing many of the places that I drove through on my way here, right into the depths of darkest New Hampshire. We stopped in the car park of a small cafe-restaurant place, Darren on the front seats and me in the back, and I went out like a light and that was that.

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Thursday 2nd October 2014 – IT WAS FREEZING THIS MORNING.

And I’m not joking either. It might be a slight exaggeration though, for it was 2°C outside when I set out. And there was a huge hanging cloud everywhere that meant that you couldn’t see a thing.

hanging cloud centreville new brunswick canadaUp on the hill at the end of the road, you can see what was going on. It seems that Centreville is suffering the wrath of the Gods today and is swathed in this huge hanging cloud while the rest of the region is bathed in glorious sunshine.

I don’t know what we have all done to deserve that, but here it is and here’s the proof.

old railway bridge canadian pacific centreville woodstock new brunswick canada september 2014I set out to continue my exploration of the area and managed to find my way onto the old railway bridge that I featured yesterday.

It’s evidently seen much better days than this and it’s not the strongest bridge over which I have walked in my time. But at least it’s still here and not been swept away. And it was a beautiful day in the sunshine out of the hanging cloud.

bridge abandoned railway line canadian pacific woodstock new brunswick canada september 2014I mentioned … "a few times now" – ed … that there was a railway line that followed the Saint John River between the coast and Edmundston in the north, and it crossed the river just outside Woodstock.

I went for a prowl around in the area and found the old bridge. Much to my surprise, most of that is still here too. One span is missing but nevertheless, the main part of the bridge is still standing and that looks quite impressive even if it is in worse condition than the one at Centreville.

There are the remains of an old rural railway station near here and the goods yard has been transformed into a commercial vehicle scrap yard. I had a slow drive past to see what I could see, and attracted the attention of a couple of the employees who took a decided interest in what I was up to.

I had my lunch on the car park that is by the “lake” in the River Meduxnekeag (I hope that I’ve spelled that correctly) in the beautiful sunshine, and then read a book and had a play on the guitar for a while. I didn’t feel much like going anywhere else seeing how nice the day was and how good was my little spec here.

And why not? I’m on holiday and I should be relaxing. It’s what holidays are for.

And autumn is definitely here. No wonder they call it “fall” in North America because I’ve never seen leaves fall so quickly from the trees as I did today. And you will be surprised at the noise that they make too. I would never have believed it.

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Wednesday 1st October 2014 – NOT FOR NOTHING …

potato harvest florenceville bristol new brunswick canada september 2014… is this area known as the French Fry Capital Of The World. And not for nothing does it have the world’s largest food processing plant. It’s the potato harvesting time and you can’t move on the roads without squidging a potato that has fallen off the back of an overleaded potato lorry.

And with the weather having been dry for the last while or so there are clouds of dust all over the horizon where the potato rippers are out harvesting this years crop. All this automation is a far cry from when I used to go spud-bashing as a kid.

You never know – the McCain Frozen Chips that you eat next yar light be the very ones that you are seeing here being ripped out

After that, I’ve been hunting down old railway lines.

canadian pacific bridge abandoned railway line centreville woodstock new brunswick canada september 2014As we mentioned the other day, there was formerly a railway line that ran along the banks of the Saint Jonh River, and a branch left the main line at Woodstock to come up to Centreville. In fact, the tractor-pulling track in Centreville is situated on the former site of the railway goods yard.

I set out today to see if there were any vestiges of the old line still remaining, and here on the edge of town I found, not darkness, but an old bridge that very likely carried the line over the river that runs through the town.

It looks as if it’s in the correct place and going in the correct direction so it’s a fairly safe bet.

site of lakeville station canadian pacific abandoned railway line centreville woodstock new brunswick canada september 2014Further along the road is the town of Lakeville and on the back road that runs (eventually) to the Saint John River is where the old track bed crosses the road.

And knowing nothing at all about anything related to this railway line, this is the site that looks to me like the most logical site to have built the railway station.

As I have said before, only in the UK has everything that there is to be known about all railway lines in the country been recorded and documented. In all other countries of the world, the old abandoned railway lines have simply been forgotten.

And as I have also said before … "and you will say again" – ed … Canada ruthlessly out-Beechinged Beeching when it came to savaging the country’s rail network. There’s practically nothing left of it, and passenger transport is definitely a thing of the past.

This afternoon I spent sitting in a Ford Ranger 4×4 pickup. 2011 (so it is probably one of the very last to be made), white, one owner, main-agent maintained, 49,000 kms on the clock and looking as if it’s just come out of the factory. It was love at first sight, I’ll tell you that, but the price tag of a mere $16950 means that the love will remain unrequited.

But it was a magnificent vehicle, a credit to its previous owner, and probably worth every penny of its sale tag.

It was at the Ford main agent in Woodstock and I ended up having a long chat with the owner. They do have Rangers in fairly often but very few make it onto the forecourt. Most of them are sent straight away to the auctions at Moncton. Anyway, he now knows what I’m looking for and, more in hope that expectation, he has my phone number.

I crashed out this afternoon at the side of the road – I had another really bad night last night and was still awake at 05:00 – and then came back here for tea. Now I’m off for an early night.

And October already.

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Tuesday 30th September 2014 – I’VE BEEN SHOPPING TODAY

I was planning just to chill out a little today but then Rachel asked me what I was doing. And so, a few minutes later, I was on my way to the bank. But a bank with a difference, to whit, a bank in the USA. Darren is of course quite often on his travels to tractor-pulling events in the USA and so needs USA cash for expenses, but then his prize money (because he almost always wins something) is paid in cheques likewise. Consequently, it makes sense to have a USA bank account.

I was once again nailed at the border by a very unfriendly USA border guard and I’m beginning to hate that country with an undisguised passion. I’m absolutely convinced that they must comb the ranks of the USA civil service for the most unpleasant and arrogant officers that they can find and then dress them up in border guard uniforms and stand them at the frontier. As you know, it’s long been my contention that the USA doesn’t have any enemies at all except those that it has created for itself, and this is where the border guards have contributed enormously.

And don’t forget that I’m white and English-speaking too. Whatever must it be like to be a brown-skinned foreigner?

And this reminds me. In all of the years that I have been crossing the border in and out of the USA at all kinds of different border posts I haven’t seen any USA border control person other than a white-skinned one.

So abandoning yet another good rant for the time being, off I went to the bank at Mars Hill to pay in a couple of cheques.

Over the road from the bank at Mars Hill is an IGA supermarket and Rachel had given me shopping list of things that she needed; so I duly obliged.

coconut milk ice cream IGA supermarket mars hill maine USA september 2014And that’s not the best of it either. If you remember from a few weeks ago I found an IGA supermarket in Quebec that sold some ice cream made with almond milk.

Here in this one, there was ice cream made with coconut milk. Four different types too, and who could resist the chocolate version, even though the temperature was a mere 7°C? And delicious it was too. I thoroughly enjoyed that.

Make no mistake – I’ll be back there again.

Having done the chores, I then went off on my own little adventures around the shops. The most exciting find was in Presque Ile where in the Graves supermarket next to Mardens, I discovered not only a pile of vegetarian and vegan food products but about 6 different types of hummus. Yes, despite all of the USA-bashing that goes on all over the place … "as if…" – ed … it’s specialist-diet ranges are light years ahead of whatever mainland Europe can offer and it’s the place to be for products such as this. France, take note.

two way ratchet half inch drive 3 8 drive tractor supply company presque ile maine USAThere’s a new chain of shops opened up in the area too, called The Tractor Supply Company or something like that. It’s mainly for farmers (as indeed you might expect with a name like that) and Darren recommended that I go for a nosey around in there.

He was right too.

As you know, I’ve been buying a few odds and ends of sockets and that sort of thing while I’ve been over here, and in here they had a , well, agricultural-quality reversible ratchet that had a half-inch socket end on one side and a three-eights socket end on the other. And all for $9:99 too. Being designed for farmers, it’s huge and well-nigh indestructible, just the thing for me. It’ll go nicely with my 25-inch power bar.

So that was everything that I did today (apart from the obligatory refuelling of course) and then it was time to confront the border guards again.

Just for a change, there was a human being at the border control on the Canadian side and after what can be best described as “a brief exchange of pleasantries”, I was on my way.

If only every border crossing person could be as friendly as this, it would be a very agreeable way of spending the time, going back and too across the border, instead of having to quite literally run the gauntlet of the nasty and aggressive people whom one usually finds in places like this. They must really have some unfortunate control issues with their spouses at home that they have to vent their spleen and demonstrate their authority to the poor and wretched passers-by who have come to invest a little money to prop up their crumbling economy.

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