They are off! The boys in france 1.
PJ and Mark have been planning a trip to look at the Millau bridge in France for sometime. The chosen method of transport - motorbike; a 1950s Panther, and a 1970s CSX 500. This all sounds entirely sensible until you realise the Panther wasn't running and the CSX hadn't been purchased when they decided to do it.
Needless to say the last month or so has been very exciting as we have all watched the Panther being rebuilt, mended, fixed, bolted back together and declared fit for purpose. That sounds bad until you realise that PJ purchased his CSX from a man who was very keen to know why he wanted one of those bikes, and it hadn't been running for decades. It wasn't a runner of course, so there was a lot of tinkering going on at the other end of the canal as PJ got the bike started, founded out what bits he needed, ordered them, and then discovered with 2 weekends to go that the bits were out of stock and might be in stock sometime. With an urgent need for an MOT he did what every man should do when faced with such adversity, and purchased a new bike with an MOT. Ironically he purchased the same make and model of bike, so he still can't get spare parts. "They wont need spare parts" he said, which we didn't remind him of when earlier this week the engine in the new bike blew up. So, there he was, two broken bikes. Not to be put off, there was much scratching of heads, puffing and all sorts of other noises that engineers make when together and finally with lots of enthusiasm by last night he had one working bike, a packed tank bag and his passport in hand.
PJ and Mark set off for the ferry Portsmouth - Caen. They were keen that I should have a map of their journey on the pub wall.. I thought a map of France would be over kill as their journey would be down the village road (canal road), and if they were lucky they might get to Portsmouth in time to turn around and come home again. I was wrong.
8am this morning I received a text 'we are on the ferry'.
Well, that was impressive. Not as impressive as the next text half an hour ago 'We are in Argentan'
Actually, they sounded rather surprised at themselves!
If it was beginning to sound as though they were organised and going to make it, do not loose hope. They aren't.
I just received another text from PJ:
"when picking up the envelope with your foreign money in, make sure you pick up the right one. Mark picked up the envelope with the Aussie money in not Euros... we need a bank!"
Watch out France
Needless to say the last month or so has been very exciting as we have all watched the Panther being rebuilt, mended, fixed, bolted back together and declared fit for purpose. That sounds bad until you realise that PJ purchased his CSX from a man who was very keen to know why he wanted one of those bikes, and it hadn't been running for decades. It wasn't a runner of course, so there was a lot of tinkering going on at the other end of the canal as PJ got the bike started, founded out what bits he needed, ordered them, and then discovered with 2 weekends to go that the bits were out of stock and might be in stock sometime. With an urgent need for an MOT he did what every man should do when faced with such adversity, and purchased a new bike with an MOT. Ironically he purchased the same make and model of bike, so he still can't get spare parts. "They wont need spare parts" he said, which we didn't remind him of when earlier this week the engine in the new bike blew up. So, there he was, two broken bikes. Not to be put off, there was much scratching of heads, puffing and all sorts of other noises that engineers make when together and finally with lots of enthusiasm by last night he had one working bike, a packed tank bag and his passport in hand.
PJ and Mark set off for the ferry Portsmouth - Caen. They were keen that I should have a map of their journey on the pub wall.. I thought a map of France would be over kill as their journey would be down the village road (canal road), and if they were lucky they might get to Portsmouth in time to turn around and come home again. I was wrong.
8am this morning I received a text 'we are on the ferry'.
Well, that was impressive. Not as impressive as the next text half an hour ago 'We are in Argentan'
Actually, they sounded rather surprised at themselves!
If it was beginning to sound as though they were organised and going to make it, do not loose hope. They aren't.
I just received another text from PJ:
"when picking up the envelope with your foreign money in, make sure you pick up the right one. Mark picked up the envelope with the Aussie money in not Euros... we need a bank!"
Watch out France
posted by MortimerBones at
5:10 PM
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