Germany 2018 - An attempt at valid journalism.

[tintin]

Originally Posted by Conan_the_Librarian

Here we are later. Still dug in; making full use of the eat all you can breakfast.
We are now waiting in our 4 star dugout for the light support wagon to catch up. We've been joined by an elite Dutch special weapons team, and have increased our heavy armour by a W12 and a scouting vehicle, an Audi Cabriolet. Once the light support vehicle catches up, our plan is to break camp and commence s lightning strike across the border. We will send the scout ahead to draw fire and if it receives any divert to avoid that hotspot! Our number now includes an A8, 5 X S8s and a W12. Germany here we come.......

And all you need now is for the Americans to join in, late as usual. At least this time there's only one of them...

[David's8]

However Mike, isnt the invasion of Europe line of journalism slightly (!) inappropriate when you are driving an Audi to a German car meet ? What happens with the first contact report?

Keep up the excellent reporting!

[tc4332]

For those of you without the latest data; I attended the German 2018 War retaliation meet. It was bloodie wonderful, or should that read wonderfully bloodie?
Thursday 9th August 2018
19:00 Arrived home from Edinburgh tour. Ate a piza and went to bed.


Friday 10th August 2018
00:01 Woke up and dressed
00:10 Departed in my A8
05:10 Arrived EuroTunnel, Folkestone
05:36 Train departed for Calais
10:10 Drove past Eindoven, thinking everyone would have left I kept going, hoping to secretly catch up with the convoy and quietly slip in behind them. Miserable sods had a lie in.

14:45 Stopped for Fuel 20 Km before the hotel (first time out of the seat).
15:10 Arrived at hotel. First A8/S8 there.


Slowly the others arrived, first a few Germans, then some more Germans, then the English attackers complete with support vehicles and finally some more Germans.
Surprisingly, without shots being fired, peace was declared and I received lots of very welcome hugs.
Car bollocks started, drinks were drunk, more car bollocks and food digested followed by more drinks and car bollocks until deep into the night. I was unable to stay the pace and fell into my bed before midnight. Sorry that I let the side down but my old body was well knackered by then and I wanted to be awake for breakfast and more CB.
Really interesting convoy run to the Edelsee, nice boat ride followed by two goes at the Summerollerbahn. Think about an inspection trolley with a very weak brake hurtling down a steel half pipe.
Good fun. Followed by a barbecue and prize presentations.

We won best car (Dean in a red T shirt) and furthest travelled. The intrepid Vera won 3rd best car. Somehow a German won second best car.

Quiet drive back to the hotel and the usual evening shenanigans with lots of liquid plus CB.
Sunday after breakfast people started to depart but yours truly could not because my keys were in the locked boot. Vera stepped forward and managed to organise rescue of said keys by the Local bright yellow uniformed ADAC operative. Whilst this erstwhile man did the dirty on my car Vera and I retired to the hotel and took part of a nice lunch.
Car restored to operational capability and Vera and I set off northwards, sort of, parting ways at a Junction where I peeled off northwards for twenty minutes arriving in Bielefeld for coffee and cakes followed shortly by a heavy dinner, and a short drive to my old abode.
Couple of days visiting old friends in the area and today I have driven via Viersen, visiting an old Army buddy, and am currently ensconced in my hotel room in Valkenburg near Maastricht in Holland.
Must remember to book my return rail journey for Friday night.

[Conquistador]

An enjoyable few days with good company, good cars, good food and drink.

Started with a nice cruise over to Eindhoven on Thursday afternoon. The hotel there was excellent and makes a good stop off location if you are getting an evening ferry/train and have a long onward journey east or south to make the next morning. We continued our journey to Kassel late Friday morning after Bert and Charlie's arrival in the Subaru support vehicle with Tjalling joining in his D2 W12 and Fred in the Audi Cabrio joining the convoy. Not too much excitement to be had on the autobahn and major roads when we hit a couple of slow patches and eastern European lorries are more than happy to just pull out into your lane ahead when you are doing 100mph.

Saturday's boat tour on the meandering Edersee lake was interesting and very civilised, taking in the famous dam, and then continuing our journey to the toboggan.

I missed the prize giving ceremony as I was having a few extra runs on the toboggan but Ray won furthest distance traveled, with Dean winning best car overall and both picking up handsome trophies so well done to them. The BBQ and buffet laid on at the toboggan area was fantastic. Less fantastic was the wasp problem! One obvious observation about the cars is that the Germans certainly aren't afraid to modify their 8's whereas we seem to prefer to keep ours stock and original. Spoilers on a D2, 22" Range Rover wheels and air-ride on a D3, full custom paint on a D4... anything goes.

Sunday morning we all departed for Dunkirk in convoy. Lorries cannot transverse the country on Sundays (I think I've got that right?) and cars on the autobahn were quite sparse in places so when a lovely straight piece of road ahead presented itself I took it as an opportunity to stretch the car's legs . I got to 177mph which read as 285kph on the digital display and don't mind admitting I got a bit scared and only lasted a few seconds at that speed but the car was still wanting more. I backed down to 120mph or so before a British Prius pulled out on me and put an end to that fun. I did find something in VCDS a while ago which lifted the speed limiter 1mph at a time so my tinkering with that has obviously worked. It leaves me wondering what the true max speed is though...

I selfishly didn't take many pictures because I saw lots of others snapping away and taking videos so knew there would be some good memories of the weekend appearing soon after.

[Architex_mA8tey]

Great Video from the Germany meet here from Robert at A8-Freunde -
https://youtu.be/xp3OOfkyNnA

[RICKY D]

Great Vid Neil - Thanks for sharing

Some tasty looking 8’s in there

[Architex_mA8tey]

Our German Friends make some awesome videos from the meet - here are a few from previous meets including one by our very own DelBoy. . .

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ClxVudAp3uY
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lt7WO1O2hBU
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zPwlAsbFVrk
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xLzhsg6AxI4

Makes you want to come along next year eh?