Off on my travels again

[tc4332]

You are correct of course.
I keep telling you that my two grey cells don't converse, in fact they speak two different tongues.
Bugger this game of getting old.
Gwen used to proof read most of what I wrote but I do not have her services anymore.
At Mark's suggestion I took a few photos of where I was this weekend, back home now. What to do with the photos and started to think along the lines of a new thread in the meetings area. Unless someone objects I'll try and do something like that tomorrow.

[tc4332]

Long time to wait to update this twaddle tale.
Something major happened a few weeks back, my bus licence came up for it's annual renewal and I decided at 84 years I've done enough. I let it lapse, contacted Swansea and officially let them know.
Couple of weeks back I went to the office, collected my last pay and handed in my key.
End of an era.
23:00 tonight, Linda and I set of for the Chunnel on our trip to Germany. Tomorrow we will be having a mini meet lunch at the Mohne Dam. Hopefully two 8s will be in attendance.

[Djinny]

Looking forward to the mini meet 🥰

[tonupkid]

Indeed Ray, end of an era. Most of us lazier folks (me) hang up our work keys twenty odd years earlier than you did.
Have a thoroughly enjoyable trip.

[tintin]

Safe travels - hope you and Linda have a great trip, and a great 8s catch up, I look forward to hearing about it in person at your next mini-meet, closer to home

[steamship]

Originally Posted by tc4332

23:00 tonight, Linda and I set of for the Chunnel on our trip to Germany. Tomorrow we will be having a mini meet lunch at the Mohne Dam. Hopefully two 8s will be in attendance.

Good to hear both of you are back in better health. Enjoy your trip.

[tc4332]

The Journey is ongoing.
Brilliant.
I have started to pen a word or three but I need some sleep.
I will fully bore you all later as we progress.
Please be patient with this old fool.

[briang9]

Enjoy your well earned retirement Ray, and hope you and Linda have a great time on your current trip

[tc4332]

Wow
Eight hours sleep and I'm still knackered. God knows what strange noises I made but I woke to the gentle snores of the wonderful Linda, and I'm knackered. Do you get the picture, not as young as I used to be?
Guess starting at the earlier part is the best. Early in the week I had checked my routing on Google maps and TomTom, all was really looking good to go, four hours to Folkestone. Then for some inexplicable reason, no I am not a pedantic old fool, I tried Waze; using the arrive at feature. Roadworks? Not a single road shovelling navvy was working days, couldn't have been, the motorway network was in dire straits. journey time over five hours. Left home at 23:00, one hour earlier than originally planned. ten minutes to the M6, very little traffic, brilliant. Next junction M6 closed. All the HGVs of Europe as well as UK were on the A49, and they were dutifully in convoy in front of me. Waze knew more than Audi/Google and directed via Stoke, Derby and the M1. Added an hour to the journey but better than the five extra it envisioned if I'd used my normal route. Used Dartford Bridge, no charge during the night, and the dreaded, but what else could we expect, roadworks sign joined the party. Used M2, then dropped down to the M20. success was short lived, Junction 7 to 9 closed. Forced into another long line of "I don't know the way" foreign trucks. Honestly, writing this is shorter than Wigan to Folkestone. Arrived at the Chunnel with impeccable (sic!) timing, according to the young lady in the booking in cabin with 20 minutes to spare. Managed to grab a hot cheese toasty thingy from Starbucks to join our 05:18 train. Did I forget to mention the rain? It was spectacular, sure the whole universe followed us all the way.
The journey from Calais to our lunch stop at Mohne See was very quiet, mainly due to the rather slow speeds of the ever-constant heavy traffic and roadworks. Arrived at the eatery by Mohne See where I had booked a table for 13:00, only ninety minutes late. As we pulled into a parking slot a white D4 slipped in alongside me. Vera, Dean and Harlan had joined us for lunch. OK pre-arranged but a most welcome mini meet in our good Forum manner. Quick prattle of car rubbish, some liquid intake and a Viennese Schnitzel meant that we all enjoyed ourselves.

[ainarssems]

I also find that Waze is better for traffic and updates faster, it makes sense as it's community driven with drivers reporting issues. But for new roads or new estates, they usually appear on Google maps before Waze. On the other hand it is a bit strange about differences as Google has owned Waze since 2013 so I would kind of expect more data sharing and both to be very similar.