Tapp's Travels

Well, I’ve forgotten how to do this! In the two years since my last post, EVERYTHING has changed. Everything has been upgraded, speeded up, streamlined, organised and generally made more difficult to remember how to use it!

So, 222222222. What’s that all about? We’ll get to that later. As of now the caravan is serviced and ready to roll. The car has had an incredibly slow puncture located and fixed. At a price! BMW’s sensitive electronics won’t allow the 4mm difference in tread depth that would occur with one new tyre and three partly used ones! So FOUR new ones it was. And they came with a bit of discovery!

The little yellow spot on the side wall of each one. I never knew about them. All tyres are slightly uneven in weight – I knew that – it’s why they need balancing. It transpires that they mark the lightest point on the circumference. This is apparently the spot which should be aligned with the valve.  Allegedly this will minimise the amount of weight that needs to be added.  Allegedly!  However, it’s more complex than that.  The “high point” on a tyre is marked with a red spot.  This should be aligned with the “low spot” (if any) which is marked on the wheel.  And red spots trump yellow spots.  I’ve just checked my four new boots – and I confirm one yellow is opposite the valve on one, but there are yellow, white AND green spots on two of them.  Make what you want of that!

Never mind tyres! What about ferries? First we had storm Dudley followed closely by Eunice. A record 122 mph gust was recorded at The Needles on Friday this week. That’s breezy. And our ferry will sail past the Isle of Wight on Tuesday morning. Hopefully!

This is the picture of the wind pattern this evening – two days after the worst of the storm and a day and a half before we sail down the channel!

Moving swiftly on…

Spain requires evidence of vaccination, check; evidence of ownership of car and caravan plus relevant insurances, check; and a completed FCS (health and locator) form…  Well, I’ve registered for one and got all necessary codes and passwords, but the form cannot be completed until 48 hours before arrival in Spain.  With nearly 30 hours on the boat and 9 hours at the docks from midnight it leaves less than 10 hours to complete the form, get it printed, and get to Portsmouth.   No worries there, then!

Storm Eunice, which hit on Friday, meant we decided to delay our departure from home a day.  Just as well.   Storm damage was very significant.  Land-based wind gust measured at a record 122 mph at the Needles on the Isle of Wight (which we are passing as I write this!).  Our trip to Dorset on Saturday afternoon, after Eunice settled down, was easy.  One of our easiest trips on that route.  Large parts of Dorset had suffered major power outages.  Some of these lasted several days.  Luckily, electricity had been restored before we arrived at Shapwick.  However, the road outside Jeremy’s House was blocked by a fallen tree that had taken down a power cable.  Not good.

The next saga was the completion of the Spanish health and travel form (TCS).  This is a “simple”, five page electronic form.  It can be started at any time, but the health statement on the final page can only be completed 48 before arrival in Spain.  In the end, after six hours of failed attempts, we finally got the email with the QR code needed to board the ship.  The trick turned out to be, NOT to use our electronic Covid passes, to FIB a little about which jab we had been given and EXAGGERATE the time we plan to spend at the first campsite.  (We said 49 days rather than the likely two day stay planned!)  That, and mount a sustained cyber attack on the Spth website using an Android phone, an i-phone, a Mac PC and an IOS laptop – all at the same time.

Arriving at Portsmouth docks at 11.15pm (45 minutes before Brittany Ferries said we could take up residence in the loading queue), we discovered we were about 70th in line!  Still, we were in residence with all the correct paperwork!

We were rudely awoken at 5 am to start the checking in process.  Then, over the next four hours, we gradually worked our way towards the back of the queue and ended up boarding in the last 20 vehicles.  The bonus was that we were going to be about five from the front of the queue when we come to disembark!

The various storms, and indeed the current breeze up the channel, had given us 2-3 metre swells to face.  Fine when heading straight into the wind.  Less so, as we veered South to pass Finnistere.  This change of direction coincided with our call to dinner!  Sadly, only one of us ate that evening.

In our favour, the previous crossing on this route (which we had tried to book, but found it was full) had to contend with 8 metre swells.  NASTY!  All the produce in the on-board shop was swathed in plastic and cardboard to keep it on the shelves

Anyway, the snacks in the club lounge were very substantial and more or less continuously available – and free wine was available at rather unpredictable intervals.  Maybe the intervals WERE predictable,  but I just lost track of the time!

Arriving in Spain is for another episode.  Let’s just say it got VERY “interesting”!

Anyway, while on the ferry, we passed 22 seconds past 22.22 in the  2nd month of ’22.  Hence 222222222!