On the Road Again!

Shirt arrived today.

It looks like weeks of neglect have led to Vera Strom's battery dying. When I say that, I mean not riding. I started and ran the engine a couple of times. Not enough. It seems to coincide with my dbPower jumper pack also giving up. It shows 100% charged but when connected to the bike nothing happens. No output. Maybe time for a new one? I have the battery on charge with the power provided by the Bluetti AC70. I'll keep a check on it during the evening and see how it goes. It could be a new battery and if it is, I'll look at another Motobatt. It looks as though the MBTZ14S is the fitment.

We bought one of these a few days before we went on our three week holiday to Spain and France last month. Of course, we hadn't expected the unusually high temperatures across the mountains that we were headed for. As a result, the fan was used everyday, with our lithium setup in the van we could run the fan all night plugged into the 230v system. And we did.  It's probably the best buy we have made.  So much so I ordered another from France and it arrived on Saturday at home. With another "heatwave" this week the two have been heavensent. 

After a few days of being back and the van stationary on the driv3 I had a look to see the mileage we did.  Unfortunately I reset Trip B at Plymouth just before we got on the ferry. I'd forgotten it at home before the trip. So the mileage for the trip comes out at 1610.6 miles. Plus 281 miles from home to the dockside. So a total of 1891.6. Before setting off I withdrew €200 from the foreign exchange office in Folkestone.  That went into the wallet with the €5 note from last time. I had €8 in 50c to €2 coins.  From that starting point we have come back with €85 in notes. The largest cash payments were to the vets and totalled €105. On top of that we spent £955.85 on the Clarity card. We use it for everything.  I don't think that's bad given we were away for 21 days in total.

Following the advice of the doctor in France when we left the hospital in Calais, I tried the e-Consult service.  After typing in all the details it said I had to call them instead. As it was after hours on Thursday it meant calling Friday morning.  I got through and it was phone back time. Spoke to the doc twice between 1200 and about 1240. We were told to go to the Same Day Emergency Care at the William Harvey in Ashford.  Off we went.  Around five hours later we finally saw the doctor. They'd taken blood. I'd given urine.  Then I went down to get a chest x-ray. The doc looked at the French paperwork and there were some of the indicators that were too high, that two days later were still high. They've let me go and I am supposed to go back to SDEC on Friday morning at 9am. Let's see.

That Leisure Shop came back quite quickly and have refunded the money.  It's a shame that they weren't up to the job. They are a really good idea but needed to be a little more robust.

After getting back from three weeks in Spain and France where the weather was abnormally hot we decided we can't put our old dog through that anymore. As he has got older he is less happy travelling in the car and in the van. He doesn't settle like he used to and it's unfair on him. Once I can get through to Eurotunnel I can cancel the booking. In the past they haven't refunded the fare but have deferred it as a credit to be used within 12 months. We shall see. It will save us some money as our travel insurance for us and the van ends on August 28th, and we would have needed to renew that. The dog comes before holiday travel. Let's see what the future brings.