On the Road Again!

William Devall. 7th Battalion Kings Shropshire Light Infantry. Wounded in the assault on Bazentin Ridge on July 14th 1916. Died of his wounds on the 16th.

Some refining needed doing.  The original route out looked a bit in need of optimising. And that's what I have done. Taking the A26 route will be a toll route.  I am fully aware that "experts" reading this will be horrified that I have even suggested using a motorway/autoroute when I could use back roads. There. The elephant in the room is loose. Sod the "experts".  It will give me a chance to use my T-Liberté tag, also known as Emovis Tag.  It works perfectly in the car. Approach the toll booth barrier and "bing", the barrier goes up. Payment later on account.  It is also supposed to work on the bike as with the car.  I emailed Emovis to check on the procedure. It seems to know the length of the vehicle, so when a bike approaches the barrier it needs to be clear behind. No tailgating.  They also said to check my account a few days later to make sure I was charged the bike toll not the car.  I'll get it out of the car and it has to face forward, a...

As I am off for a few weeks over the summer I have decided to have a day on the bike.  My vain attempts to ride the bike more and from MoT to MoT and get more miles under the wheels than last year seem to have been somewhat blunted. So later in August I have planned and booked a trip across to France. Although the ferry is cheaper than the Shuttle it is less convenient.  When the Shuttle isn't plagued by delays and cancellations that is! So. The date will be August 21st. Midweek might have less of a crush! I have planned a route that will take me down the motorway as near as possible to Corbie to visit William Devall and then have lunch.   My plan is to ride back via Bazentin le Grand to see where the KSLI 7th Bn attacked and came a cropper on the undamaged wire. I have chosen a no-toll route back  Out via A26 In - no tolls William Devall

This trip has been on the back burner for a while and I waited until I had something concrete to write about. November 11th 2018 is the centenary of the formal ending of the First World War and there has been very little written about what commemorations there will be. I saw a note on one of the battlefield travel tour operators for a trip to the Somme that included either a visit to Thiepval or to the Australian monument at Villers Brettoneux. I checked with the British Legion and they didn't seem to know anything about organised event at Thiepval at this time. I took a punt and checked out the Aussie sites and found that they were taking applications for ticket and so I filled in the forms for Claire and myself.  At the moment it looks like we have been successful and accepted.. So need to wait a while before booking anything... Oh. I forgot. I have booked the hotel we always stay in at Amiens....

Oops. Posted on another of my blogs and here are some posts.  http://devalltravel.blogspot.co.uk/2016/07/some-trip-reports-somme-2016.html

Even though we didn't have to be at the Shuttle terminal for our train to France until 1015 or so we still had to have an early start. I had to take Reggie off to his weekend away at Wyncot Kennels. Once again he was excited as I turned into the drive and he positively ran off with the kennel lady, again without a backward glance to his Dad standing in the reception area. Back at the house Claire was doing the last minute packing. The new Saddlemen FTB3600 bag was getting filled with our "duds" that we would need for the ceremony.  The waterproof bags that I bought last year would have other stuff for two days and two evenings in Amiens.  They fit snugly in the panniers as long as they aren't overfilled. With rain looking highly likely I fitted the Saddlemen with its supplied waterproof cover. It's bright yellow to help other road users see us in the spray and gloom! Saddlemen FTB We were away via a petrol stop to top off t...

Two days to go until we start the commemorations for the Battle of the Somme. The 1st July is in the history books as the worst day's casualties for the British Army. We are lucky to have tickets to attend the commemoration at the Ulster Tower. Even luckier that there is a train to the Shuttle buses from Amiens where we stay in the same hotel each year. This year Claire is coming.  I write this as I head home after work.  So far I have fitted the luggage on the bike, but it is all empty. Packing. We have to be smartly dressed and so jeans and bike gear won't do. So we have to pack stuff that means we won't stand out too much from the crowd.  Bikes are generally not good for this! So let's see how it goes?

Each year for our wedding anniversary we have been going away for the weekend or a week even. Sometimes to Spain to the timeshare and sometimes across the Channel to France. With Reggie in tow last year we had him inoculated against "la rage" or rabies as we call it in English, and he got his passport. We went across to France and Belgium and visited some family war graves on their centenary. This year we looked at holiday rentals (gites) in France and also in England. It's become apparent that France has more to offer and at more pocket friendly rental cost than at home! So I started looking seriously at cottages and mobile homes. Gradually moving northwards to remove the need for overnight hotels where Reggie is less happy. Finally settling on the north of France. Another consideration is that under the terms of the pet passport Reggie has to be wormed between 120 and 24 hours before he arrives back at the port to return to England. So before booking anything I went on ...

Day 2. After the long day the day before I was feeling a little tired and after the early night,aided by two pints of Monaco at the restaurant, I slept most of the night. I set my alarm on my phone for 0800. By the time I had showered and got changed I got to breakfast to find all my travel mates already there.   We had a good chat over breakfast and by the time we were ready to leave it was easily 0945.   The first stop was to be the site where the Red Baron was shot down. Somehow we had missed it last year.  It would be easy to miss as it is simply a small notice board at the side of the road. The next stop was only a few miles along the road. Grove Town Cemetery where David wanted to look up one of his relatives buried there. Although from Google Maps the cemetery looks to be in the middle of farmland, what it didn't show was the rough track to get there. Unlike the Pals, we couldn't miss this one. At least Neil got to take his new Honda Cross Tourer "off road"!! P...

An early start on Saturday. I had old friend Ken Fulton staying over. My plan was to be up about 5.30am, leave at 6am to arrive Dover at 6.30am. Except Ken was up earlier and we left and arrived  at Dover way before 6am. I messaged Cal to say we were going through immigration and check-in. We were first in the line. It took so long at Costa to get a coffee that the others had arrived and we were almost ready to load. Bugger. The crossing was pretty straightforward and after breakfast we were disgorged into dull weather Calais. The plan was to head down the A26 to Arras and then cut across to the first stop at the Accrington Pals Memorial.  First delay was that the autoroute ticket machine played up and some of us got tickets and others had to wait to get one. At the pay station near Arras, the lucky ones from the ticket collection found their tickets were not recognised!!! More holdups. Then we got split up twice! The eight bikes became four and then two. Luckily, of the eight...

These are the places that I have added to the weekend. I expect I have over-engineered it as I normally do, so there may be places that we can remove "on the hoof" if we are running out of time. I'll have the route for TomTom ITN and a .GPX copy available soon. Some links. Pals at Sheffield Park Ocean Villas - Auchonvillers really! Newfoundland Memorial Ulster Tower Tank Memorial / Australian Memorial Pozieres Pozieres British Cemetery / Memorial to the Missing Froissy-Dompierre Light Railway Historical Peronne Souvenir Francaise Rancourt

It was an early start on Saturday for the ride to Dover to meet the rest of the group. Ken Fulton, who I have known for thirty years or so stayed over Friday night. The group numbered ten people; Alan and Sue, Frank, Cal, Ian, Ken, David, Elaine, Neil and me. The problem of keeping together never arose as everyone did a good job keeping an eye on the other bikes in front and behind, although we did occasionally get stretched out along the road. Once we had negotiated the ferry port and I then set the first part if the A26 cruising speed to approx 70mph, and then got through the tolls I upped to about 125kph or about 77mph. Keeping us below the dry speed limit of 130km or 81 mph.  In the wet the limit drops to 110km or around 68mph. In hindsight I should have plotted a route around Arras as we ended up going through the centre and the resultant traffic cost us valuable time.  The first stop was Serre Road Cemetery No2 to plant a British Legion Poppy...