248 DEAR DIARY, DAY TWELVE…

Dear Diary,

Many people warned us that the Bay of Biscay can be a cruel mistress, but she was a pussycat to us on the trip from Bilbao to Portsmouth.  Honestly, it was like a millpond…only calmer!  I’ve been on rougher coach trips than this journey.   

After a massive sleep-in, I checked the location tracker on the ship's infotainment system and found we were just off the coast of Normandy near the hilariously named town of Brest (sorry, I’m such a child).  We met for lunch, and I found my fellow ralliers had all had an extended lie-in, which ironically made us look like we had just been dug up rather than radiant and refreshed - the last couple of weeks had taken it out of us.

We headed back to our cabins, packed our stuff and got ready to dock in Portsmouth by watching a couple of episodes of ‘Ramsey’s Hotel Hell’.  Then it was time for the disembarkation pantomime.  Thrown out of our room, stood around for 20 minutes, rushed to our cars, sat around for 30 minutes, got off the ferry, queued up for 30 minutes to get through passport control.

Rant time.  Why don’t they have a lane at Border Security for caravans/camper vans and leave the rest for normal people?  We were made to wait while the Immigration Wombles rooted through Sagren & Gwillam’s manky Castleton Roamer, sat like plums, desperate to start the long journey back to Liverpool.

After some banter with the Kiosk Womble about how I don’t look like my passport photo because of my hobo beard, we finally got on to the motorway and straight into roadworks - miles and miles of restricted speed because of workers in the road. 

Never saw a single hi-viz the entire time.  At one point, the motorway was restricted to 50mph as they were testing the system!  Sake.  Then it was a quick stop for fuel and screen wash - my windscreen was dirtier than a teenager's imagination - and we were off.

We planned to stop in Birmingham for a break and a possible driver switch, but after the drives we had done over the last couple of weeks, the Portsmouth-to-Liverpool stint was a walk in the park. 

I got excited when I started to see places I knew how to get to without a sat nav.  We were almost home.  We left the M6, dashed along the M62, and turned onto the M57, where, without any planning, we drove down the motorway 3 abreast. Our little convoy was just a few miles from home.  Not going to lie, I felt a little emotional.

All the planning, all the preparation, all the effort, and we made it home, safe and sound. 

2,241 miles. 

12 days. 

8 countries. 

1 experience of a lifetime.

Yours,

Rob