London to St Goa

Introduction

London to St Goar

Sunday 23rd September: London Embankment I awoke with a start to Chris’s banging on the door, him bringing us the time and a cup of tea. Thanks to Chris and Jo we made it safely across London to Cleopatra’s Needle, the bus and the awaiting media from the BBC. After introductions with Mark, Andrew and our fellow travellers we were interviewed for the One Show with our backs to a beautiful emerging dawn across the Thames, illuminating of all things The Festival Hall. Being a member of the Grenoside Sword team it seemed ironical that our bus journey should start out facing the building where Grenoside danced in 1951 to celebrate peace and end in Boston dancing with them in March. The trip down to Dover went smoothly, caught an early ferry and France passed by unnoticed. After a long journey past Brussels, Brugge, Aachen and Trier we arrived at 6.45pm at a very quaint campsite in St Gaor on the river Rhine. When I walked into the bar the owner’s wife, a celebrity in the area, threw her hands in the air exclaiming I was Joe Cocker. I didn’t no whether to take it as a compliment or an insult. It seems my 25 years of teaching has had the same effect on my face as the drugs, fags and beer have had on the ex gas board plumber from Crooks. However, the river, site, food and accommodation all lived up to expectations: for an extra 2 euro we upgraded to a caravan. All in all a very pleasant day passed as we skirted by the birth places of two of my favourite historical figures .i.e. Charlemagne and Carl Marx. With very little ceremony we enjoyed a hearty menu consisting of a tasty salad starter, pork, peas and fritz and peaches and ice cream all washed down with copious amounts of passable German wine and excellent larger. Afterwards we experienced a surreal session in the night club situated under the restaurant which brought back memories of a similar evening in the Ecuadorian Amazon. On this occasion instead of UB40 singing ‘Red Red Wine’ Hermie the campsite owner played a selection of umpah music through an enormous box speaker while equally as loud some opera singer stood arms under her breasts singing Wagner as the backdrop to a TV presentation about Rhine wines. This kind of evening is obviously a regular occurrence because the ceiling of the club is covered in beer mats containing messages posted by previous travellers and revellers. Just as on Facebook Lucy Allen dominated with a message for all of us that ‘the first bus is better than ours’ This appropriately leads me on to the crew and our fellow travellers. Simon Caudel’s observations in the Independent that the trip could become big brother on wheels is a lot closer than even he could image. The bus consists of, at the moment, 35 travellers and three crew members. The crew, strangely enough, seem more normal than those sitting behind them. The bus is being driven by JonPal a coach driver from Brugge, Belgium. Over a beer last night he told me the story of how he came to be here. Earlier in the year he was fined €750 for breaking some EU driving regulation and was so pissed off that he handed in his notice. His boss asked him if he would reconsider his decision and drive his coach to Calcutta. After a little convincing that the boss was not taking the micky he jumped at the opportunity. After a day and bit of driving us I’m very glad he agreed to because he’s a very steady driver and a thoroughly nice person. However, I daren’t ask him what the offence was for just in case it changes my opinion of him. The backup driver Marcus is a Kiwi returning after working in Edinburgh. However, normality stops with the leader of the bus Layton an Irish Pakistani ex PE Teacher with striking dark eyes and a very strong County Down ascent. On the other hand the travellers are something very different to a normal coach party and I use the term ‘party’ very wisely because a certain small section are intent on doing exactly that all the way to Sydney much to the annoyance of Leighton who is at the moment adopting a similar approach to another of my heroes (all in one day) Napoleon. Just as that great figure attempted to steer France from anarchy after the Revolution Leyton is trying to work the same magic on the bus. At the moment the trip is more Animal Farm than Big Brother, although I suppose they are similar. I am convinced the outbreak of violence is more imminent here on the bus than up the road in Iran and Pakistan. I just can’t wait!