Departure

Leaving the ‘White Crow’.

After the Post and Chronicle publicity shots, prominently displaying our travel sponsor together with his office totty outside the Crow, Jo, my dad and a few bemused punters dredged from the vault gathered on the car park. This small but eminent assemblage cheered us off around 2.00pm. Geoff with myself in the Burlington, Graham, John and Jack in the Volvo 144. The larks shall begin.

The journey would take us over the Channel from Portsmouth to St. Malo, then, after a 7.00am start, on to the fortified river town Amboise situated on the south bank of the Loire: the following day our small convoy would travel to our final destination to the timber framed medieval town of Beaune, the northern capital of the Burgundy region. Although not strictly in the Beaujolais ‘department’ this particular centre has usurped the title of ‘coeur de Beaujolais’; this is where, along with all the other competitors, we would congregate in search of the 1981 Nouveau Beaujolais. Possessing the greater knowledge regarding the geography of central France, plus having another significant advantage, the latest ‘ING’ map, Geoff had planned the trip.

It was probably the most indirect, curiously contrived route possible, but Geoff was stealing time from work and thought “If I’m going to get caught for bunking off I might as well enjoy it and see a little more of ‘beautiful’ France”. The Burlington ran like a dream down to Portsmouth arriving at 8.30 to board the overnight ferry. Jack hadn’t brought his passport; he also did not have a ticket for the ferry. Notably, he was still pissed from the pre-race lunchtime session having also enjoyed several comfort breaks whilst traveling south. He had witnessed every ‘scam’ on the planet throughout his horse trading days but still couldn’t believe that he been so easily hoodwinked out of the Crow finding himself now standing at Portsmouth docks. Problem solved, Jack was to hide in the boot of the Volvo then smuggled aboard. The crossing is ideal for passengers who ‘partake’ of a drink, because, the boat slowly trickles over the Channel throughout the night with the bar open. We knew that we were a ‘bunk’ down on the four berth allocation so it made good sense to secure as much pleasure from the facilities that were on offer, principally to have a serious drinking session to offset the ‘soon after’ scramble for the beds. As it turned out, John gave up his berth for Jack, on the grounds that he was a good Christian, Jack requiring the greater comfort considering that he was a wrinkly old choot: perhaps another reason may have been that John, earlier in the evening, did fall out of the top bunk cutting his head on the floor of the cabin: once is bad enough, risking the tumble twice is just plain dumb. 

The ferry docked at 7.00am, we were in France.