Baron von Münchausen or Boys Own Paper?

Don’t expect pictures in this one…...it is, as you will see, a deadly serious analysis of what lies before me.

I am suffering with a case of very cold feet in the last 10 days, not literally you understand, but rather with regards to my ever nearing trek to the United States. Today it is 37 days off, and counting. I have had some misgivings about it before, as I previously mentioned. (February blog “I have a dream…”) The truth is that it really was just all a dream and then I suddenly decided to make it reality. Now some elements of it seem to be threatening nightmares instead. My family and friends will know, some to their pain and cost, that, some of my dreams are ill thought out with regard to their consequences, some are very carefully planned and executed ruthlessly, and some are just simple (though sometimes quite complex) fantasies that are best left locked in my head. This one seems to be a combination of all those three. It is true that the consequences of anything going really pear shaped could be disastrous both in expense and such things as medical care and flights and time and collecting the pieces (or ashes at worst!). It is true that it has been pretty carefully planned and so far executed ruthlessly to bring it about, and it is also true that there are fantasies as to how I had always envisaged myself making this trip and the fun that “we” would have and the stories “we” would accumulate to relate in coming years. The honest truth of this part though, is that the “we” is me in my early twenties, two stone lighter, no wrinkles, with long brown hair in a pony tail, hedonistic and full of adventure, and “her”, an ethereal, an ephemeral, a similar twenties beauty, an exciting, intelligent adoring sex goddess, my companion through the explorations of day and night, a soul mate and help meat, packed in close behind me on the pillion of my low, custom built, Arlen Ness chopper. Now do you see what I mean by the fantasies best locked in my head? The actual facts are that, when I was that age, I couldn’t ride a motorbike, I wasn’t hedonistic and adventurous, at least not outwardly, my hair, though long, was never long enough to tie back, and I was struggling to make it through medical school, even if I had some fantasies. Other little glitches in the picture were that I could never have found the time, let alone the money, and I have never recognised adoring sex goddesses until it was too late to realise that I had one in tow. So, now, grey, short haired, slightly portly(though definitely not fat!), I am still hedonistic but generally incapable (hot chocolate or Horlicks is about as hedonistic as I seem to get) even if I still yearn for adventure, I find I am embarking into a less than fantasy world alone. I cannot persuade the sex goddess of the last 33 years to leave home for much longer than a fortnight every two years or so, let alone ride pillion for 14,000 miles, and without compromising the whole balance of those 33 years, and, most essentially, the right of access to my workshop and garage, I cannot advertise for a suitable replacement ( who should, of course, fill the description of the above companion…..see my e-mail address if you’re interested, or form an orderly queue up our drive on one of the next two Saturday mornings for interview!) I have persuaded Wife and indeed Daughter to fly out for a week or so each, for a short part of the trip, but with Wife, it will probably have to be the beaches of California with the bike parked up and a decent hotel, and with Daughter, maybe we will hit Sturgis, where we can have a good fun time either together or doing our own things. Anyway, pleasant as I am sure those weeks will be, it still leaves at least 11 weeks of travelling alone. It is really on that subject that I have had some monstrous nightmares, made worse by V, my ex-sister in law, and then by Euan McGregor and Charlie Boorman, and finally by Eion Crighton, about whom, considerably more later.

Now, two weeks ago on Saturday, we went to the dedication of Amy at the Liberal Jewish synagogue in Nottingham. She is the daughter of J, my nephew,( he of graphic design and my fabulous logos fame) and his wife L. J’s mother is V. Well, we had all returned in the early afternoon to J and L’s house, a hobbit burrow in an ecological development 12 miles outside Nottingham, and we were sitting in their energy-gathering, enviro-friendly conservatory enjoying the sumptuous fare and drinking some very pleasant wine, when the topic of my imminent trip was raised with some interest. I heard myself going through the usual stuff, probably quite boring to most of the family by now….”Yes…about 14 weeks, it’s about 14,000 miles, …No, it’ll be anti-clockwise from Boston, sort of ‘sticking round the edge’…Yes, camping most of the time but motels if it’s pissing it down….I’ll be O.K. as long as I don’t drop it…..No, I’m going to try to avoid Tornado Alley”…Rustle of polite laughter.… Outside, between showers of light rain, the sun powered the water heaters and re-charged the electric cells, the grass grew quietly and lush over their roof , munching away at the carbon dioxide, the reed bed outside quietly sucked up the sewage and fed the remains into the pond, and the children played enthusiastically on the swings in the garden when suddenly, in this palace of the peaceful new age, in the silence that followed my brief exposition, and quite out of the blue, V said “Are you going to buy a gun when you’re over there, in case of trouble?” Well, that hit me a bit between the eyes, because, although I had not voiced it, or seriously considered it, it had crossed the distant recesses of my mind that I could encounter some such problem somewhere on such a big journey and where, as we all know from the films, everybody carries guns all the time and is not averse to using them. I had already decided to take my oldest cheapest watch, not to carry much cash, to record the numbers of my credit cards and make notes of how to contact my mobile phone provider in case I were to be mugged. I had already made a mental note to be a total chicken and give up without a murmur in the face of real and present danger, I had even ( and this is from one of the deepest dungeons of my mind) thought to carry a tube of K-Y Jelly in my leathers just in case “the worse than death scenario” were to rear its ugly head, but the thought of buying a gun had never really entered my head. I mean, it’s not the first time that this sort of thought of “what would you do if …had crossed my mind. If for example you caught a burglar in your house, if some bastard really hurt your daughter or wife, if your child was abused by some psycho-wierdo ,if you were threatened in the street by a knife waving youth, and, even years before, if a bunch of rockers turned up to wreck your youth club hop, if you were marooned alone on a desert island with ….., No, sorry, that’s from the other “what if” files. I had a flick knife when I was a teenager. I bought it in Italy when the family was on holiday and smuggled it home in the bottom of my suitcase. I had, in fact still have, my Senior Scout’s 7 inch blade sheath knife, but I never carried either of them in public. I have a shotgun and firearms licence and have two rifles and two shotguns. I have shot target rifles and shot many different pistols with the, now defunct, Lancashire Police Gun Club at their range in the multi-storey car park at the Blackpool Police Station. I carried a 9mm Browning pistol when on operational tour in Bosnia with the Royal Artillery, and beat off nine other reservist officers in a competition shoot at Chilwell when we were training before deployment. Now, however, someone was actually asking me whether I would carry a weapon on my dream trip….presumably being prepared to use it. I joked it off and replied “No, of course not, but I might keep a knife down my sleeping bag”. How stupid! Of course I wouldn’t. What the hell would I do with a knife in my sleeping bag, except perhaps nick my dick when I rolled over. I have always believed that you shouldn’t pretend to know what you are doing with a weapon if you really doubt if you could use it. I mean, almost anybody could probably take a knife off me, especially if there was more than one anybody. What a bloody silly reply to have made; do I really believe somewhere that I am potentially that brave or perhaps that stupid. No, nice smile, lots of gentle quiet talk, acquiescence and hope you get out alive the other end. Attack is only a last ditch hope for chickens facing an inevitable Kiev. Maybe then, and only then, just before I reach for the K-Y Jelly.

Now making matters worse, I have recently been lent a DVD of Euan McGregor and Charlie Boorman’s great trip, “The Long Way Round”. Truly this is fantastic stuff and really worth watching, whether you are a motorcycle enthusiast or not. For those of you who don’t know of it, it was produced as a television series and tells their story of a 22,000 mile mammoth trip from London to New York. Their trip took them across Europe, Eastern Europe, Mongolia, Siberia and southern Russia, across to Alaska and across the U.S to New York. They went on two BMW motor bikes, with helmet and bike cameras, and to their enormous credit, did the vast majority of it entirely unassisted, although they were followed and filmed by an equally intrepid biker cameraman from Holland. They also had a film producer and crew and support vehicles following them, although, admittedly some variable distance behind them. The cost must have been astronomical, only something that two film stars could have considered, although they visited several Unicef houses on the way round to promote the charity and, I believe, that the film has been sold with the profit to support them. Euan and Charlie are both highly experienced motorcyclists, far, far more skilled than I am, with many more years of experience including off road riding. They are also a lot younger, probably about 15 years younger. Even they had terrible problems, largely across Mongolia and Siberia, encountering deserts, mud, floods, rivers, broken roads, and significant breakdowns. They fell off numerous times, they helped each other out of the tricky bits, they supported each other, boosted each others morale, visited numerous homes where they were royally entertained, slept and fed, from Yurts to mafia style mansions. They were escorted by police security escorts across dangerous territories in Siberia through prior arrangement by the Embassy in London. They went on specialist bike riding courses, had specialist film input, specially prepared bikes and luggage carriers and lastly, before they went, they went on a full day’s firearms and escape and evasion course, in case they came across any real hostilities.. Then, while they were sat in a dusty lay-by in God-knows-where, a car drew up alongside them. The back window rolled down and a geezer, with smiley gold teeth, bad breath and a 5 day 5o’clock shadow, pointed a pistol at the cameraman and nicked all his papers, all his cameras, his passport and credit cards and all his cash, and drove off in a cloud of dust, never to be seen again. The point of this is that, if two film stars, known even in these remote parts, and supported by an entire team, can be ripped off at gun-point, what hope for the rest of us?

For two weeks, since watching this, my feet started to get cold. Here am I, at 60, and I am considering embarking on a 14,000 mile trip, and no help, no support team, no endless cash in case of trouble and nobody to boost my morale or share my Yurt with me. Am I mad?

Then, this last weekend, as if to add to my problems, I received the bi-monthly magazine of a British motorcycle group of which I am a member. I was fascinated by a front cover headline which read “75 year old conquers the Sahara”. This turned out to be the extracts from the diary of one, Eion Crighton, a 75 year old who decided to raise money for his favourite charity by riding his motorbike 7,000 miles over 5 weeks, from a well known motorcycle show in Peterborough to return to another show ground at Paddock Wood. Now, I have to say, that either, this guy is either incredibly fit and strong and capable, beyond anything that most really fit men are in their thirties, or he is incredibly stupid and inconceivably lucky, or he is the reincarnation of The Baron von Munchausen off on one last trip. I accept that my Harley is not the bike for this sort of trip, but he did it on what appears to be a 15 year old, beautiful condition Kawasaki 550GT, and what is remarkable about the pictures, is that it really isn’t very big and he isn’t smothered over in bags and additional kit over and above his standard panniers and top box. At one stage he says that he stopped to pick up 30, two litre bottles of water. Thirty mind! (There is now way I could load the Harley up with 30 two litre bottles…..they’d have to be hung on with binder twine from every available part, and I’d end up looking like a giant Harley with giant shingles.) He is also dressed in what appears to be a pair of jodhpurs, a scarlet leather jacket and World War II Commando boots. He looks like a sort of 1980’s Post Office delivery man, or a sort of gay Mad Max beyond Thunderdome. Whatever he’s taking, I could do with a few bottles of it! It certainly isn’t slivo. My guess would be ecstasy or LSD, but, who knows, perhaps it really is all absolute gospel truth. And if it really is, or, actually, even if it isn’t, good luck to him…it’s a ripping yarn! Whatever, this article does not belong in a motorcycle magazine. It really is the stuff of Boys’ Own Paper ( God rest it’s soul). Even Indiana Jones did not have any more to cope with! I have to quote some chunks of this, so, all credit to him, this is Eion Crighton’s own account, in his own words, copied here from the magazine, for which I don’t have permission, but I hope it helps to sell his book in due course when he finally publishes.

There are three episodes in particular that grabbed me (where I won’t say).

“My tank and two reserve tanks were virtually empty and at 1.30 a.m. I drifted into Cadiz on the smell of the fuel. I couldn’t find anywhere open and ended up in the docks where a kind truck driver told me where to find a fuel station that was open. I pulled in, put the bike on the stand and looked at the unleaded fuel pumps. Then I noticed an elderly man in the office looking at me very intently through what I thought to be armoured glass.

I had a funny feeling that something wrong was behind me and I turned slowly around. There were three chaps standing there, all of whom had knives and although they did not speak English, French or Arabic, they made their demands very plain. They wanted my wallet.

Now, I come from a Scottish family, brought up in Scotland with certain Scottish traits. Naturally, I refused and they became very hostile. In the end they made it quite plain that they intended to cut my throat. Now I have served in the forces, been trained by Israeli Commando Division and served in the Middle East, and working on what I had always been taught, three to one was a nice, safe bet for success”. (I mean, you just would feel confident with just those odds wouldn’t you ?)

“Our discussions came to an abrupt end. The older one said something to his colleague who took his finger across his own throat and looked at me. I told him to piss off. The next thing I knew, he lunged at me with a knife, which I managed to forestall from actually going into my shoulder and chest above my heart. Unfortunately for him, it meant that he was standing for that split second with his legs well apart. I managed to restrain his wrist and held the knife off, although it had already cut my shirt slightly”….(Must have taken his Captain Scarlet jacket off)…. “My knee, having been used to many similar troubles in dockyards round the world, seemed to have a will of its own. The poor chap gasped loudly and sank down in front of me, his knife falling from his hand as he clasped his nether regions.

To my horror, I looked up to see his colleague leering over me with his knife approaching my throat. I pulled back suddenly and the blade disappeared out of sight, under my chin! It must have been very, very close to my throat! Surprisingly enough this chap lost his balance and the next thing I knew was that my heavy motorcycle boot was in full flight and contacted the chap’s Khyber Pass. He shot forward, unable to save himself and landed, facedown on the concrete pump ledge. Poor chap!

I spun round, by then in temper”…. (No!...surely not!) …. “and lunged at the third one but he turned, legged it down the road and disappeared up a dark alleyway! I think it was the shortest fight I have ever had in my life and the first for about 5 years. The outcome however, had so amused me that my laughter kept me wide awake for the rest of the night over a very tortuous mountain route that I had to take in the dark”

Well, have you got the picture of this chap yet? But wait, dear Reader there is more to come! Away, to the Atlas Mountains in Morrocco….

………“About an hour and a half later I saw dust on the horizon. It turned out to be three vehicles of a desert patrol which was obviously not Moroccan because it contained some very badly turned-out troops, all badly disciplined and behaving more like pirates than I had ever seen in my life.

They were upset that I had filmed them”…. (Well, of course, you would take photos of them wouldn’t you!) ….“and forced me to hand over my three cameras. The films were taken out and the cameras actually thrown down on the ground. I was interrogated in very broken French, and every question was punctuated with a blow on my back with the butt of their guns”. (No multiple broken ribs then …clearly no 75 year old osteoporotic bones here!) “Cutting a nasty story short, I was turned around and permitted to return to Morocco after I had shown them my Omani Arabic service driving licence”. (Made all the difference that then?...must remember to get one of those for tight corners) “I am convinced that it had saved me from being interned in one of their prison camps for which I was obviously very grateful! It certainly gave me some credibility in their eyes” ( Seems more likely that the old wives tale that if you mess with a madman, you mess with the devil, may be a more rational explanation, but who needs rational with a tale this gripping!)

And finally, Indiana Eion, or Crocodile Crighton, as he surely must become known for these deeds of daring-do, exceeds all boundaries of courage and true British ‘stiffupperlipmanship’….choppers at dusk in Casablanca….say it again Sam!

“The next day I set off north again for Casablanca, reaching a small town some 100 miles north after dark and again finding a very nice hotel right on the beach. As I took a walk along the beach I saw two young lads coming towards me. They looked friendly and I had no reason to suspect otherwise, but, unfortunately, they decided to ask for my telephone and my wallet. What they thought was my telephone was, in fact, a combination knife set with some tools. I told them that they couldn’t have anything of the sort so they took out two large flick knives and became aggressive. I said ‘Look, I will show you but you won’t want it’. It took a while getting the knife out, which they thought was the telephone, and by the time I had got it out from behind my back, I had opened two blades, leaning down as I did so I pulled out my commando knife from inside my boot”…... (I don’t know how the hell he got through the immigration and Customs services with these, but clearly they must have recognised a true hero on a mission)

“I stood up and took a violent leap towards them, screaming as I did so and they backed off, looked at each other and ran about 20 or 30 yards away from me. Amusingly, they discussed the situation, put their knives away and came over with their hands raised towards me, apologising in French and saying that they wouldn’t take anything from me but advising me not to go into any of the quieter areas of town. We ended on good terms so I made my way back to my hotel.”(We need this guy…he’s the perfect answer to the knife culture of today’s youth…put him on the streets and he’ll play them at their own game, scare the living shit out of them and turn them instantly into good upright citizens or even baby super-grasses)

Well, there you are, that’s my problem, V asks me do I need to buy a gun, Euan and Charlie get threatened by a gun and Crocodile Crighton just finds it all over the place as easily as Casanova in Venice. Are you surprised I have got cold feet? Add to that, that it is two thirds of the distance Euan and Charlie covered, twice the distance that Indiana rode, and even though most of it is likely to be on tarmacked roads in a supposedly civilised country, it has the biggest gun culture in the world, maniacs carrying as much weaponry as the British Army who massacre entire High Schools, Hells Angel gangs who eat baby bikers like me or thrash their balls off with bicycle chains, and I’ve seen the films too…chainsaw massacres, things in sheets with scissors for fingers or nails like knives, The Mob who bury you in concrete for looking at a girl in a bar the wrong way….need I say more? AND, I’m by myself….I’ve gone off my head in the past because I was by myself! So, what is my conclusion from all this? Well, certainly not the double bladed knife in the back of my trousers and commando knife in my boot. It would be just my luck to drop the bike, stab my arse and wreck my already damaged right ankle. Probably not the pull your opponent in close and knee him in the balls approach either. I already have some arthritic changes in my knees , and I would probably try it on some thug who carries his double bladed knife in the front of his trousers. So, the pistol? Probably not. I am a doctor after all and although I am, of course, a lethal weapon with a pistol. I couldn’t bear the guilt of seriously injuring someone less skilled. No, it can’t be any of these things. It has to be safe, yet totally disabling, the skill of my life’s work, listening and talking…yep…I’ve got it…write a blog and bore them to death.

Best wishes,

Doc

Finally, a foot-note to Eion Crighton. Eion, if you were ever read to this, as I said, you are either, quite the most fantastic old man, or you are far superior blagger to me. You have my greatest admiration whichever it is. It is quite clear that this wasn’t the standard Saga Holiday package. Perhaps you can advise on future excursions which I might join…always providing that you ride as bodyguard of course. I am reminded of the Steppenwolf song, Born to be Wild…..”get your motor running, get out on the Highway, looking for adventure, in whatever comes our way” Ride safe, ride free old man!. I hope you can do so for many years yet.

Final, final footnote: This is the final word of advice from Eion to adventurous motorcyclists. “Make certain before you leave that your bike is in pristine condition and that your brakes have new pads, that there are no weak areas and that you are carrying spare cables with you. One last point I would say to anybody, is that it is dangerous to ride at night because the patrols and roadblocks will fire at you if you come at them with your headlight on at speed”

(Well that’s O.K. then. Perhaps, in addition to the spare sets of cables, a couple of dozen pairs of disposable underpants might prove useful; my dear late mother always seemed to think clean underpants were essential in case you found yourself in hospital. Night patrols and roadblocks eh? Well, it may not be cricket, and I still don’t think I’ll buy a pistol, but perhaps I do need to fix some sort of ex–military GPMG (general purpose machine gun) to my front fairing? I’m sure they must be available over the counter in Texas or Alabama if I ask nicely?)

SEE THE PICTURES BETTER IF YOU WANT

I think that most of you who read this can see the pictures in full size or, if not full, certainly better size if you want to, by a single right click on the picture. Then click left button on "Open link in a new tab" You will get the full picture and can close it by clicking on the cross on the top right. Best wishes to you all and enjoy the Bank Holiday weekend.

Best wishes

Doc

Pinnacle of success.

The road from Strasbourg to Paris is pretty straight forward, Metz, Reims, Paris, only once again the remarkable thing for an Englishman is that it is just a delight to be driving rather than a chore. Although there was an increasing amount of traffic as we neared the capital, there were no hold ups, a few fast tracked road works, good surface, and still, superb weather. Even the Peripherique, the Paris ring road, was constantly moving well, although it was the beginning of the evening rush hour when we arrived on the Friday in late afternoon. When we had stopped overnight in Austria two nights before, I had looked on the internet and found a campsite on the western edge of Paris, just off the Peripherique, and although I had not been able to phone then to book ahead, I thought we would take a chance and go. So Thomas the Satnav was now guiding us effortlessly around the ring, off multiple junctions, to the back roads of the western Parisian suberbs. “Prepare to leave highway in point four of a mile”, “leave highway in 300yards”, in a hundred yards keep right”. This would have been a major effort with a road map, and we would have needed a street map to have actually known where we were going. Father was amazed at Thomas’s accuracy. I was used to it, but grateful to have it. And so, after about an hour of south and west Paris, at 5.30, we finally were told “In 100yards reach destination”, and there in front of us was the green iron archway over the entrance to the municipal campsite. Now don’t ask me exactly where it was. I followed a post code on the internet and saw the rough area on the large scale map; suffice to know that we had arrived and Thomas knew where we were. We entered the park and drew up at the bureau of the concierge to see if we could book in. It was closed. A sign on the window stated that the office hours were 9.00 to 4.00 daily and 10.00 to 3.00 on weekends. Damn! What to do? Well, the barriers were up and people were coming and going, so perhaps try and sort it tomorrow morning? We drove in. The first thing that we noticed was that there were many small holiday chalets on the site, arranged along small loop roads. It was beautifully laid out with wooded areas and grassy camping areas, but as we travelled around the chalets were almost everywhere. We saw no caravans and no free sites to park. Not that it was crowded, there were plenty of free grassy areas, just no obvious plots for mobile caravans. Up one side road however, we came across several, camped near each other with a couple of chalets. I stopped to ask. This seemed clearly to be the local permitted gypsy encampment, and their French seemed to me probably as strange as mine did to them. However they were very friendly and I understood that they just said “park up where you want, it’s alright for a night or two” or something to that effect. They pointed across the clearing towards some more chalets and a low building and so we followed their directions and saw that the low building was a large shower and toilet block, and there was some room alongside this to pull in alongside some empty holiday chalets, so we did. The weather was still lovely and the park was quiet and peaceful. I had had some apprehension about the proximity of the “gypsy” group, but they were perfectly friendly and welcoming and we spent a good night there. The most enjoyable part of the stay being the shower block! I won’t say that we were filthy, because we weren’t. We had been having basin washes in the camper for two weeks, including hair washes, but because of the difficulty of filling up with water from a tap, we had had to be sparse in our use of water and so we had not been able to use the shower. This block was a bit old, but had large tiled showers, even a disabled one with a seat on the wall. The floor however was slippery, and the showers were delightfully fierce, but would have almost blown Father away! It meant a rather undignified effort of showering together which both of us found a bit embarrassing to start with I think, but it was the only way and it was so nice to feel really clean and fresh again. Because the floor was so slippery I had to hold Father up both in the shower and when drying him, and we really could have done with a third assistant! I was glad however that we had gone there in dressing gowns and slippers and not fully dressed. Just a simple non-slip floor would have made all the difference. Enough of the showers! Just use your imagination. After an excellent dinner of shepherd’s pie and salad, and a very peaceful night, we woke as usual at about 7.00 and were ready to go into the Saturday morning Parisian traffic for the last objective. I was hoping to take Father up the Eiffel tower, as he had taken me, almost 50 years ago. As we left for the gate, we filled up the water tanks and went to the office, to sort out our stay. Closed of course, but the barrier was open!
I had planned it so that we would drive just about 15 miles directly east to the Eiffel tower. I noticed two large parking signs on the Paris map close by and thought that we may be able to park there and I could take Father the last mile in the wheelchair. We followed the last mile of the journey on the west bank of the Seine with the tower in sight on our right ahead of us, Thomas having a lie in this morning as I simply followed the signs and looked out for car parks. We drove past the tower and followed signs for the coach park. I didn’t want the same problem I had had in Canterbury to spoil the end of the trip as it had the beginning. It was just after twenty past eight, and on the east side of the tower is a long pathway approach through a lawned tree lined area, and at the end of that a parking and dropping off area for coaches. As we drove into this it was clear that there were a lot of free spaces and I easily pulled into one. I went to a kiosk close by to ask if they had some change for the meter and if it was alright to park there. The official stated “D’accord. C’est libre aujourd’hui, c’est libre le weekend” Free at the weekends! How refreshing is that! There’s a lot to be learned here about Liberté, Egalité, Fraternité…Ken Livingstone and Canterbury Council pay attention!
Father felt that he could walk the 300 yards to the base of the tower, and we strolled up the plane lined avenue to the four great bases of the superb soaring steel spire, marvelling once more at the engineering which for its day, and probably even now, was a masterpiece of construction and design. There were already quite a lot of people waiting, mostly tour groups at the entrances to the tower bases, so I sat Father on a bench in the centre in the sun where he could watch my progress down a queue and when it opened at nine o’clock and I had got to almost the front of the queue, I beckoned him over. We still had one of those winding barrier things to pass through, the sort of thing that makes you feel you’re already at the front but actually winds another 50 yards of tightly packed people into a deceptively small space. Suddenly, magnifique! 'Un gentil home officiel ' beckoned us out of the barrier and he guided us straight to the side disabled entrance and straight to the bottom of the lift. So, there’s a lesson to all you young families…don’t leave the old folk at home..they’ll get you fast passes to all the places you want to visit, and possibly have a disabled passenger parking permit too! I don’t really remember very much about going up the Eiffel Tower as a child. I seem to remember the views from the top, but not the actual actual. Now, for a sixty year old, and even more for a ninety five year old, it is quite an unnerving experience, especially if you look out sideways as you go. It's not the height or the rapid ascent, but the effect that passing the steel girders so fast has on your balance. It throws your eyes into vertical nystagmus, and your vestibular organs turn on their heads! ( it can make you very giddy). We had a break at the second floor and took a short stroll to adjust. Father told me to go to the top and he would stay there and wait for me to return. I refused. We had done this together and would finish together whether it was here or at the top. He decided to do it, for me I think, but none the less, he was up for it. We entered the small cage that shoots you vertically though the centre of the upper two thirds of the tower. I held him facing me and told him to focus on my shoulder for 30 seconds.(I focused on his!) And so we made it, neither of us giddy anymore, on to the steel balcony at the top. Here, on the shady side it was chilly in a light wind, but on the sunny side it was fantastic and we looked out together over the city and the river spread out like a carpet below. Together, fifty years on, and with the role responsibilities reversed, we stood once again on the top of the pinnacle of Europe. It was a great moment and we had a hug. We met a delightful couple from California who I asked to take a photograph of us. They were astonished at Father’s age ( and actually mine too, but I don’t know quite what that says! They did not specify “What really sixty”, or “what only sixty” Perhaps it just says how polite Californians are when they are touring Europe?) After about 20 minutes walking the balcony, we descended again to the second floor and had coffee and a cake at the café, and then returned to the camper, all done and dusted, and objectives achieved by 11.30. Father was chuffed to bits that we had done it. He kept on saying “ I just couldn’t have done it without you” to which my simple reply was that I wouldn’t have done it without you, which I suppose is true of my whole lifetime relationship with him!
Our ferry home from Calais was booked for the following day at 11.00a.m., but, with all objectives achieved, an early finish at the Eiffel Tower and a fine day, we decided to go for the 200mile trip to Calais now, and see whether we could get an early ferry. Despite a leisurely trip and a stop for a picnic lunch, we arrived at just after four in the afternoon and they kindly swapped us to the 4.45 ferry. The only hiccup was the inspection by Immigration, previously related, but that was a part of a streamlined process of our embarkation, and once again, when we got on board, P and O ferries had arranged for us to park right adjacent to the passenger lift on the lorry deck, which made life so simple and comfortable. Thank you P and O for a really great service. The rest as they say, is history, well actually boring, but that isn’t the accepted expression. We stopped at Milton Keynes overnight as it had been a tiring day and there was no rush. It started to rain of course as we went north of Stoke on Trent, just to make us feel at home, and has persisted, pretty well ever since, over the last four weeks. Father was back in Windermere to a welcome reception from his friends and in time for lunch. I was back at the farm by half past one. Door to door distance? 3,542 miles. Bosnia or bust?....No worries!

Best wishes,

Doc.

Piccies to follow very soon. Watch this space.

Stop Press

You will of course realise that I am not writing all this stuff from the streets of Paris, or on the boat at Calais, or from a motorway stop on the way home, but rather from the camper, somewhere on Catterick Garrison. I am sorry it is late,of course, but maybe all travelogues would be like this if their authors had to work too! Some really current things have come up though ,which need to be said.
Firstly, Thank you to the Parking Officer for Canterbury Council who has grudgingly, with a strong reminder of how wrong I was, agreed to let me off my parking fine, sending me a photo of the sign board at the car park entrance showing that only PLG vehicles are allowed to park there and that, within the marked bays. My vehicle is a PLG vehicle, and they did not have any bays quite long enough. It seems it would be OK to park a car and a trailer there, but you should disconnect the trailer to fit in the bay behind your car. Anyway, I appreciate it. It did rather spoil the start of the trip.
Second, I managed to get a fantastic battery for the Harley from All American in Kidderminster. It kicks 135 cold start amps and is 2/3rds the size of the original Harley one. That is enough to start two Harleys at once! No troubles now then.
Third, A and I sadly said goodbye to our family 1973 MGB Roadster last Saturday....not for good we hope, but for better. A better life...T and H have "borrowed her for the summer" on condition that T keeps all tools for inspection and demolition of gadgets locked up. H has promised they will be confiscated if they appear.
Finally...big push this month for daughter H.....GO FOR IT darling...ALLSTOPS OUT...You can do it. Sorry, only the family will understand what this is about.

Best wishes,

Doc

Strasbourg and Paris, the long way home.

If you regard a holiday as a period when you go out drinking or clubbing ‘til the early hours and lie in ‘til lunchtime, a trip with Father and me to Bosnia would not suit your taste. Father usually goes to bed about 10 p.m.and in the countryside in Bosnia, when it’s dark, that seems fairly sensible. In the mornings, my body clock is so set in its ways that it almost always wakes me at 6.30a.m., so our holiday followed these sort of hours. All our hosts are around and about at these times too…..

So, in accordance with our normal practice, we were up, breakfasted, stowed away and on the road soon after 7.00 and heading rapidly out of the valley and over the mountain pass towards Mrkonjic Grad and Banja Luka.. It was our intention to return home via Strasbourg which is where our friends, A and S are now living. But for now, as the early morning sunshine burned off the mountain mist, we headed to Banja Luka to meet Ranka who had returned to the university and had asked us to see her once more when we were leaving. We texted her as we dropped down the steep beautiful Vrbas valley from the Čemernica Mountains. As we entered the city, she was there at the side of the first bus stop. With her she had brought her old flatmates, her two closest university friends, to meet us; we are obviously slight local peculiarities, oddities, a fact that I would actually find hard to deny! She introduced A and C, and with some fascination, clearly not having been anywhere near such a strange vehicle, they all clambered inside and we headed for the city centre. The girls were fascinated by the fact that we had a kitchen, bathroom, beds and kitchen all on wheels and were totally independent. Parking was just a bit of a problem and involved the three girls smiling sweetly and chatting up a blushing young parking attendant. Eventually, we squeezed in to a space on a demolition site car park, with a promise by the young official that he would personally take care of their mobile home. This involved the payment of €10.00, about a day’s wages for him, about the price I would expect to pay for a parking space at home. We set off for the pedestrian centre. I was quite surprised because the centre of Banja Luka was so much improved over what I remembered from my last visit about 6 years ago; normally we by-pass the centre. There were clean new pavements and streets, lots of new shops and restaurants and bustling crowds of people. No longer large pot holes and mortar craters, no longer many shell holes visible on the buildings, it could have been almost any European city. We sat in a corner café on the pavement over-looking the square, the past generations, the old gynaecologist, the old family doctor, and the new generation, lawyer, sociologist and psychologist, quite symbolic of the fading out of the old and the hopeful development of the new all around us. Quite suddenly, Ranka said that they were going to leave us for a little while and pop into the market. She thought she knew where there might be a Russian water pump like the one her dad had used to pump the water from the cistern and which I had coveted for wild camping. Such a pump would enable me to go off normal parks and draw water even from a river. Zarko had said that they were very difficult to get and, although he had found it in Banja Luka, he couldn’t remember where. They would not be long. It seems that Ranka had done a bit of research before we arrived and had spoken to some of the hardware stall holders in the large open market and they had put the word out. It was only about 15 minutes before they returned. “We’ve found the pumps” Ranka smiled. So after paying the bill we sat Father on a bench in the square while the three girls and I entered the busy market area. The range of things on sale in this market is extraordinary. You can buy almost anything that we would buy in a large retail park. In one area were the plumbing, heating and electrical stalls. Ranka lead me to the side of one of the stalls and there, under the table with all sorts of plumbing and bathroom stuff was “the” pump. Not only that, but two stalls away there was another one and yet another on a third stall. “Argue! ” she said. There was one new one, complete with spare washers, and Russian instruction booklet and warranty. That had to be the one. We ranged back and forth in the open view of the stall holders, some fascination at the three lovely leggy young women browsing around the plumbing stalls with a grizzled old Englishman. They were, as I have seen my own daughter, in “giggle mode”, and chattering away in Serbian and English and obviously being teased somewhat by the men on the stall. I don’t think they knew whether they were English or Serbian. Ranka translated after rapid exchanges of Serbian. We heard sixty euros at all three stalls, but then refused all three. We passed between them over about 15 minutes, carefully pretending to examine all three and discuss them between us, criticizing each pump for why it was not as good as the others or did not have quite the same properties and such rubbish. The giggles persisted. Finally we got the worst one to 25 Euros, which we spoke of quite loudly. We went to the new pump stall and offered “final price” 30 euros, and succeeded.. The girls were obviously pleased and felt the joy of finding success for their friend. I was delighted with my brilliant acquisition! We wandered back laughing to the square where Father was sitting quietly in the sunshine with an old Bosnian man next to him. He joked that he was still quite safe and had not been mugged or taken away. He remarked that the whole place feels so much more settled and safe this visit, echoing both our impressions. Father touched his cap and bade a very loud “good morning” to the old Bosnian next to him. He looked up bemused but oddly, replied “Dobra dan” appropriately and went back to his dozing in the sunshine. We wandered back across the precinct to where we had parked. I gave the girls a little pocket money to go and treat themselves to a great girls’ lunch and we said our goodbyes and had our hugs. I have invited Ranka and her friends to come to visit us for a holiday in Yorkshire next year, which they all jumped at. I am sure we can arrange this now things are more settled and there is a fairly good international air service to Germany at least. We moved off, waving to each other, amused as the young parking attendant moved in to continue to try to push his early morning luck.

The journey was easy with clear roads and lovely weather, our only real delays being firstly at the Croatian border control and then at the Slovenian. As usual they wanted to know why we had been in the previous country and what we were bringing out. The five litres of Slivovic were stowed quietly sleeping in my berth, and otherwise,with the exception of a prized Russian water pump(sad isn’t it!), we were coming out with much less than when we went in. (Oddly enough, here at the European border areas, there was no check at all on whether we had any hidden passengers, but at the port at Calais, our own Immigration Officers boarded and searched us. It seems that we are the only, and last, bastion of illegal immigration. There, they pulled us over into an inspection area and the friendly officer, who checked all our accommodation areas to ensure we were not people smugglers, said that 13 was the record for a camper van so far, with the people hidden behind false fronts to the fridge and cooker and in the blanket boxes and under beds in place of mattresses with cardboard covers over them!.....now there’s an idea for a partly retired doctor to fund his ramblings. I would not have thought about it unless informed how it can be done) Anyway, we haven’t got to Calais yet, so back to Jesince at the Slovenian border. This was a different border crossing from the one’s we had done before, because instead of returning through Graz in Austria, we were going via Ljubljana,through Villach, Salzburg, Munich and Stuttgart and then dropping slightly south into Strasbourg, a more westerly route and one which we had not traveled before…I thought at least. The actual route itself is slightly irrelevant, you know, motorways, A-class roads, mountains, tunnels, large pastures, forests etc. All very nice and we made good progress in lovely weather, but an irritating trip as Father seemed confused quite a lot of the time. He always remarks on places as we pass through them, he had done on the way down, he always does. Actually, I like that because it means he is enjoying it and watching things, and he knows the route by heart almost. Going this way however, he kept on saying, things like “That’s were we stopped for petrol” and “We stopped for lunch there” and “we change routes soon”. I kept gently telling him that this was a new route for us and that we had not returned this way before via Strasbourg. “It all looks similar, but it’s new”. This was all a bit worrying, I thought he was a bit over tired. Then as we were coming in to Strasbourg he announced that this was the German bit and when we crossed the Rhine bridge we were in France. Well, O.K., he had to get something right!. “Yes, that’s right” I said, although I couldn’t really remember that myself until we arrived there, and even .then I couldn’t understand why I seemed to recognize it. As we neared the area that A and S live, guided by the Satnav, Father was pre-empting the dronal tone of Thomas the Satnav voice, “Left soon”, “This is the main road past their road” Fantastic memory this chap for his age! I have to confess now, and I have only just realized it as I wrote this and looked at the route on the map, it’s me who has gone bonkers, not the Aged Parent! I opened my European map and checked the route we travelled before I started to write. It was highlighted in yellow high-lighter pen. “That’s odd”, I thought, “I never looked at the route in the map this year, I simply set it up on the Satnav”. It was 10 seconds later that it hit me. This was the route we had come down to Bosnia 18 months ago when we stopped at A and S in Strasbourg on the outward journey. The old man had been absolutely spot on….he didn’t feel us driving on the left when he was always pointing that way…they were the places we stopped on the way out!...Now I feel dreadful. I’ll have to tell him. Yes, I really will; he knows he was right and I doubted him, I’ll sort it this weekend….unless he’s forgotten about it? Some chance!

Strasbourg, a really cosmopolitan city with peoples from Eastern and Western Europe, is a lovely old city, with quaint “quartiers” and a mixed language of French and German. The centre is compact, mostly on the French side of the river Rhine with an equal cosmopolitan mix of architecture. A and S are living on the edge of the centre in a ground floor, two bedroomed apartment on a small estate of three or four similar compact blocks. It is largely an area where new French immigrants are housed and is State owned. A and S are asylum seekers in France. They fled from Bosnia when they were outlawed by their own local communities for getting married. Neither of them could get work, accommodation was almost impossible and they were abused in the streets. I had met A when I served in 1999 and he was an interpreter. He was a good friend of N, and she told me about him some time before I met him, He is a very straight good honest man with eclectic beliefs and open mindedness. He is a man of deep and well constructed thought, and is a fascinating conversationalist. But, A is a Bosniac, a Moslem man, and S, a Serbian orthodox Christian. They fled three years ago, after the end of the wars, having both just fallen in love across their peer group boundaries. They had hoped to be able to go to Canada, but the Canadians wanted a minimum of a £5,000 bank roll to support them and that was way beyond their means, and finally, fairly desperate to escape they managed to get some sort of visa and escape to France, where they pleaded for asylum. Fortunately their application was accepted and they spent the next 12 months attending French lessons, political and social instruction, early job training and living in separate sex hostels with drug addicts, alcoholics, prostitutes and other homeless people. They met for a few hours each day determined to find their dream together, A always dreaming of being an artisan, and S, who was training to be a nurse, hoping to continue her training. Finally, when they had permission to stay and apply for citizenship, they found a flat to rent for a few months while the owner was away. A started work as a trainee baker, not quite what he had expected, but S was unable to transfer any of her training or qualifications as they were not recognized by France. She got a job as a care assistant. At last, they both had subsistence jobs and could plan a little. Finally, after almost 2 years, they were allocated this apartment, and restored it together to a superb open, modern, bijou flat. They were allowed to apply for citizenship, but that is still by no means guaranteed. S was pregnant by this time and expecting a baby girl….NOW. We had been all waiting to hear of her birth, and now, some 10 days late, it had still not happened. I was a bit concerned that it might be tiring and difficult for them to entertain us, but when we arrived, she was busy, bright and cheerful as ever with no feelings as if anything was about to happen. A’s sister, V, who had fled to Austria at the start of the War and is married and settled there, had come to help and brought her delightful 8 year old daughter. S’s mother was on a bus coming from Banja Luka and arriving that night. And we turned up. S was totally at ease, just delighted to see so many people she wanted to be with, and V was busy making an evening meal. A came back soon after with Mother, complete with bags of stuff, containing baby clothes, lots of Kymac, some illegally imported slivo, Bosnian beers, and some pre-prepared food. How she had coped with all that lot on the crowded, non-stop 24 hour bus, goodness knows, but had we known she was coming, I would have been delighted to have packed her behind our fridge. We spent a delightful evening together, sharing some memories, catching up on mutual friends, showing our photos of people they know back home, and of course, sipping slivo and coffee. (Only this time, in modest amounts! A drinks very little.) Father and I were parked on their street, just 100 metres away, and intended to sleep there. We wished them goodnight and hoped that S might start in labour during the night, she was due to be induced in 4 days time.. However, S. had a quiet night; I did not. Father is pretty deaf without his hearing aid, and so when he goes to bed he hears virtually nothing. He did not hear the cacophony of singing cats, which started at about 11.00pm, just as the clock in the bell tower 50 metres away sounded the hour. He did not hear the cats at the quarter, half and three quarter hours as the clock in the bell tower kept watch through the night. He did not hear this stone watchman notify every bloody quarter and every bloody hour through the night. At about 2.00, the cats went to bed and my mind got into the rhythm of the chimes, hardly stirring until the hour chimes of six, and that was just too many and I woke up fully, rather yearning for a good night on the Glamoc Polje. No, Father slept well and rose again ready for his porridge at 7.00. Some things went O.K. then!

Over a fabulous continental breakfast of cold meats, eggs, bread from our own boulanger, and Kymac of course, and with as much coffee as I could manage to push down me, we departed, sad of course that we hadn’t managed to meet little baby Uma, but pleased that A and S were so well and so secure now. We set off for Paris, several cans of Red Bull alongside the driver. I had one last mission for the Archer and Arrow together.

Next: Pinnacle of success.

Only two pictures for this bit. (No...really..there ARE only two pictures for this bit) I do manage to post them now but it seems a slow process... I still don’t fully understand exactly what I am doing yet and don’t know anyone to teach me, so bear with it…I'll maybe find an expert in the States!

Best wishes,

Doc

Zavidovici...fantastic trip!

On Monday morning we had said our goodbyes to the family and friends in Sumnjajce. We had actually had a very early breakfast in the sunshine with Branko, the still manager, who had insisted that we all went to his house for a goodbye breakfast. It was actually like a British summer by 8.30 and they lent Father a baseball cap to shelter his neck from the sun. All he really needed with that was a skate-board! In actual fact they insisted that he kept it as a present. There is little doubt that if he wears it in Windermere he will be one of the funkiest nonogenarians in Cumbria. In the afternoon we went to the farm where Vllora lives with her husband Nurko and her two children, Hirudin, now aged 2 and her 7 month old daughter Almedina. They live in the upper floor of a "farmhouse" on the central area of the plateau which is actually really not much more than a living area above a store and attached to a large barn. By UK standards it is rough living. The children, though healthy and well loved, live in a situation which would cause our social services departments to have nightmares (and daymares!). The staircase to the first floor is an open wooden one with no protection across the top. It leads into a sort of summer day area where they leave their shoes before going into the house. Muslim households always take off their shoes and walk about in small knitted slippers, which are beautifully made and very comfortable. The Bosnian muslim people are very moderate in their religion compared to many of our immigrant muslims. They do not dress in any different fashion or live any any very different way or eat very different foods, and the only thing s of note which mark them out are that they usually do not use toilet paper in their lavatories but wash instead, they take their shoes off in the house, they have different names and use some different words, and most have more children. Many of them in Bosnia are sheep farmers or have worked on the land, and some of them have a sort of itinerant family set up, living in the mountains with their flocks in the summer and outside main towns in the winters. Vllora and her husband live here all the year round however, but are already quite successful with sales of their sheep and are buying a house in Livno. The kitchen, likemost in the valley, has long settees down two sides with a low coffee table between and in the corner is a wood burning cooking and heating stove and a sink............

back the story of Zavidovici........

Vllora has a habit of sending me demanding text messages, mostly just “Haw are yau and yaur Dad? Call me!” Actually this is sometimes irritating, especially as she has no idea how much it costs to phone her mobile phone from the U.K. I don’t resent the occasional call, because, at the end of the day, I do like her and the family a lot, but it is usually because she wants something rather than that she is particularly interested in either of our wellbeing. No, that’s unfair, she is, but self preservation and relative poverty and paucity of material things push her to it. Vllora loves her material things, but sadly hasn’t got many. She really is a very attractive 20 year old, with a brain, and if she had been sensible like Ranka, she too would have been at university and be preparing to make herself a better world. Instead, at sixteen, she went off with a middle aged Bosnian sheep farmer and got pregnant. So she now faces the prospect of following the usual tradition of Bosnian female subservience, multiple children, fat. flabby and poor, looking 50 when she is 30, and bent over,wrapped in an old headscarf and grey or black blanket-like clothes at 60. It is sad really. In a fairer world she would have been born on the other side of the Adriatic in Italy, where she would have become all the things that she secretly yearns to be inside the young grubby farmer’s wife exterior that we now see. But, back to the phone call, this time, four weeks before we set off, she asked if I could bring her a computer and a new mobile phone and an iPod. The call back cost me about £16-00! The truth is that I have sometimes taken things like that. I was given some obsolete computers when I was in Germany, which I took to Bosnia. They went down well at the schools I took them to. I have had several one or two year old mobile phones from people who have changed them every year. iPods however are in a different league. The chance of finding an iPod going spare is just a no starter. I did change my own phone this year and now have a Nokia N73 instead of the 6230i (or something like that) which I had had for 4 years. I intended to take that to Bosnia for her because I knew she’d like it. Vllora won’t get that now though. I am determined that she must learn not to demand like she does. She never says please, although she does say thank you, and she just seems to expect me to conjure up the goods whenever she wants. She does not realise that many of the things I have taken out to Bosnia, like sewing machines, cookware, implements, seeds, and babies clothes, I have actually been out to buy specially, albeit from Clitheroe car boot sale on a Sunday morning. The telephone call persisted in asking for a favour when I come; will I take her and the children and Arzija her mother, to see Samire her sister and her new husband? Samire has been married for 18 months and they have not seen her 7 month old baby. ( Samire is just coming up 17 now) “Where do they live?” “The other side of Livno, ‘in the mountains, in the country, ‘bout two hours”. “Well, O.K., we will do a day trip out there before we leave”, I had said. I thought this would be a good way of spending time with them and doing something other than sitting in Arzija’s hot smokey kitchen, which Father hates. With this family, it is always a bit harder to know quite what to do. In Sumnjajce, time is always unpressured and relaxed, but here the atmosphere is slightly different and can verge on boredom. The television is always on in the corner and overshadows easy conversation, while Grandad watches and smokes. Two years ago, we had thought that Arzija and Samire, who was 15 then and not yet married, might like to go to Mostar, a predominantly Muslim town, to see the wonderful newly restored Mostar bridge which had featured in the world news only weeks before. It was a lovely journey and Mostar was just fabulous, the new bridge and the whole great river gorge and area around it was all it was reported to be. Samire however spent the entire trip there and back sleeping in the car, and when we arrived spent all the time texting, and talking about, “my boyfriend this… and my boyfriend that….”.(Not, incidentally, the one she has now married, but Father and I got pretty sick of hearing constantly about this wretched fellow, nice though I am sure he was) She had no interest in what we were seeing other than some passing interest in the shops. She was just sex and text that day. Arzija was rather better, but in general, treated the day rather as I would treat a trip into Skipton. Neither of them showed the slightest appreciation of the architecture or beauty of the river. Father and I had enjoyed it immensely, but I guess we may as well have done it alone for all the apparent benefit or enjoyment that the girls seemed to get from it. So, a day trip to visit Samire, seemed on the surface of it to be something that Arzija and Vllora would certainly enjoy, and Father and I could relax and tolerate.
On Monday evening, we sat eating at Vllora’s house. Two and a half year old Hiroudin was alternating between leaping on the sofa next to the open window, staggering past the steel stove pipe on the red hot wood burning cooker in the corner, and trying to escape on to the outer landing next to the open staircase. He picked up cups and anything on the table, including my new Mobile which Vllora took off him and confiscated, suggesting that I would leave it or swap it with her when I left. I quickly retrieved it. She wasn’t joking. Arzija tried to entertain him. She gave him a packet of cigarettes, from which he took one. “This is party trick by Grandfather” she proudly announced. I watched in even greater horror than I did at the ever present dangers of the kitchen, as he put the cigarette to his mouth and held it there. Arzija lit it and he sucked and blew out a little smoke and gave it to her. “Arzija, you can’t do that” I exclaimed. “He’s only two! He can’t be encouraged to smoke at this age, whatever he may do when he is older” “No,” she said, “is good he no like it make him cough sick and he no smoke when he grown up” I would have said more but I felt Father’s usual quiet calmness about to erupt, and nudged him with a look. How far apart are our two cultures.
We looked towards the following day and I asked where exactly Samire lived so that I could look it up on the map and plan the trip. “Zavidovici”, I was told, and because it sounded to me something like the names of the villages in the Glamoc valley, and I had been told it was “on the other side of Livno” I started to look on the map to the East and South of Livno. I couldn’t see it, so asked Vllora to show me. She pointed. “There, Zavidovici!” “But that’s miles away!” I exclaimed. “No, ‘bout two hours,maybe three”she retorted. Distances in Bosnia are often measured in hours rather than kilometres. It is almost impossible to know how long it will take to get somewhere because of varying road surfaces, forestry trucks and accidents. Generally “’bout 2 hours” probably means about 130km (80miles), but in a camper van that could be two and a half. I measured the distance as well as I could with the edge of a piece of paper. The road was so full of obvious “S” bends that it was difficult. East out of Livno into the Hrbijina Mountains, north west to Kupres. From Kupres to Bugojna and then north following the river valleys of the Vrba to Donji Vakuf, and on at it’s confluence, now in a new range of mountains, the Krušćica Mountains, into the Lasva valley via Travnik to the Bosna valley, through Zenica to Zavidovici. Well, bugger me! That was almost 300km, 180miles! “Vllora, that’s 300 bloody kilometres!” I said. “You said it was just the other side of Livno, about 30 kilometres!” “No”, she insisted, “I say ‘bout 300, you no hear right on bad telephone; I need new telephone for better hear” “But anyway,”I said, “whatever, that’s never 2 hours,maybe three” “Well, three hours maybe four” she replied. “Five hours, maybe six”, I snapped back. “I know men drive that three hour, fast drive” “Maybe, bloody Bosnian drivers all over the road and high on slivo” I muttered, “and not in a bloody 8 metre long diesel camper van”. She could see I was ruffled. “No problem with good mobile”, she sulked, “I know you have me new phone and I can speak better next time”. I quietly seethed inside. All I really didn’t need was a trip like this, through difficult country with a 95 year old Dad with colitis, Vllora and her mum, and two kids playing up in the back. And no, she definitely bloody wasn’t having a new telephone now under any circumstances! Vllora’s little boy could really play up and was into everything and frequently quite demanding. I would have to lock everything up and really batten down the hatches. I accepted the inevitable and quietly broke the news to Father that I had inadvertently seemed to promise a 360 mile round day trip, hooked, lined and sinkered! I suppose I could have pulled out, made some excuse, but I knew inside it was a sort of promise, it was what they had actually wanted and asked of me. At the end of the day I had agreed to take them, even though I had not realised what exactly I was embarking on.
I told Father what a long trip it was. He wasn’t phased. His usual trust and enthusiasm for the adventure was still there. “Can you do it safely” he said, “you’re the driver, I can’t help” “Yes, I can DO it,” I said, “but it’s going to be a very early start and a late return”.
Father and I went across the field to the camper to go to bed. A 7o’clock departure was needed so bed now. It was cold in the valley, the sky was black with millions of stars. No light pollution in Glamoc Polje!. The camper was alongside the diamond shaped wire sheep fold where Vllora’s husband had gathered his herd for the night to protect them from the grey wolves that live in the forest. The massive sheepdog lay outside, even two wolves would have thought twice about him. He stands almost to my hips and is about the size of a deer hound but has a brown and cream shaggy coat about as thick as the sheep themselves. He is as soft as putty with people in his owner’s company, but not a dog you would want to meet up an alley on a dark night!(or if the owners were called Baskerville)
The following morning, we woke, dressed, breakfasted as usual and got packed up by 6.45. I ventured out. The sky was clear, brilliant blue as the sun was just rising over the mountains to the east of the plateau. The sheep rustled in the cage, thinking I was going to release them to their pastures; the dog growled and then smiled as he recognised a known figure and lay down again. There was a thick frost everywhere, which we had not had in the more sheltered northern end of the valley. Soon Vllora came out. She looked stunning. Thoroughly washed clean, hair done, lippy, foundation and eyes on, smart, clinging, and rather revealing dress and small heeled shoes. “My goodness Vllora, is that really still you under that?” “I still like be pretty when see my sister” she said, “and go out for trip with you,”she added smiling beautifully and flashing her eyes. I take it all as a tease, and laugh. She always was a flirt, well practised with the Canadian and British soldiers who had been in the valley, because she could speak English so well. ( well, American really because she had learned most from American films and TV programmes) How she ever managed to not marry a Canadian or British soldier I shall never understand. She had at least half a dozen offers.
Arzija comes out next holding baby Almedina, and Hiro follows, charging off to see the great dog. “Vllora”, I say, “can you please try to keep Hiro under a bit of control when we are travelling. It could be dangerous if he starts to run about” “Hiro will sleep good” she says, “Nemo problemo” We set off at 7.00 as planned. It is a beautiful day. Little Almedina sucks on a bottle and within a few miles is asleep on Arzija’s lap. Hiro climbs on the rear facing bench seat and lies down. Within minutes he is asleep. The girls relax in their finery in the back with drinks and cigarettes and children fast asleep. Almedina is finally put into the sleeping bag on my berth at the back of the camper with a safety board in front of her. With the exception of stopping then for loos and coffee, the children sleep the whole four and a half hour, 186 mile trip. We didn’t even know they were there. The journey was truly magnificent. Unbelievable. This route took us to the East of Bosnia, into a part that I had never visited. The mountains and river valleys rival the beauty of any in Europe and they are all quiet and just ours, and we are the only tourists, and this is likely to be the only camper van in Bosnia! This is the true country, the part of the old Yugoslavia that my late Great Aunt Hilda talked about from her coach trips. This is the part that you really should see, much of it restored after the war, much of it farmed with an ancient husbandry and forestry of many generations of Balkan peoples back to the times of the Ottoman Empire. I bet many things have changed little here other than perhaps the dress and the road surfaces. The river valleys were spectacular, deep cool green, verdant, rich gorges; the mountains often deeply forested in the middle areas , barren and rocky scrub high up, and ascending fields from the valleys 600 feet below the road. to rivers meandering across the meadows in their floors. The road wound back and forth around the ridges, following contours through rocky passes. Slow driving, but terrific views at every turn, often almost turning 180 degrees before straightening up and continuing north and eastwards. No, I admit, “bugger me” had been my initial reaction, but this trip was one which Father and I enjoyed every mile of the way. It was a real highlight. You could not have paid for a better excursion. “Haw are yau, and yaur Farder?” Arzija questioned as we entered the outskirts of Zavidovici at about 12.45. “Fine” I said, “sorry about the upset yesterday, we would not have missed that trip for the world, It was fabulous”
As we approached the town centre, Arzija, who had been there once before, guided us out on very rough roads, across the back of the railway tracks, and down a narrow track. Here we were between two sets of railway lines, one raised up high on a grassy bank on our left and one on our right on gravel.. “In minute, we turn left” she said. I wondered how. Another 200 yards and we arrived at a square concrete bridge, under the tracks to our left. I looked at it in horror. We had travelled all this way and now, a mile from where we were due to arrive for lunch, we were confronted with a bridge that was almost certainly about the same dimensions exactly as the camper. There was no way that Father could walk the last bit, and I could not push him up the side of this mountain to our left in the wheelchair. I got out to have a closer look. It was obvious that height had been a problem here before. The floor of the bridge had been dug out about another two feet so it was like a bridge over a shallow basin under a low railway track. I paced out the width of the bridge with my feet. I paced out the width of the camper with my feet. I drove to the entrance, got out and looked carefully at the height of the van and the bridgefrom a little stand off. There seemed just about 4 inches in the height and we would drop as we went under. There was about one shoe width on each side if the wing mirrors were folded in. I asked Vllora to go up front and watch as we came through, and then we went for it. She took a photo. Marvellous, still no disappointments, still a great day out.
To cut to the end now, rather than give the reader(s?) further pap, our visit to Samire was lovely. We had a good lunch with her Parents in Law and her husband, and saw her little boy who she has named Mohammed, which I personally felt was rather inflammatory in a future secular Bosnia, but perhaps it is a sad sign of future divisiveness. They live up at the top of the hill overlooking the railway from Zavidovici to Banja Lika, in a modern comfortable, tidy and clean bungalow. Her father in law looked very cachectic and ill to me. He had a tremor and sallow face. I would guess he is terminally sick whether he knows it or not. Samire’s husband has no job and no prospect of one. There is a factory there but one has to pay the foreman about £200-00 bribery to get employed and then that is no guarantee that the job will continue. They have about £100-00 a month between them in some bit of pension and some small amounts of casual labour that the son gets occasionally. It beats me how they all survive, but they do seem to somehow. We gave Samire the baby clothes and push chair and crib that we had got for her. She was delighted. We had a family photograph of the two sisters with their families and tears when we left. A day that was lovely, reuniting, fulfilling for all of us and a real success.
We departed at about 7.00p.m. I felt happier now I knew what to expect from the road. I could remember the phases of the journey, the markers of the distance travelled, the landmarks we had seen on the way. The drive went smoothly. We stopped for a bite of supper, watching the camper with the children fast asleep inside, and taking it in turns to pop back every fifteen minutes or so to look through the window to check on them. The journey was fast as the sun set, and we moved rapidly from dusk to dark, as you do in the mountains, now with the hardest part of the circuitous route behind us. A wonderful sunset, the dark shadows of the mountains, the brilliant sharp beam of the main headlamps cutting the darkness of an empty road, the silence from the sleeping children, the resting adults with hushed and spasmodic conversation, and the gentle growl of the big diesel, its powerful intercooler whistling slightly as it sucked in great gulps of mountain air, climbing once again into the mountains around Kupres before the final descent to Livno and the home straight.. To cap it all, a late text message came in from N. She had been to Sarajevo to sign her new contract for work. S had taken a day off work to drive her there and while there, he had bought her a ring and asked her to marry him. Great! Perfect end to a perfect day.
The following morning, after the late return, we again had an early start. It was the start of the journey home, leaving Bosnia and heading for Strasburg where we wanted to visit A and S, about whom, later. We went up to the kitchen for breakfast, even though Father had already had his porridge of course! Vllora was back to Cinderella. Hiro had woken up and was into everything again, Almedina scuttled around the stove in her baby walker, and we ate bread, Kymac, eggs, and coffee of course. Sad good-byes, hugs and a few tears and thanks for such a lovely day. Zavidovici…..fantastic trip!

Oh, yes, Vllora did get my old mobile phone!


Next…Strasbourg and Paris, the long way home, but the pinnacle of success!

Best wishes,
Doc.