
Vimy
Still at the planning stage at the moment. I say this even though I have already booked my ferry crossing from Dover to Calais for April 9th. Of course mode of transport will be the lovely Vera.
The commemoration is held every year on April 9th no matter what day of the week it occurs on. For the last two years it has been cancelled due to the Covid-19 pandemic that has hit the entire globe. But this year it should be back with some covid awareness on the day.
As I said, I have already booked the ferry. It is later than I would normally cross the English Channel but now that the UK is no longer a member of the EU, there's a load of b*llocks involved to get into their Bloc. More paperwork and that has nothing to do with Covid.
I should be on French soil sometime around 1145 or so. The ceremony at Vimy starts at around 3pm and so there is plenty of time to get to the area, have some lunch, even if it is courtesy of McDonalds (!) in Lens. Not that I gravitate to a burger joint but it is nearby, always has somewhere to sit and has free Wifi.
After the ceremony there is the rush back to the channel port and the ferry home.
I usually use Eurotunnel but this year the ticket for the day trip comes out at £104! When I last went to France and Belgium for the last ever St Nicks Rally in early December 2019 and pre-covid, it was £34. Rip-off? It seems they are trying to make up for lost revenue from the lockdowns.
So I chose to go with P&O Ferries.
A very reasonable £34.50.
In theory the ferry takes longer to get across the Channel but after bitter experience of over 20 years of using Eurotunnel that isn't a given. I can count on the yellow fingers of Homer Simpson how many times I have actually been on the train I have booked (and therefore paid for) and have arrived as expected in France. I have sat at the French end on several occasions, always at night, for hours as there are problems in the tunnel, or a train has broken down. And once. Once only in the last five years I actually got on the train before, yes before, the one I was booked on, and it left on time!
I have a route planned from the ferry terminal at Calais to Lens and then to Vimy. The map and the route were created in MyRouteApp and downloaded and copied to my TomTom 410.
After the ceremony it's back to Vera and a fast run back up the A26 "Autoroute des Anglais" to the port and back home in time for dinner.