Dudley's Funeral Pt1

As this tour has now been renamed The William Walker Memorial Tour,  I make no apologies for including some posts in regards to Bill's funeral. 

The date for laying our Hog buddy to rest is 6th March, in his home town of Keswick. 

There's never been any question in my mind that I wouldn't attend and I suspect the same goes for Grizzly and Biggsy, plus the family are keen for us to be there. Lewis,  Bill's son has asked if we would provide a motorcycle escort from home to the church. Of course we have said yes. 

At first glance that would seem no issue but given I'm a bit of a girl (no offence ladies) and don't ride in the cold/wet, Biggsy's bike is hidden away under building materials in his garage and Dudley's Harley has suffered a battery mishap (nice one Dud!), that left just Grizzly to fly the flag, a bleeding foreign one at that! Fear not though, Dudley's Harley is being supplied with a new battery by those awfully nice chaps at Preston Harley Davidson, so Biggsy has a ride and I shall bite the bullet and fire up the Sprint. It's the very least we can do to see the old boy off.

And so, this weekend I shall prep the Sprint for the 350 odd mile trip up to the lakes on Wednesday/Thursday. Battery has been on charge all winter,  so she should just need chain and tyres checking and maybe a clean. 

More in Part 2. 

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William 'Dudley' Walker

It is with a heavy heart that I sit and write this post. I hadn't really planned to post another update to the blog just yet but I learnt last night that Bill, a.k.a. Dudley, has sadly passed away. Active to the last, it seems he suffered a heart attack whilst skiing in Austria, I believe with members of his Keswick Scout Group.

Though I've only known him since the summer of 2010, we have crossed, states, counties and countries together and roomed together along the way, the last time of course, being in the summer of 2013, on our Wild West adventure. In those few years I've barely scratched the surface, just enough to appreciate what a kind, thoughtful and funny gentleman he was, showing an immense love for his family, especially his grandchildren. Wherever we stopped, he was always looking for something to take back home for them and postcards to send them, so they could follow him on his travels. My heart goes out to them and the rest of his family. He was one top bloke and I and the other Hogs shall miss him dearly.

It's very, very hard to believe that this tour, planned with his inclusion from the start, will now see him absent from the line-up. Grizzly and I have discussed it and we both feel that Bill would not want us to change our plans but as a mark of respect for him, the tour will now be known as, The William Walker Memorial Tour, rather than the Hogs of War, so whilst absent in body, he'll be with us in spirit.

Thanks for some magic moments Dud, our thoughts are with you!



Bill 'Dudley' Walker, riding the American dream - June 2013

Somme more stops

Having looked a little closer at the Somme region we shall be riding through, I have now added the Memorial to the Missing at Thiepval, to the stops we shall make. This memorial reminds us that not all those who made the ultimate sacrifice are 'lucky' enough to have a place of rest.  You'll find the link to this and the other new stops down below. 

Shortly after the Memorial to the Missing, just outside Pozieres, we'll make another brief stop by the Australian and Tank Memorials. I'm keen to see what Grizzly,  a keen and very good photographer, makes of the small scale replica tanks on the latter. 

Leaving these memorials,  we'll be back on track for our overnight hotel stop, a Campanile in Arras. 

Changing the subject, I've been in touch with Biggsy to see if he's going to be coming with us. At the moment it's not looking too promising but there are still a few months to go and we all remain hopeful.  If he doesn't make it this time,  we'll make certain we drag his arse with us to Scandinavia next year!

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For Fokkers Sake!

The inspiration for the first of my latest route additions, comes from my brother and I thank him once again. He is planning a commemorative trip of his own to France in the summer, heading out later in the month than the Hogs, though he will be in this area just a few days before us, as we approach the end of our tour. If you want to know what he is planning, he has a blog going;

http://somme98th.blogspot.co.uk/

On one of his posts he mentioned the crash site of the Red Baron, Manfred von Richthofen. I was interested to know where this was, so searched on Google for more information and found that it is actually less than 2 miles from the cemetery in Corbie, where William Devall is buried. I was able to find a site that described where the crash (more a controlled landing, apparently) had taken place and using streetview on Google maps (an invaluable tool), found a commemorative sign board. This location was duly entered into our Day 18 route map.




The Red Baron's Fokker dr.i 425/17

 Having added this stop, the route changed slightly and on checking where it was taking us, I suddenly realised that this area, was of great historical importance. Slow on the uptake or what? This is after all, The Somme region but it hadn't really clicked with me, when I'd been plotting the A to B route to our overnight hotel stop.

As I surveyed the new route, I came across another place of interest. Aside from the plethora of cemeteries, there is a place called the Lochnagar Crater. Now if anything is likely to grab your attention when looking at a map, it is going to be a Scottish named landmark in the middle of France. Switch to satellite view on Google maps and instantly you can see this is a 'feature' worthy of further investigation. I'll let you go and do your own Googling but basically, this crater was made by 2 huge mines, placed in tunnels under the German trench system by the Royal Engineers and stands today as a memorial to all those who were obliterated in the blast. Needless to say, that is now on the tour itinerary.


The Lochnagar Crater

I'll probably have a further look in the region to see if anything else is worthy of a stop. Apart from the cemetery visit at Corbie, this was pretty much just a riding day.

Come back soon to see what else I've discovered/planned.

Not as Irish as it sounds

Happy 2014 everybody.

Here we are in tour year finally and with under 6 months to go till the off. Exciting, eh?

There wasn't much left to do as we entered the new year, apart from Grizzly sorting out his travel and accommodation for when he comes across from the Emerald Isle. We'll all be meeting up at my place on Saturday 5th July, so given Grizzly has to cross the Irish Sea before traversing the breadth of Wales and England, it made sense for him to come across a day early and stop en route. It could be done in a day but riding pretty much non stop from Pembroke, he wouldn't arrive till gone 6pm. Given that we have our welcome dinner on the Saturday evening and an early start on Sunday, it just didn't make sense to try to do it all at once. The same applies to the return journey. We get back into blighty on 24th and there's an overnighter in Chatham but it would be asking a bit much to get to Pembroke in time for the ferry back on 25th.

And so, Grizzly has booked himself on Irish ferries service from Rosslare to Pembroke on 4th, with the return journey on 26th. As for the accommodation, well Grizzly had it in mind to break the journey in the west country, no doubt with it in his mind, that if Biggsy IS coming on the tour, then they would be close enough to each other to meet up and ride to mine together. I'm not sure of Dudley's plans but if he is staying at his daughter's place in Reading, then the 3 Hogs could end up flying in formation. Safety in numbers and all that.

The west country it is then, with both overnighters booked at the Leigh Delamere Eastbound Services Travelodge. Both?, I here you say. Isn't that just typically Irish! On the face of it, it does seem odd to be staying on the Eastbound carriageway of the motorway when you are travelling westbound, however, there is method in the madness and I take full credit for it. You see, on the day Grizzly goes back along the M4, 25th July, there happens to be a £15 discrepancy in the room cost, westbound over eastbound. Some people might pay it and be damned and some might drive up to the next junction and turn back, to save that money BUT the beauty of Leigh Delamere is, that the eastbound Travelodge can be accessed from the surrounding country lanes, meaning Grizzly only has to go off at J17, a few miles along the motorway and use the back entrance. The mileage of doing that is quite a bit less than going to J18 and back and of course means he's saving himself £15 into the bargain. (me 15 quid actually, as I booked it!)

And there you have it, one of the Hogs' planned movements all accounted for. Hopefully, I'll have an update soon on Biggsy and whether he will be travelling with us or not. Come back soon.

This time next year, we'll be Milwyonaires!

If only, I wouldn't have been worrying about the cost of this tour. I shouldn't have though, coz as everyone knows, pensioners are loaded!

Grizzly had asked if I had a rough cost for the tour. I hadn't really. I knew the individual costs for the hotels, from my bookings on Booking.Com but not the total, so I knocked up a spreadsheet. Totalling up all the hotel costs and then the costs for the 'attractions' we plan to visit and factoring in fuel costs, it isn't going to be a particularly cheap holiday. My fuel will be somewhere in the region of £350 on its own. On top of that we will have our subsistence, i.e. beer, dinners, beer, breakfasts, coffees, beer, lunches and snacks. Not to mention the odd beer or three. That, clearly, is an unknown quantity. So as the costs were stacking up, I was beginning to worry that I may be committing my fellow Hogs, particularly my retired chum from the depressed potato growing nation across the Irish sea, to something a bit beyond their means.

As I said though, I shouldn't have worried, as Grizzly has set my mind at rest.  We shan't be blowing a huge wedge in the casino at Monaco but by the same token, we shan't need to doss down with our bikes under any bridges!

The only other worry, is whether Biggsy will be joining us. As mentioned previously, I don't expect an answer on that till the New Year.

With a shade over 200 days to go and the nights soon to start drawing out again, it's downhill all the way now. I plan to help pass the next 6 months by brushing up my language skills, after all we shall be staying in 4 different countries.

I've made a start;

Quatre bieres s'il vous plait.
Vier biere bitte.
Quattro birre per favore.

Once again Merry Christmas and Happy New Year.

All Afourd!

Quick update on the tunnel bookings. Dudley has come up trumps today and we now have four crossings booked. All we need to do now is get the fourth hog on board with us. Not expecting any update on that until the new year, so don't expect to hear much from Blogland before that, eh?

In the meantime, Happy Xmas to all and Happy Thanksgiving to all my American readers too.