Luxembourg to 'I Love Man'

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From Luxembourg to 'I Love Man'

After a few days in Luxembourg and some shopping over in Germany at Louis and Polo, the motorcycle 'lolly Shops', we headed off to Rotterdam in overcast, but fine weather, to catch our overnight ferry to Hull in England.

The ride to Rotterdam was a game of motorcycle/Car/Truck chess but we all made it in good time.

Tom rode his Yamaha Tenere, Nadine on her BMW G650 and Bones and I on Tom's Suzuki 650 VStrom, that he rode with us on the High Andes Adventure in 2008.

Bones had a problem getting on and off the VStrom, so Tom became her 'Care Giver' and everyone thought I had an invalid on my bike, until she stood up and walked after being dragged off the back of my bike....we need to work on this!!

We loaded the bikes onto the ferry and packed them in like sardines, there had to be at least 500 motorcycles on that ship, with a very unique method of tying the bikes down.

We found our cabin (cupboard) that was to sleep the four of us, along with all our bike gear, only one person at a time could be out of bed!!

After our six am wake up call, we packed up all our gear and headed down to unload the bikes.

We were last to leave the boat, assuming that the the others were now out riding on the English roads... NOT, as we ran into the queue that were still being processed through the check point.

As we were not part of the EU, we had to fill in an immigration form and another stamp in our Passports, before we could hit the road, but this time on our normal side.

The weather had deteriorated overnight and we had woken to drizzly rain, well, we were now in England...so for the first time in living memory, I donned my wet weather gear, this also helped with the chill factor, as I only had my new summer Pharao riding gear on.

From Hull, on the east coast, we had to make a mad dash across England to Heysham, on the west coast, to pick up the ferry to the Isle of Man (I Love Man)

We arrived on the island early evening and found our home stay with no problems.

We are staying within walking distance of Quarter Bridge and Bradden Bridge, two very good spectator vantage points.

The following day we did a ride around the island to get a feel of the place, including riding the actual race roads. As the return section of the mountain course was closed due to a couple of crashes up there by wannabe TT Racers, we took a much less used route up and over the mountain on a sealed one lane road to finally drop down into Peel for an ice-cream.

Returning to Douglas, we walked down to Quarter Bridge to watch the last practise session of the week.

Today is the first Race Day and we were up at 6.00am for toast and coffee and hoofed it down to Bradden Bridge to claim a good seat beside the track. The first race was the SuperBikes, scheduled for 11.00, so it was a bit of a long wait, but we have great roadside seats.

A new lap record was set three times during this race, with Kiwi Bruce Anstey setting a new record on the last lap to give them a bit of kiwi!!

After a good T Bone steak and a few beers, I was ready for a good sleep.....

Cheers for now.

Rosco

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Photos

Boarding in Rotterdam
Fog, mist and rain as we bordered our overnight ferry to Hull.

Linda and Brian
We met this couple from Scotland on the ferry to the Isle of Man

Bikes packed like sadines
The ferry to Isle of Man

Comments

[D MJ Binkley]

Isle of Man
We were there in March and had a great time. Your blog brought back some great memories.

[John Carpenter]

Jealous as hell, but happy for you both
[e-mail] did the same adventure many years ago, so I have it now on my bucket list to do next year, so will have to plan our trip to the USA, UK, Singapore, Adelaide, Melbourne, Sunshine Coast around it. The Isle-of Man will have to be by car though. I wish you both safe travels, have a great time, & take care. Love John (JC)