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Got up early and had breakfast while it was raining. Our route out of Brussels also looked doubtful as the local main roads were being closed for a half marathon around Brussels.
Having packed the car between rain showers and said our goodbyes to Tom, Marta, Hannah and Dinah we decided to make an early start for the Eurotunnel. As we set out, the road we wanted was closed in parts but we were able to make progress in slip roads alongside the main road we needed. In some parts we were unable to access the tunnels through Brussels city centre but managed to make progress on the surface tracking the route of the tunnels.
Eventually, we left the half marathon route behind and made good progress out of Brussels onto the A10 motorway. Considering it was a Sunday morning, there was plenty of traffic about. We had a break at the services near Jabekke, cup of tea and a pain au chocolate, and a change of driver. Whilst we were stopped at the services, the sun had come out and we sat outside for our tea and bun. Bob noticed the tree pruning around the services and decided
to take a picture to show Carine how you severely you could prune trees without killing them.
After turning onto the A18, the traffic got heavy but suddenly at Veume everything turned off the motorway and was queued on the exit slip road. There must have been some major event there but we did not know what it was. We then had a clear run for the rest of journey to the Eurotunnel terminal to catch the train. We arrived early and had the chance to catch an earlier train than we had booked so accepted the offer to gain a bit of time. We had time to visit the duty free shop and Bob purchased cigarettes and Neal a few bottles of beer and wine which needed a trolley.
We were loaded onto the bottom deck of the train and settled down to eat our baguettes and drink the tea from the flask we had made in Brussels. Thirty five minutes later we arrived in England and had the novel experience of driving on the left for the first time in a week. We made good progress on the M20 towards the M25 then our problems started
as the exit road we needed to get onto the M1 was closed because there had been a lorry fire. The traffic now was horrendous and as we were barely able to make progress, we decided to go on to the next junction and get off and back onto the M25 going the other way. The problem was that the rest of the world had also decided to do the same thing. We lost a lot of time with this hold up and most of our patience. Eventually we cleared the problem and soon after entering the M1 exited onto the A5 towards Dunstable. Once through Dunstable, we made good progress and arrived in Buckingham around 2:30pm.
We have now collected Dinah from Milton Keynes train station and she has had a smooth ride from Brussels to Buckingham in about 3 hours.
Trip completed with over 2,000 extra miles on the Porsche which I am sure it could do again with no problems even if we could not!!!!! Bob said that his apprentice has made a good start but thinks he may have developed a taste for the life of a grey nomad a bit early in his
career.
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amy
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We might have to come over and sample some of those beers/wines!!! Well done on the blogging it was great to keep up with the progress. Glad you enjoyed the trip, now you need to start planning the next one and go for as many countries in Europe you can visit in a week!!!