Portugal to UK - European Road Trip 2014 (Part 1 of 2)

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In July I decided I would go back to the UK during August to resolve some issues with properties I own. I didn’t know how long I’d need to be in the UK for so I decided it was a good time to come back with my car, making it easy to drive around without hiring vehicles. After researching into various route options, my mind was made up …. Let’s do a road trip all the way to the Eurotunnel port in Calais. For the first time I was going on a journey with no planning whatsoever, so much so that I didn’t even remember my passport until the final hour when I was reminiscing about another holiday and saw the passport in my head. All I knew is that I wanted to visit a few places along the way and that I may get to the UK after 3 days, 4 days, 5 days, 60 days … anything could happen.

The day before, my car went to the garage to sort a few things out, the following morning I went to the beach and then the journey began …. Exciting times, I sit in my car, put into the GPS my 1st destination which is ‘Lisbon’ and start the engine. Something smelt funny, and over the next 5 minutes the smell grew stronger and stronger until I realized I was breathing in petrol fumes coming in through my front air vents … what the feck did they do in the garage the day before … I was p!ssed big time. I didn’t have time to faff around now, the journey had begun.

It took a lot longer to get to Lisbon than it could have done as I had a setting on my satnav that made me go around and around in circles around Lisbon … I had a feeling something funny was going on but I trusted this untrustworthy Garmin tool. It was worth the wait …. Lisbon is wow … just wow. I’m not a fan of cities but Lisbon was something else … it was as beautiful and special as the little village-type towns that I’m into. Stunning architecture, little cobbled streets (not good for driving), DJs on the streets.

I hadn’t slept for 2 nights and I had a loooong drive the night after so my plan was to rest up that night, check out the city the next day and then continue my journey. I checked into this hostel in the centre and was given a room with 7 others (all female). I went to bed at midnight. Did I sleep? Well, let’s just say this 1 girl had some serious coughing issues that night … it was terrible and I could tell everyone else was getting p!ssed off too … tossing and turning. It didn’t even sound like a real cough, more like a forced “give me attention” type. At about 3am I wondered if anybody would care if I ended her cough permanently using a pillow … but then I decided to put in some headphones and listen to the sound of a train at the seaside … I calmed down.

The next day I made plans to catch up with someone who moved from Tavira to Lisbon … so I made my way into the city and went via some scenic landmarks … it was lovely. At lunchtime I sat at this outdoor café and waited for a waiter to come and serve me. I don’t usually get noticed or cared about when I go out eating alone and for this reason I usually end up in Subway … but I was feeling good and confident this time. I sat down and watched the waiters going to other tables around me … eventually I was about to get up and somebody came, and then said “if you would like to sit inside its even better” … and pointed me to some door to the side of the building … I went with my head down and as I entered, I saw a little room with no seats. I decided to get my own back so I went out and ordered from him a rather expensive meal … then I went inside and exited out the back door to a café 2 doors away and ate there … in your face.

Around 4pm I’d seen enough and got in my car to continue on. Only as soon as I left the city did the person I was supposed to meet call me saying she lost her wallet hence the delay … too late for me, I was now en-route to …… a big-ass traffic jam, we all turned the cars off and stood by the motorway side for 1 hour wondering what was going on. There were police cars flying by so something was up. I took this opportunity to investigate the petrol-leaking smell under the bonnet ... I could smell it very strongly but wasn't sure where it was coming from. I asked somebody for a lighter, closed my eyes and decided to find the leak the old fashion way ... if anything were to explode I'd be around (hopefully caring) people ... but no explosion, I didn't get my answer. Eventually we got moving and a mile on I saw what caused the delay … 1 of the 3 lanes were closed, it didn’t make any sense but I continued on … getting high on these petrol fumes I was breathing in.

I had around 16 hours to get to my next stop … Paris. The plan was to drive for 4 hrs, sleep somewhere, then drive 4 hrs at sunrise, spend the afternoon somewhere, then 4 hrs, sleep, and so on. I did my 1st 4 hrs and got to this service stop in Spain and went in to eat something. Oh man, the Spanish love their meat … everything was meaty. When I told him I don’t eat meat he said in Spanish “sad times for you” and turned around to walk away. I called out to him to please have more consideration for my hunger so he then made me an egg cake … it was lovely. After this I thought I’d go to sleep in the car park so I brushed my teeth, got back in the car back seats and tried to sleep. Immediately I could see flashing red/blue lights … I was reminded that the police love to go around these service spots around Spain and check passports and cause a hassle … so I just locked the door and hid in the back seat. The police car stopped when it got near my car and I could see them looking at my Portuguese plates … I was hoping they wouldn’t come and check through the window (I was 90% naked at the time too … it was warm nights) … but then they started driving past and I was feeling smug … at the same time I learned a valuable lesson about my vehicle, when you lock the door with your key, it isn’t smart enough to know that you are in the car and don’t want the alarm to be armed …. I moved my head and … “TOOT TOOT TOOT TOOT” … sigh.

I made it through the night and went back into the shop to clean up in the morning … for a small fee I could use their shower, freshen up and have a shave. Back on the road … I felt good because I slept very well being squashed in the back seat … I should have done that in Lisbon.

After my next 4 hr leg I stopped off at a town called Vitoria on the border of Spain and France. My neighbour told me when he drives to Tavira this is where he likes to stop. I wasn’t too impressed but I decided to chill here for a few hours and get some fruit from the shop. I was very good throughout my trip with nutrition (apart from the egg cake the night before) … mainly I bought fruit/tuna/cottage cheese from supermarkets and ate them with plastic cutlery. There was this small shopping mall in Vitoria that I went into in order to use the toilets. When I went in there was this guy staring at me in a funny way … I went into the cubicle to do my business and as I came out I saw he was still there by the door, trying to look cool and acting as if he was waiting for me. I got scared and washed my hands and dried them 11 times until he disappeared. I was chilling around the shopping mall and sat at the café upstairs using their free wifi to make plans when I looked down and saw the same dude at the front entrance door looking up at me and acting like he was waiting for me. I kid you not, that afternoon wherever I walked to in the town of Vitoria I saw him … but he was always in front making it look like I was the one following him … it was very clever. Part of me wanted to go up and ask “Excuse Me … Why am I following you?” But I just changed directions over and over until he got the idea that I’m not into those games. I got back into the car and left the town as quickly as I could.

Shortly after I landed in France …. As was the case from Portugal to Spain, there was no border control … I just went straight through. It was fun driving through this part of the world, mountains, fields … tunnels, awesome nature. Driving through France is absolutely stunning. It’s also very expensive with the toll roads … I was going on tolls in Portugal and Spain too but they were easy to pay …. With Portugal it’s automatic for me using my gadget … with Spain it was a 1-time credit card payment at the end. In France I had to stop off every 20km and throw money into a basket, and with a right-hand drive it meant getting out of the car. I drive with blankets and cushions around me to give me a certain posture that helps with long drives and disturbing that every 15 mins was starting to p!ss me off … I even tried throwing coins through the passenger window but I was losing some valuable coinage so this plan had to stop. Eventually the toll booths got further and further apart until I wasn’t disturbed for a looong time … it was special. Well, apart from the little black fly that managed to get in and was buzzing around me for hours … it wouldn’t go out of the window so I opened them all … eventually it disappeared.

Night driving was the best for me …. There’s something about driving in the dark when you’re tired and have double-vision that’s appealing to me … it’s therapeutic. I knew my time was coming up to stop off somewhere and sleep. France has a lot of great picnic areas to stop off at and they all start with “Aire de xxx”, which I think means “Area of xxx”. They all had different services based on the pictures so I was looking for one that appealed to me for the night. I passed one and thought “yep this is the Aire that I want” … so I was driving by until that same name came up again …. It never did, Aire De This … Aire De That … but not my Aire. It was only the following day I realized the names weren’t based on the type of area … they were all given unique names to identify them …. That Aire was never going to come again. I stopped off in another Aire and set up shop by the washing area. There was just another caravan in the car park and my car. The washing area was awesome … they had these futuristic toilets with rock solid soundproof doors (which was useful after 5 tins of tuna and 900 grams of cottage cheese). When you opened the door to enter, the toilet flushed itself in preparation for you ... then you closed it and it auto-locked … you sat down and as soon as bum touched seat the radio came on … when you got up it auto-flushed .. you walked towards the door and it auto-unlocked, amazing.

I had a great sleep here … I went into foetal position in the back seat and didn’t move for 12 hours. Eventually I thought I should get going so I got up … and I was joined by that frickin black fly that I thought I’d gotten rid of … my windows had been locked all night so it must have been watching me smugly for 12 hours. I made sure to get it out this time… another tuna and cottage cheese meal later I was back on the road midway into France. Things were getting tough driving now as we were in serious mountain territory … I felt like it was an arm workout turning the wheel before the car fell down the Cliffside … my arm size increased by 5mm because of this drive and the high-protein diet. I was dealing with it ok … my car wasn’t though. Ever since I bought it I realized it doesn’t do well driving uphill …. The slightest incline and it loses power … there are less powerful cars flying by and mine comes to a halt .. I have to go into a seriously low gear and rag it at high rpms just to not come to a complete standstill. This was tough driving through the mountains as I like to speed when I can so I’m overtaking cars … then there’s an incline and my speed halves and the same cars get annoyed and fly by me … then the road flattens out and I speed up and fly by them … it was cat and mouse all the way.

That afternoon I reached Paris … as per any city it took forever to park. There were 2 reasons I decided to go to Paris … a) I hadn’t been for a while and b) to meet a French girl I used to live with and hadn’t seen in 7 yrs and I knew was living in Paris. It was great catching up … it’s always good to see how people have grown up and changed or not changed and reminisce about the fun times. I also decided to head to the Eiffel Tower but this time there were problems with public transport getting there. I ended up walking all the way along the river and that was a great choice … this is something you must do if going to Paris … a lovely walk by the river below the roads, they had areas for board games, music, graffiti, cafes, a lot of funky retro stuff going on … it was cool to say the least. When I arrived at the tower I was immediately approached by a dude who wanted to give me a ‘friendship’ bracelet … “erm no, get away from me” … “im offended, its tradition” … “well go and practice tradition on some other mug”. I turned away and was approached by this girl with a clipboard “hello, we are signing a petition to save children, that’s all .. please sign” and I look at the clipboard and see names and ‘donations’ … and tell her to “f off” then her friend comes up and shouts at her saying that she did it wrong and she was supposed to chit-chat with me 1st before making me see that money has to be transferred. These people make happy times sad times … for real.

After my adventures in Paris I was back on the road heading up to Calais … that night I slept in front of a shop. A lot of young hoodie-wearing kids were coming by throughout the night … 1 particular gang went to the shop owner (who was only serving through a small window, main door being locked) and asked him for a load of stuff … he went around the shop to find it all, scanned it and then the crew said they didn’t have money and he should just give it to them … bad things almost went down but it was all good in the end … which was good for me because I was once again 90% naked in the back seat of my car witnessing the show.

Next morning I freshened up and headed towards Calais … I looked online the night before and saw a train was living on the EuroTunnel at lunchtime for £70 so I made my way to catch it. I arrived early and had to wait in the car park for 2 hours …. After this I drove up happy to be getting to the UK when the booth girl asked me if I had a ticket. I confirmed that I did not and that I wanted to buy one and her response shocked me .. “that will be £250” … “erm its £70 online” … “oh yh well you have to buy it online, in person it always costs more”. So I turned around, parked up, got onto 3G and bought a ticket online for later that night at £90 … simples. Now I had a lot of time to kill so I went into Calais town. I couldn’t find much to do, eventually I found a supermarket so I parked up outside and chilled in the car. Every hr I went back into the supermarket to buy something just to get a change of scenery … then back in the car. This one time I went in there were 2 guys in the checkout ahead of me. They were scanning a few items and were holding a few in their hands … the checkout guy was saying “what about those items in your hand?” … “these are ours” … “but they have our company logo on them” … “oh that’s weird, we came in with them” … and then they walked past the security scanner and the alarm went off and they said “it’s a mistake, this is ours” … then the guy took it off them and scanned it and the barcode worked and he just let them have the rest of the items to get rid of them. I was next and I was buying something I saw there which I thought was a bargain …. But it wasn’t because I saw it in tesco for 50% cheaper the next week.

I got bored of waiting in the car park so I went for a drive. To my surprise I saw a sign for a beach … I followed it and boom … there is a beach in Calais. It was like what you’d expect in the UK seaside, that kind of a beach with loads of shacks that people can rent and sunbathe outside of … but it was cool, I could now get 95% naked and it would be normal. I chilled on the beach for couple of hours then took a stroll alongside the beach … they had a lot of exercise equipment and I started training calisthenics-style … tricep dips, levers, pullups … monkey bars, trampolines, etc. Fun times.

Later that night it was time to go back to the Calais port … round 2. I drove there and prepared to check in. Immediately my poor luck with border control kicked in as I was asked to drive to a secluded area where I could be questioned and my car searched. It didn’t look good: a British Pakistani with a Portuguese address driving a UK-registered right-hand drive car with Portuguese plates through France to the UK. The guy was interrogating me to the point where I felt guilty … I was tired too so my responses were slow … when he asked me where I was travelling to it took me 5 seconds to realize it was England. He kept telling me it was an offense to take drugs over and kept asking me multiple times “How much drugs are you carrying?” … it was an offensive form of interrogation. I was asked if I’m a user and how often I use … and my eyes were seriously red because I was tired and had been on the road for days, but he was staring into them asking about drugs. Then he opened my passport to a random page but that page happened to be the one that showed I was in Brazil for a full month earlier in the year … he questioned that … then asked me to open the boot of the car. First he asked “has anybody put anything into your car?” … “no” … “does everything in your car belong to you?” … “yes, every single thing is mine”. He opens the boot and the 1st thing he sees is a cushion with a picture of a cannabis plant on it … damn I forgot about that. I was at this full-moon psy-trance festival the previous summer and it had been in my car since … I was using it to sleep on through France but didn’t clock onto the fact that it was promoting drugs. He looked at that and said “How long have you been using?” … “oh that thing … its not mine, a friend left it in my car” …… “soooo, everything in your car ISNT yours?” ….. I wanted to cry. Eventually he wanted to see a business card proving I did what I said I did and then he let me go.

I got onto the tunnel and went into the back seat to relax and midway through the crossing I saw 2 officials going around my car and eyeing it up …. I started getting angry at this point and asked them in an angry tone what the problem was. They were just making sure there was enough space around the car to open the exit door as I was the 1st car at the front …. I felt small. Actually when I got on I did a numpty thing too … it’s the 1st time I’ve gotten onto the tunnel train and because I was the 1st car in my queue I had to lead by example. I drove into the side door and the lane went on for a looong time … I didn’t know what to or how far to drive as there were no officials to guide me. I drove a little bit, got confused and parked the car in this narrow land with walls on both sides …. The car behind me kept beeping so I went a bit further and stopped … wondering if other cars will appear in front of me from another door (which was physically impossible by the way but sometimes I’m not bright) … so a few beeping sessions later I realized I had to drive all the way to the front of the train.

The journey was quite short and very soon I landed in a very wet England … next stop was driving to a friend’s house for the night. When I got there it was 3am and he didn’t answer his phone so I decided to sleep in the car on the street … not realizing his mum was up and looking out for me throughout the night. I was in the car for 8 hrs …. I’d gotten used to sleeping in the car by this point. The next day my friend took me to a nice Thai massage in London which was exactly what I needed … followed by a lovely lunch in a café that had a sign on the wall saying “Please do not eat smelly food”. That evening we had a BBQ party and then it was time for me to go up north to have fun times with the family.

Boys and girls …. I made it, another successful adventure from Portugal to UK …. Total travel cost including fun times = £500.

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