Club Arnage

Me and the crew are sailing from Dover 7.15 on wednesday morning, Thinking of travelling down to Dover Tuesday afternoon. Anybody know of a decent place to stay overnight near Dover

Cheers

Whitey

If you're going to be there Tuesday evening, I'd probably suggest you try to get the ferry over that night and grab a cheap as chips Formule 1 in Calais (25 Euros per room per night) and then you've got a head start in the morning.

Whitey,
I've just booked two rooms at the Travel Lodge in Ashford, Kent (about 30mins from Dover) for the Tuesday night at £26 per room, Rooms are Family Rooms that take 2 adults, rates are discounted web rates.

Worth looking at their website

http://www.travelodge.co.uk
Steve

I would avoid Dover if I were you, it's not the most pleasant of places. I live in Ashford & would back up the Travelodge for a decent cheap night. There is a nightclub & various restaurants on the site aswell. Ashford town centre is about 5 mins drive from the hotel too, not that theres a huge amount to do!!!

I'm with JP on this one.

We have been going overnight from Portsmouth for the last few years but before then we used to go from Dover first thing Wed AM (7:00ish). The problem we found is that we would arrive in Kent on Tuesday evening and then wish we could carry on to Le Mans.

One year we even tried leaving Dover around 11:00pm Tuesday night and driving through the night. We had three drviers and did 2 hours each and arrived around 5:00ish the next day.

If you do stay over night, stay clear of Dover.

Yep, the downside (upside for some) of overnighting in France instead of England is the temptation to crack on down to LM. I did exactly that for last year's pre-q and ended up sleeping in the car, as NONE of the cheapies around LM had any vacancies (and by the time I got there - sometime after midnight - I wasn't prepared to pay sensible money for just a few hours sleep.

Sleeping in the car was uncomfortable and cold!

I was queuing at Carrefour when it opened, and luckily was able to book into my hotel mid-morning Friday to catch up on the zeds.

Mind you, I was able to do the Mulsanne straight in the dark at high speed and low risk...  :)


Oh, and I used to work in Dover (for P&O) - also wouldn't recommend it for an overnight if you have any other choice...

Thanks for the help, have booked into the Travel Lodge for the Tuesday night. Will see you there Steve, maybe a beer. 8) 8) 8) ;D ;D ;D

Her's what happened to my fellow Commer drivers Malcolm and Janet in Dover...

http://classiccamperclub.tripod.com/memberstales.htm

Down and outs soup kitchen indeed!

Andy,
I'm afraid I couldn't stay with it for the whole account, as I didn't have any valium at hand. Or ether, for that matter.
However, a couple of things seem clear. The couple in question seem to be suffering from some form of narcolepsy (do you get tse-tse flies in Romford I wonder?), and Malcolm seems to be on the wrong side of a textbook example of an obsessive compulsive disorder.
May I be so bold as to suggest that Malcolm is in fact a nom de plume, and you, yes you, Mr. Andrew Zarse of Sussex, is in fact Malcolm, and you're trying to lure us into your, frankly sordid, world?
It leaves a bad taste in my mouth.
H

GRRRR!! Rumbled at last. And I'd have gotten away with it if it wasn't for you meddling kids!

Malcolm is indeed my nom de spume but in mitigation, surely you realise hot hubs are no joke and are you surprised I got a bit anal about them? I blame society and the GKN Bearing Co. Ltd in equal measure.

PS The last paragraph makes interesting reading IMO, it's about three quarters of the way down the page, just before Colin's trip to Ireland in the Bedford...

Whitey,
Feel free to join us for a drink...
You won't miss the car in the car park,
It's a 1960 Ford Zodiac pulling a trailer made from the front end of a Pop...

Just look for the Le mans T-Shirts in the bar

Team Cannonball will be staying at the Travel Lodge in Medway on the M2 on the Wednesday night. I got two rooms for 26 notes each. Not bad all the cheap rooms (webrate) at Ashford for the Wednesday were gone.

Anyone else staying there? We are going over on the 945 P anO from Dover on the Thursday.

Jay

Not too sure Jay. I have yet to get our paperwork from the travel company. However, we normally get a boat at around that time or earlier if we can get going properly without the usual return for something somebody has forgotten.

My brother lives very close to where you will be staying, and we plan on our second meeting point at his place at around 7AM on the Thursday. We will then be crossing over to the M20 for the trip to Dover.

So, we may well see you on the outward journey. I think our provisional list of transport this year is as follows, Audi RS6 Avant, Corvette C5 (+ Nitrous, the driver is mad  8) ), Cobra (just been rebuilt following a near terminal encounter with a concrete barrier on the way to LM 2 years ago  :'( , I was the passenger then, and will be in it again this year, so I am hoping it will make it this time  ;) ), Nissan 200 ZX (no comment about this driver, except he has not been able to get a passenger to go with him for the last 5 years  :o , still it means we can get a fridge on his passenger seat  ;D ), Audi S6 Avant and finally there is a chance of a Merc Sprinter Van, which will leave us at Calais if it comes, but does mean less luggage in the other cars.

Anyway, that is what you need to look out for if you fancy saying hello.

Steve

Is there a bar in the travel lodge? looking forward to seeing the car and trailer. If you have read other threads on the website, I asked for opinions on BMW Z3's and got a fairly mixed bag of views mainly not very good. I decided in the end to buy one and run for a year, so it will be making its first and possibly last trip

Cheers

Whitey

maybe not....
But there will be one nearby....
If not there's always the Frankie and Benny's

Sounds like i will need to thrash the arse of my Alfa 156 if i want to have any chance of seeing anything other than your trail of dust.

I'm not too sure on that Jay, I have a horrible gut feeling about the plod this year. So far we have managed to get away quite lightly, with only 3 nicks in the last 2 years. And only one of them involved losing the licence  :(

We had a REALLY close call coming home last year at a probable get locked up speed, and I just don't think our luck is going to hold if we keep pushing it. So much so, I am possibly planning on a motorhome for next year.

Mr I, if you take it easy out of Calais and then stay away from the N138 you should avoid the coppers completely. Every year we make the same mistake at Rouen and end up heading down to Evreux. We have never seen any coppers on this road. Hence the miles might be a little longer, but there is some dual carriageway, with no police it takes about the same length of time.

I heard some horror stories last year about 1000 euro fines and the like. Also if you have any form of radar detector or even a dash sat nav that looks like a radar detector then i would leave it at home. Plod were taking it out of your car and getting you to reverse over it last year. They are highly illegal in France i think.

;D :D ;D I've got the t-shirt for that one as well!

Do you make the same mistake on the way back to Rouen, and take the wrong first exit off the dual carriageway thus driving into Rouen via the old industrial area?  :(

Thanks for the heads up regarding detecters, but we are well aware of this already and nobody takes them.

How things change. When I first started going, you knew every year where the buggers were going to be, and even then they only knicked you if you really took the mickey. Now, though, they have realised just how much money can be made from poor foreign drivers who won't be around to complain and go on strike or burn the rozzers house down.

We have never made that mistake Mr I, but on the way back on the Monday, i am usualy shovelled behind the wheel at some god forsaken hour and somehow we end back up in calais about 4 hours later. I do remember getting hideously lost once, i have no idea where though. Hence being lost.

I got hopelessly lost one year travelling down from Caen and ended up on a desserted bit of duel carriageway... saw a notice saying peage 2000m and suddenly within a couple of hundred meters found a row of unattended semi derilict peage booths with cones funnelling into one of them.........braking sharply to reduce my speed from ... erm.. whatever the permitted kms per hour were ...*cough* .... I squealed to a halt some metres after hitting a barrier arm which was down!!!!  I stopped ....looked back at the barrier which was now bent n buckled and lying in the road..........and then legged it outta there as fast as i could!  If it wasnt for the line of scratches across the windscreen i would have thought i imagined it.... probably some kinda ambush laid out by the local bandidos (or possibly something set up by Le Camera Candide)  - either way its a good job i didnt stop.  8)

Has that ever happened to anyone else?  ???

F

[quote Has that ever happened to anyone else?  ???

F

No. But coming back from PQ's in the black beastie last year we were stopped at a roundabout by some funny looking locals who wanted us to buy a brightly cuddly toy!  Gave em a handful euro's and we were on our way, still don't know what they were doing. :o :o :o

Locals and Cuddly Toys eh. Reminds me of a time when i was a student in Glasgow and i used to live in a flat in Govan. I was waiting for my meal at the local Chinese when in walked two proper Glaswegian Neds (for you southerners read chavs) with great big bin bag full of cuddly toys. Anyhoo i said no i don't want a cuddly toy to go with my prawn balls. However he did see me pay and i happened to have a fair wad of cash on me at time.  So having picked up my chinese i set off home, however the two neds happened to see me and gave chase (I assume i was about to become a victim of street crime), as i look round to see if they are gaining on me (they weren't heroin obviously doesn't improve your health) one of them was holding what looked very much like a fire axe. If you have ever been chased by an axe wielding heroin addict it certainly sharpens the mind. I managed to get away by disappearing up a side street and hiding behind the wheels of an articulated lorry.

The motto of this story. Buy a cuddly toy when offered

"Do you make the same mistake on the way back to Rouen, and take the wrong first exit off the dual carriageway thus driving into Rouen via the old industrial area?"

DO YOU MEAN TO SAY IT ISN'T COMPULSORY TO DO THAT?

Last year we tried ever so hard to just drive past Rouen without getting into the fabled "industrial area trap" but had to concede to defeat. I was a bustin' for an extended water leak too but that bloody bouncy rutted road made it so bad  I had to stop behind a strategically parked camion.  (I know, maybe too much info, but it all adds to the Le Mans Experience" dunnit?)

My mate has route guidance this year and I intend to be behind him at that point, see if IT does any better!

The RG is built in and doesn't look like a Radar detector thank God.

 :o

Bill

Rouen industrial area is definitely compulsory routing... in fact i think there is a tear off strip on your LM tickets that has to be handed in before you can get out the other side!  ::)  

Still at least you might be slightly off the optimum course, but you know its the same bit u got lost on last year and that eventually you will end up in LM.

F

Fran, you must be right if you say so.

In fact if you say so and you are right, are we married?



That Peage incident reminds me....

The new M6 Toll road has a system of electronic barrier lifters that work when a "Tagged " vehicle comes through, but, and it is a BIG but, only if in certain marked lanes. Makes sense I suppose.
Our company vans have the electronic gismo in the windscreens since we need access to ALL the midlands Motorways.

I was driving into TOLL PLAZA southbound with a call on my blood* handsfree mobile which had lost its handsfreeability. The call was from our office from a bloke who had my customer on the phone and who was worriting about whether we would find him.

Trying to answer him and get into the right lane for GISMO I was using the handset, trying to be unobtrusive (the new mobiles law had just started) and trying to get in lane.

Inevitable innit?

I drove straight into a lane that I thought was showing the GISMO sign, no bugger in front either so "Aha, clear run through!"

BERDONNNNNNNGGGG!!!

Wrong, invalid GISMO lane and the barrier bar clattered  orf me windscreen.

Luckily the barrers are designed to spring forwards if some paperat hits 'em, but bloody hell how daft does it make you feel?

Especially if they ALWAYS report the incident to the vehicle owners......

 >:( >:( >:(

Bill

Lol Perdu - thanks for the discussion of marriage, lets take a raincheck on that for now shall we?  (esp bearing in mind the time of you post and the fact you MUST have been under the influence).

At least my BERRRRDOINNNNGGGGG incident wasnt witnessed!  ::)   Mind you when i went through the real peage a couple of kms further down the road i was expecting alarm bells n flashing lights n shouts of "Madame you 'ave  deestroyed our barrierre" from the gentlemen of the gendarmerie.

Still the line of scratches across the screen were a nice reminder of expeditions to LM for daydreaming in traffic jams - also the growing cluster of ACO superglue dollops in the top left corner of the screen - what the heck is that stuff made of?   >:(

Team DMC thought long and hard on this one. In the end we
decided on staying in Rouen. As we had a early afternoon
ferry and wanted to avoid the autoroute's and Plod as much
as possible.
 I guess the ultimate route if you have the time/money would be to go out from Plymouth to Spain and come in "under the radar" from the west. ;)
Regards
Nick H
 

haha, the roeun industrial estate. im sure there are some interesting pics of ricks van feeling rather poorly on a very hot day sitting on the bridge over the river seine a few years back.

i think i managed to avoid that route the following year though and we managed to get round roeun a different way. but then we got lost cos the tunnel was closed....

Ooohhhh, I remember the year the tunnel was closed.........and i still ended up in the industrial estate.

 ???

F

(http://G:\My Pictures\Le Mans 2002\Pete's Pics\90 - Broken Down.JPG)

No wonder he's trying to sell it ;) ;)