Club Arnage

Me and a few friends are planning on camping from Thurs. thru Sunday this year, and I've been reading horror stories about the theiving pikeys. Our electronics and major valuables will be locked up in the rental car, but are small 1 man tents  on their shopping list? Should I pack up the tent every morning to keep it from walking away?


http://us.st11.yimg.com/store1.yimg.com/I/karst_1884_11546044

Like any thief, they're only after anything of real value or use.  I wouldn't expect a pikey to want to nick a small tent either to sell (worthless) or live in.

As in any situation, be aware of your belongings and your valuables, lock / hide them away when not required and, as Shaw Taylor used to say, "Keep 'em Peeled".

I have stayed in a variety of campsites over the years (always picking a place right beside the roadside) and have never had anything pinched or fiddled with yet!!!  (still... i keep hoping  ;) )

You need to call on Uncle Ernie, Fran  8)

(http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/tommys/tommy059.jpg)

We had a generator stolen last year from HA in the early hours of Sunday morning I think.
Stupidly it wasn't chained to anything.
We'll know better for this year.

Gary,
We had chained our generator to the concrete fence posts by our 'marquee'.  When we came to unlock the padlock on Monday morning, we found someone had tampered with the lock (probably attempting to nick the genny).
We had to smash the lock off.

LOL Steve, havent seen wallpaper and green shag pile like that for a while.!  8) - and i dont mind waiting a few years before i see it again.

P.S.  Usual bunch of insomniacs online again tonight then!

Only what I'd expect in Houx Annexe.  It full of criminals you know

Why don't the ACO have more power outlets?

Can we start a petition?

Steady on Lorry. The Houx Annexe residents are a fine upstanding bunch of gentlemen,well, they are in the area we use.
 It's the wandering pikies doing all the thieving. Bastards

Now that I know you have electronics and major valuables, I'm considering stealing them myself.  ;D

Are you quite sure it was yours and your weren't just "offering to take it home for someone else"?

A coinsidense your say this Steve, we had two gennys chained together and then chained to a post on the same fence as yours. After the end of the race we noticed that someone had tried to force the lock that joined the two together and consiquently f**ked it. Ever tried to lift 2 gennys chained together, bloody difficult.
Note for this year, take hacksaw just in case.

We're only vulnerable whilst the concrete base for the walk-in Chubb safe is setting.

I suppose there are idiots who think they can prise open a padlock with a big screwdriver, and will have a go, but I wonder if it deliberate damage.

The p!keys at home tried to take my caravan in the middle of the night.  Fortunately I was asleep in front of the television.  Moral, stay on guard.

Lorry, how the hell did you get inside the TV, is there a door or something?

There was a bloke on Karting Nord who's wife had her handbag (with both sets of car keys in it) stolen out of the tent in the middle of the night - apparentley. After half the site spent a lot Sunday morning trying to smash off the steering lock on their Pug, somebody noticed a sign on the ladies bog saying a handbag had been found - with Pug keys, purse etc - nothing missing - good job - needed all their money to repair the decimated Pug steering which now wouldnt work even with keys! :-[
Last year one of our lot thought he had locked his keys in his boot, after local garage / lock smith failed to break in, so smashed the window - no keys, later found out they had been handed in to lost property :-\
Moral: Yes there are pikies and pick pockets about same as anywhere, take sensible precautions against theft,  but there is more than a good chance that if you loose something, it will get handed in.

A guy close to us on MB last year had his SAAB convertible stolen - apparently he'd left his keys on a table in a motor home awning or something similar.

Be sensible and it's not too bad.

having said that we got absolutely hammered after the race two years ago and virtually passed out -woke up the next morning to discover we'd all left our rucksacks outside the tent with cameras, phones, wallets etc. etc)  ::).  Not a thing had been touched!! 

We'd also lost a member of our group but that was a whole different story ;D

Doh!
I must have left the generator in the Bog.

Sorry that meant to have a  ;) and a ;D on the end.

We'd also lost a member of our group but that was a whole different story ;D
OK Piglet we are waiting for a good story ::)
Canada Phil

This is a great one - and I apologies to anyone who might have been involved and be reading this  ;D

As said we got really really pissed and passed out - there were five of us when we started drinking and when we woke up (fairly early when the birds starting attacking the food we'd left outside!) we realised after an hour or so that the fifth member of our group was particuarly quiet and that her sleeping bag had been moved into the centre of the main tent rather than her own tent.  It then dawned on me I'd stolen that sleeping bag at 4 in the morning when my own had acquired by Keith and that if she'd moved into the main tent rather than her own, she hadn't been there at 4..... :o

So we checked her tent and it was empty - this was a 25 year old girl who'd never been to a race meeting before Le Mans and was in a fairly delicate emotional state having just broken up with her husband.

We tried her phone - no answer - she turned up another hour or so later saying that she'd got bored when we all passed out and had gone wondering around Houx - she'd then met a group of guys who'd needed someone skinny to get into a TVR truck that they'd locked themselves out of!  She'd gone off with them and they'd shoved her through the open window of the truck and they all slept in the back of it!!   She was only just starting to get sober enough to realise that perhaps it hadn't been the brightest of things to do......

It all worked out OK but it was one of those stories that could have been soooo different!

The worst experience of thieving I ever experienced was 4 years ago. After thr race eight of us spent the rest of Sunday finishing of the left over beer and wine. I had hung my bum bag, which contained all my cash, the tour cash and my credit cards, on the gazebo frame. I was so pissed I crawled into my tent and forgot about the bag. Needless to say the next morning it had gone. First thing phone the wife to cancel the cards and was called a useless twat for getting pissed and leaving it hanging there.
 I had to rely on a mates credit card for fuel to get us home. We stopped at Leclerc in Aloncon for fuel and my brother, who was with us for the first time, was buying sarnies which I thought was strange cos on Sunday I lent him the money to buy a t-shirt as he was skint.
We stopped again in Calais to buy wine and beer to take home and my brother brought 10 crates of Fosters. The alarm bells wre ringing loud now so I went to the car to check his bag and there in the bottom was my wallet. The bastard had stollen from his own brother and wost still most of the money was tour money so he had stollen from my mates who he had never met before that weekend.
I waited till he had loaded his beer I the car and then threw all his kit out, punched him in the mouth (the only time I have ever hit anyone in my life) and left him standing in Eastenders carpark. I don't know how he got home, I don't care, I havn't heard from or spoken to him since that day.
Just goes to show the pikies may  be theiving bastards but it is not always them doing it.

God thats terrible.  I've always thought that if anything was nicked it was likely to be by another Brit, but not family.  And one of the reasons for going in a group is to look out for each other.

The moral has to be to put your valuables in a very safe place before the binge, but its always a bu@@er to remember where they are the following day.

A few years ago in KN I lost the keys to the cobra.
This was no huge worry as I always take a spare set and leave them for safe keeping with another of our illustrious band.

However, I was a bit concerned that some bastard may find them and be able to get into the boot and thieve all my spare money and valuable stuff.

I'd realised I'd mislaid the keys way up by Tertre Rouge, so I retraced my steps all the way back to KN ..... only to find the keys in the boot lock, with nothing missing or disturbed.
Since then, I attach the bunch to my belt with a short length of light chain and a snap clip.

In the 25 odd years we have been camping, we have only lost a small amount of stuff, the worst was my Mum (yes, in the early eighties I went with my parents) who had her bag stolen from the campsite by a group of kids who had a blanket that they laid over what ever they wanted and folded it over.
Some got caught and justice was given by a group of Italians who saw what they where up to, the rest ran of along with her bag and other stuff from other campers.

I did have an inflatable referee nicked 5 or so years back and last year we lost some chairs both from the Houx Annexe.

BobU, that story is terrible, Me and my Brother argue all the time we are out there, often over the most trivial thing like the space available in the boot for beer etc, but thats grim stealing from family.

 

Nordic,
I'm so sorry to hear you actually lost your parents, that takes the biscuit. Mind you, if you're going to take eighty year olds along to LM, then I must say it's no surprise, my old mum is getting along now and I certainly wouldn't trust her with a bunch of pikies, let alone the Beast Of Beausejour.
You should be ashamed of yourself.
H
Did you get them back? 

Who is this beast of Beausejour?  We should be told.

There are quite a few basic primates on MB but nothing that bad

It took bit of waiting around, but they both drifted back when they got hungry.

bless um

A couple of years ago I was behind the granstands opposite the pits at the end of the race. Two 'cleaners' walked past one wheeling a wheely bin (what else would you do with it), and the other picked up rubbish and dropped it in the bin. Suddenly a very irate Brit appeared, grabbed one of the cleaners and demanded to look in the bin. They tried to stop him, but he was having none of it, inside the bin covered over with rubbish was his rucksack. ::)

Lorry,
The Beast of Beausejour was responsible for attacking my perineum with a very coarse grade of emery cloth one night while I slept. It was murder in the Grandstands the next day, you can imagine what it's like having 200 people behind you shouting 'Sit down!!' for hours on end.
Also, the Maison Blanche Monster was very active around the time that Sutcliffe was terrorising the streets of Leeds, and I understand it's rumoured he still makes an odd appearance now and then. I believe he may have been responsible for a spate of taxidermy in the early nineties, just where Maison Blanche ends and Grimpen Mire starts. Some of the lads, those that remain, suspect that the Howling Horror of Houx and the Monster are one and the same, but you've got to ask yourself what's the point of collapsible bollards in front of lamposts, naturally, but also how does he negotiate crossing the track on those terrifying moonless nights when we're all shivering, scared sh*tless in our tents.

The ACO, understandably try to keep these goings on under their hats, and really, you can't blame them, there's nothing like a string of unsolved murders to stop any newbies turning up, and after the Terror of Tetre Rouge ran his tally into double figures I remember them sending a troupe of clowns amongst the crowd to hand out freebies and make with general clown type banter and pranks. Or that might have been the Audi corporate people, I can't remember.
H

This thread sent shivvers down my spine. Has anyone else seen the giant puma-like cat that can jump over the concrete walls with imunity and vanish just as quickly as it appears. You wouldn't want one of them popping into your tent at 3.00am for a snack I can tell you. I suggest putting all your food in a binbag at night and hauling it high up a tree. Let it take the easy pickings from the folk next door. One lot next to us had a couple of their pals go missing on consecutive nights, but the gendarmes said best not to pry into these things too deeply.

We thought we'd had a brush with it ourselves once, there was a terrible noise on MB on a thursday night a few years back, the sound of the dead arising from the grave. However on closer inspection, it turned out to be nothing more sinister than The Gimp buggering a heron round the back of the SPS trailer. Phew!

The Maison Blanche Puma!!!!
I've seen it!!

I'm not sure how PC this is, but believe me, there's no offense intended.

Last year on the Friday night a trio of tents sprang up in the middle of our encampment, strangers to me, and it stayed that way - but it's live and let live; anyway, one of these guys turned out to be profoundly deaf and dumb. He also seemed to have an unquenchable thirst for Jack Daniels, and every time I looked over he was up-ending a fresh bottle and his adams apple was bobbing up down like a ping pong ball stuck in a Hoover hose.
As we staggered back to the tents at about 4am on the Sunday we saw this chap engaged in a silent struggle of epic proportions. It was as if we still had ear plugs in. His tent was shaking and rattling at the seams with guide ropes pinging off in all directions, he suddenly popped out of the door, backwards and with all the appearances of being shot out of a cannon, landed in a heap and went still for a second. He then seemed to recover conciousness, went all bow-legged for a few moments, shook his head, dug deep, retreated a few steps and with his mouth gaping in a silent scream hurtled back towards the tent taking off several feet in front of the door and entering the tent horizontal, six feet off the ground and at a great speed. The battle then resumed with much vigour. At the time, I submitted that the only explanation was a Puma in his tent, but it all went quite and we decided it would be too dangerous to go near the tent entrance. We never saw him again.

Thank you Andy, I now know for certain it was the Maison Blanche Puma.
H

Um..... :o :o :o.....Yeah.....uh WOW :o :o :o...I've uh, Yeah :o :o :o I've been camping in New Mexico and had to use bear bags and thankfully never encountered a bear or cougar. Now you're telling me that there is the potential of having to worry about a puma camping at la Sarthe! This really will be an adventure! :o :o :o

Hey Jonny.. dont believe a bimmin word these charlatans tell ya!

Ah great sounds like we need to go for a Snipe hunt! 8)

char·la·tan (shär'l?-t?n) n.
A person who makes elaborate, fraudulent, and often voluble claims to skill or knowledge; a quack or fraud.

[French, from Italian ciarlatano, probably alteration (influenced by ciarlare, to prattle) of cerretano, inhabitant of Cerreto, a city of Italy once famous for its quacks.]

mmm...


martini...

Hmm indeed... looking at the time of my post and bearing in mind how I am feeling today.... I am astonished by my own eloquence.... :o

 ;D Well done!!

BTW - perhaps you saw my mates girlfriend - she was pretty scary  ;D

Another question undeserving of it's own thread:

What's the walk like from Karting Nord to Maison Blanche?  I assume that walking south, then taking the road under the track and walking back north is the shortest way, correct?

You are absolutly correct, Chop, about 15 mins there, and about an hour and a half when you walk back p#ssed ;D

Choppo,
When the cars are on the track, you're correct.
Most of the other times there are a couple of gates in the goon fencing that will be open, allowing a crow-flying approach to MB from KN across the track, and vice verca.
H

The guy’s opposite us on MB had his Saab stolen left the keys on the table overnight!

We were on KN year before last, they locked the gates on Sunday evening, had to slide under the fence, dodge the goon patrol touring the circuit and find a gap to get under into KN.