Dover, England - Paris, France

Sunday 30th May 1999

The start of stage two of the European travels and the first step was to hightail it to Paris where my Mum and Dad would be waiting to join us for this part of the trip.

With our new vehicle in hand, a sleek Talbot with Autosleeper conversion (everyone tells me that they're the best, it must be true), we'd stopped overnight on the motorway just near Dover so it was a short trip down to the docks. Remarkably the cheapest way across was on the hovercraft so we happily lined up for launch. It's definitely worth trying at least once just for the sensation of rising off the ground then sliding sideways into the water.

Once on the other side we quickly adjusted to the excitement of being back in Calais and slept for about three hours in the hovercraft car park. From there it was just a straight run all the way to Paris, with me desperately trying to hang on to the BBC4 on the radio to hear the Australia vs West Indies cricket match. We finally lost the signal just as the Windies lost the match.