Travel arrangements for the Davey World Tour of Wales
The logistics for this three-week holiday were the most complicated yet. So much so that until we were on the plane home I was not sure the plan would come together. But we only had one modification to do, and that was due to a combination of the M5 roadworks and an unforeseen funeral.
The problem was that we were very rarely all together in one place. Usually three of us were at one event while the fourth was somewhere else. And everything miles, sometimes hundreds of miles apart.
Firstly Catrin, Pat and I flew Easyjet to Liverpool. Here our friend Rhys was waiting to meet us.
I fly quite often now and sometimes there's someone to meet me, but usually there's not. Whenever I land unmet I always look with envy at the people being welcomed by family and friends. There's even a book I'd rather like to read called "Je voudrais que quelqu'un m'attende quelque part" (I wish someone were waiting for me somewhere). So to see Rhys' welcoming smile was a blessing.
He then loaned us his car, a little Citroen C3 diesel, which was unbelievably economical and managed to swallow us and our luggage and hurtle happily on motorways and Welsh lanes. Never in the history of Davey motoring have so many miles been travelled on so little fuel. Without the loan of the car we couldn't possibly have done all that we needed to do. Or we'd have ended up paying hundreds of pounds for a hire car.
In addition to travelling with us Catrin made some journeys in friends' cars, and possibly a minibus? as well as being the first Davey to use a Megabus. I had my doubts when I saw that the fare from London to Chester was £6, but all was fine and we met her at 10pm as scheduled.
Gwilym was working in a clothes shop in Bordeaux so he joined us halfway through our holiday. We met him at Liverpool and then took him to camp in Tywyn on the way to Aberystwyth for the conference. Then he travelled to Swindon on Monday by rail. There is no Megabus service to Swindon, though I notice that there is now a service to Toulouse.
Chester to Toulouse by Megabus... Now that's an idea.
The problem was that we were very rarely all together in one place. Usually three of us were at one event while the fourth was somewhere else. And everything miles, sometimes hundreds of miles apart.
Firstly Catrin, Pat and I flew Easyjet to Liverpool. Here our friend Rhys was waiting to meet us.
I fly quite often now and sometimes there's someone to meet me, but usually there's not. Whenever I land unmet I always look with envy at the people being welcomed by family and friends. There's even a book I'd rather like to read called "Je voudrais que quelqu'un m'attende quelque part" (I wish someone were waiting for me somewhere). So to see Rhys' welcoming smile was a blessing.
He then loaned us his car, a little Citroen C3 diesel, which was unbelievably economical and managed to swallow us and our luggage and hurtle happily on motorways and Welsh lanes. Never in the history of Davey motoring have so many miles been travelled on so little fuel. Without the loan of the car we couldn't possibly have done all that we needed to do. Or we'd have ended up paying hundreds of pounds for a hire car.
In addition to travelling with us Catrin made some journeys in friends' cars, and possibly a minibus? as well as being the first Davey to use a Megabus. I had my doubts when I saw that the fare from London to Chester was £6, but all was fine and we met her at 10pm as scheduled.
Gwilym was working in a clothes shop in Bordeaux so he joined us halfway through our holiday. We met him at Liverpool and then took him to camp in Tywyn on the way to Aberystwyth for the conference. Then he travelled to Swindon on Monday by rail. There is no Megabus service to Swindon, though I notice that there is now a service to Toulouse.
Chester to Toulouse by Megabus... Now that's an idea.
Comments