Hello again,
Welcome to my Q3 update. Since my last letter, I was mostly in the UK. I spent a few weeks with Carol in London; we stayed at the Gore Hotel, which was very nice. Then Carol met up with her kids and flew off to Turkey for a family holiday there. Meanwhile, I rented a house down in Wareham, just around the corner from my brother Roger. All four of my lovely kids (plus Lilly) joined me there at some point, and we had great fun going for walks, going out on Roger’s boat, water-skiing, and for the second time in my life, wakeboarding. As I am a long-time snowboarder, this skill is very transferable, and I managed to get up on my first try, despite my brother’s pessimism!
<< See the Wareham Holiday Gallery >>
Then Carol and I met up again, and I prepared my old Jaguar for yet another European adventure. This time the target was Spain, but we got sidetracked back into France. We drove down to Portsmouth and took the car ferry there for a two-night cruise to Santander on the north coast of Spain. We loved the relaxing crossing and our little cabin! The plan was to drive around Spain, but Carol was invited to a friend’s three-day, 60th birthday extravaganza in St. Tropez, so we changed the plan. To get there in time, we had to head directly to St. Tropez. We drove through San Sebastian, where we tried to stop for lunch, but it was too busy. We stayed the first night in a place called Pau, close to the French border. From there, we drove to Béziers for the second night. The next stop was St. Tropez, but then we had some very bad luck. ☹ Driving on the motorway just past Marseille, we stopped at a motorway service area for a comfort break. Carol rushed off to the bathroom, and I was approached by a strange-looking guy who, in French, indicated that my car was somehow parked incorrectly. I did not really understand what he was on about, but I returned to the car and moved it a little, and the guy was then happy. I should have thought about this more, but I didn’t. I locked the car again and headed for the restrooms. We then drove on towards St. Tropez, which was about another 2½ hours. As we got closer to the town, Carol told me that she had made an appointment at a salon in town and went to get her phone to find the address. This was when she realised that her handbag was not under the seat where she had left it. I stopped the car and jumped out to find that my backpack was also not behind my seat where I had left it.
It all then fell into place what had happened. The guy at the service area had tricked me into unlocking the car with the remote while someone else copied/cloned the signal. My old Jag, being 25 years old, has a very simple remote signal, which is easy to copy these days. While we were in the bathroom, they unlocked the car, took the two bags, locked it again, and ran. We lost both our passports, my laptop, iPad, iPhone, money, credit cards, and all the other things you usually keep in a backpack/handbag. It could have been worse, as all our luggage was in the boot, which they could have opened, as well as Carol’s jewellery. We went on to the hotel, dropped our bags, and decided to drive back to Marseille to report the incident. It was already late evening, and then we spent ages driving around Marseille (which is a horrible place) trying to find the police station that covered the area where it had happened. Eventually, at about 1 AM, we managed to find a policeman willing to take our statement and listen to our story. We both had trackable AirTags in each of the bags, but they were both discarded by the side of the motorway, not far from the service area. However, Carol had an app that allows her to track the location of her Apple EarBuds, and this was still working. So, we could see on our phone exactly where in Marseille they currently were. The officer told us that this was a very dangerous area of the town and the police would not go there. These were high-rise buildings, and there was no way to know which floor the EarBuds were on. They did say that if the EarBuds were moving, then they “could” do something, but it was clear that they would not. By 3 AM, we were done (in more ways than one!), and then we had another two-hour drive back to the hotel. We had missed the first night of the party, and we spent most of the next day sleeping.
<< See the Spain Roadtrip Gallery >>
Because of Carol’s other plans related to Cesca’s wedding, we had to bring forward the holiday to August instead of September. I have now vowed, and I warn you to do the same, never to go to St. Tropez in August! You cannot move for people, and it is very, very hot! We did catch up with our friends and joined in on the other parties, which were great fun, but we now had to find a way to replace our passports. Also, Carol spoke to a local security company to see if we had any options. As we know the location of the EarBuds, we wondered if we could find someone willing to retrieve our bags for us! Hmm… A spin-off from this was the news that the thieves would probably discard the passports immediately, as they would be a strong link connecting to the crime. So, we had another bad idea! This made us wonder if, after leaving the service area with our bags, they located and discarded our trackable AirTags, but what if they threw our passports out of the window at the same time! They could be lying by the side of the motorway close to the still trackable AirTags. I did not really think that this had much hope, but I was very surprised to learn that Carol had no doubts, so off we go again. This was a very dangerous idea, and we did stop by the side of the motorway where the app was telling us the tags were located, but unsurprisingly, we found nothing.
I was able to report my passport missing online and requested a temporary replacement to get me home. We collected this in Marseille a couple of days later, and Carol managed to arrange to get a replacement passport from the Brazilian consulate in Barcelona. This was our next destination after a night in Montpellier. Here, we stayed for a couple of days in a lovely seaside town called Sitges. My best friend in all the world, Mr. Peter Bonner, lives just outside Barcelona, so it was a great opportunity to see him and his wife, Martina, while we were there.
Finally, we were able to start our tour of Spain, which had to be reduced somewhat as a result of our time in St. Tropez. From Barcelona in the southeast, we decided to head up to Salamanca in the northwest. This took a couple of days crossing a very hot central Spain. Thank God for A/C as it was far too hot to have the convertible roof down. We liked Salamanca, and the food was amazing. We then headed for Santiago de Compostela to see the end of the famous pilgrimage route. From there, we made our way along the north coast and back to Santander, where we stayed for a night before our car ferry brought us safely back to the UK.
We had a few more days in London, and then Carol had to head back to Paris to meet her daughter there to try on wedding dresses! From there, they flew down to Seville to meet up with Victor (the bridegroom) and his parents. They were joined by the wedding planners to view the wedding locations. There will be a pre-wedding party at a hotel on the Thursday, the wedding will be in the Seville Cathedral on the Saturday, and there will be a post-wedding brunch on the Sunday. The wedding party will be at a farm outside of the city, and the guest limit is 600 people. When everyone provided their list of people they wanted to invite, it added up to 1,250, so they have a little work to do on that!
While this was going on, I went down to Hampshire to meet up with 10 of my old Sussex University friends and have a walking holiday for a few days. Jeff and I met for a round of golf at Alresford Golf Club:
Alresfordis also famous for the Watercress Line, which still operates steam trains. As displayed by Keith:
My friend Cris and his partner Jayne arranged the holiday and the walks:
This is in the Meon Valley, not far from a town called Four Marks, where my parents had moved in 1978. When I was 18, they decided they wanted to leave the tropic of suburban Ruislip and live in the countryside. So effectively, instead of me leaving home at 18, my home left me! I did visit there occasionally, and it was a very nice house, and my Dad was a hobby farmer for a few years before my Mum decided they should move back to Northwood.
I then spent a few days looking at some properties in London. We are thinking of buying a place so that we can save money on London hotels. I jumped on my motorbike and visited many properties in Fulham, Chelsea, Richmond, and Kingston. My Honda CBR1100-XX Super Blackbird was the ideal mode of trasport and I only got one speeding ticket :(
Now I am back in São Paulo again, and yesterday I did an online speeding awareness course, having been caught by a speed camera when visiting the London properties. ☹
Tomorrow, we will drive up to Paraty and spend a few days with Victor’s parents, with whom we are also very good friends. They have a beautiful house there. It is about a 3-4 hour drive up the coast from here. Then next weekend is the big engagement party. There will be (only) 380 guests for that, which will be fun. My friend Duncan Galloway is bringing his 7-piece jazz band, the Pasadena Roof Orchestra, to entertain us. This will also be the first time I will meet Giancarlo Civita, Carol’s ex-husband, as the party is at his house! I am sure it will be interesting! News of that will be in my next instalment!
That’s enough for now!
Peter xxx