Lost
On Penalties (Again)
Foolishly
believing that, at last, this really was England's best ever chance
to win the World Cup, Paul Hewitt sets forth to Germany in his Bongo.
This is his tale.
We
set off for Dover from Poole on Thursday 22nd June at lunchtime. Negotiated
M25 and M20 quite comfortably but not a certain well known burger
outlet at a Motorway service station a few miles before Dover. I cracked
a tooth badly on a burger. With an hour to go to ferry there was nothing
else for it but to take the evening ferry to Dunquerque with Norfolk
Line (£24 single - great value) and hope to visit a German dentist
on the following Monday. So for the next 3 days I survived on a diet
of mushy foods, paracetamols and pure German lager.
We stopped Thursday night in Dunquerque and the next day struck out
for our pre-booked campsite at Bad Liebenzell, 40kms west of Stuttgart,
in south west Germany. Driving through north east France, Belgium,
Luxembourg and into Germany we only hit really bad traffic 1 hr away
from Stuttgart after an unfortunate wrong turning. We blame the German
road signs not having road numbers, only destination names (big cities
such as Munich, Stuttgart, Karlsruhe and the like). So this wasn't
really very helpful to us in finding the right route to our small
sylvan hamlet in the Black Forest. And the Germans love to confuse
us almost as much as the French by giving roads more than one alpha
numeric title.
Our wrong turning took us along a 3 lane motorway which was down to
one lane for many kilometres due to major roadworks. Talk about bad
timing and planning. With so many World Cup football fans of many
nations driving in, around and through Germany it dispelled the German
organisation and efficiency myth.
We made our campsite after dark, grabbed a beer and went to bed after
a long day. Within half an hour we were disturbed by someone at the
back of the Bongo banging on our rear door at midnight. I summoned
up as much courage as possible and confronted a drunken scouser who
when asked what he was doing replied he didn't have a clue as he was
"out of his head"... I pointed him in the direction of the
path and he staggered on his way. We found his sunglasses the next
morning but couldn't find him. Pleased to say, that was the only slightly
fearful moment we have had with other English fans in all the 5 tournaments
we have attended.
The
campsite was tops, nestled in a small wooded valley on the edge of
a pretty town and would thoroughly recommend it. There was a large
beautifully maintained outdoor swimming pool next door which was very
welcome in the 30degC temperatures. But it cooled down in the forest
at night so good night's kip was never a problem.
On Sunday 25th we went to the Stuttgart Fans Park to view the England
v Ecuador game on 2 big screens. There were 79,852 England fans, 146
Ecuadorian fans and 2 Australians. There was no trouble (that we saw)
and the whole thing went off very well - except the football which
was pretty dull to be honest.
The
nice German dentist hacked half my tooth away the next morning and
although we had our E11's with us, didn't want any money at all! I
could now tuck into some decent German sausage.
The rest of our 6 day stay at Bad Liebenzell was idyllic. One day
we drove for an hour through beautiful wooded hills and mountains
west to Baden-Baden where the England squad were based. It is a spa
town and very pretty.
Baden-Baden
(so good they named it twice) was where the glorious England squad
and their wags (Wives And Girlfriends) stayed. And lo and behold I
came across this well known footballer of the dirty tackle leaving
a house of ill-repute, just like last year in Liverpool. He prefers
more mature pleasures, I understand.
Doesn't
Colleen look fabulous without her make up?
With England facing Portugal in the quarter finals the following Saturday
in Gelsenkirchen (near Dortmund and Dusseldorf), we drove north.We
found a strange little campsite in a town some 40kms from the venue.
It was full of permanent pitches with permanent old caravans in situ.
Some had a paraphernalia of garden gnomes, others small gardens full
of beautiful flora whilst others were pretty grim. That part of Germany
(North Rhine Westphalia) is known more for being the former industrial
(but now commercial) heartland of Germany, rather than a place of
natural beauty. It is rather flat and uninspiring but for 2 nights,
we didn't mind.
The Gelsenkirchen authorities did the fans proud by having 2 fan parks
- one dedicated to England fans with BBC beamed coverage on the 2
large screens.
After
our inevitable loss to Portugal on penalties we made our way home,
stopping off at Eindhoven overnight. The next morning, 2 hours drive
took us to Calais and homeward bound.
All
told, our Bongo, did us proud. Not a single problem. The overdue 15,000
km service a week before the trip probably helped!
Now
we are planning Euro 2008 - Austria here we come .... anyone know
any good campsites over there?
