Day 1 - High Wycombe to Stensel - 23rd May 2024

Leaving from High Wycombe heading to Dover for the ferry to Calais at @ 14:00

I'm hoping to record the mileage every day and the cumulative mileage.

Good trip to Dover. Don’t bother going to Maidstone services as you can’t get back on heading for Dover. You end up going back towards London and coming back at the next junction. You dont find this out until you are of the M20 though. 

Arrived at Dover and the 12.45 hadn’t gone down they sent me straight through which was a bonus. 

Irish ferries what can I say - registered out of Limassol manned by Bulgarians and Turks. Strange crossing as I was one of the few Cornish/Irish people on board. The vast majority were rather dour HGV drivers of varying Eastern European persuasion. There main task in life getting to the front of the cafeteria queue… well not before this Irishman you don’t!

Pleasant crossing but as we turned the cacophony of cars alarms went off. I looked to see if it was the Vans but I couldn’t see it winking at me.

On the other side it’s been a few years since I’ve come through Calais and they’ve upped the security immensely. Bits of it are like Death Race 2000.

Because of the earlier crossing I was pretty confident I would get to the place I’d seen on park for the night near Eindhoven. Nipped quickly through Belgium (most do) and into the Netherlands. Found the place quite easily though the main road through Steensel was dug up and I had to go through some back streets. 

It’s as soon as you get off a road with a white line down the middle you must remember the drive on the right. I was gesturing at a Toyota Aygo to move over when I realised I was trying to pass on its left rather than its right.  Neither of us were moving at this time.

Parked up in the car park of this small Football club with a couple of other Van lifers. Not much about had a pot noodle (chicken if anyone’s interested- though not sure you can tell) and did my Strava activity (walk).

Boiled the water using the big battery David gave us and a small electric hob from Badgers. Heavy usage - about 12%.As it grew dark I shut the van doors and lay down to sleep. The bike takes up more room than I would like. Wasn’t cold and slept until someone started their diesel heater about 4 am. Eventually back to sleep and woke at 7.30