To many the purpose of the trip is to run the Luxembourg marathon but really it’s all about the journey… it’ll take two weeks and almost 5,000 kilometers to get there and back and I’m looking forward to every minute and meter on the road.
It didn’t start according to plan, I forgot that I no longer work for a ferry company and can’t arrive with seconds to spare… and so as I watched the car deck doors slowly grinding to a close and the  gangway being hoisted away from the deck I had to put plan B into action, just as soon as I figured out what plan B might look like. All I knew was that I had to get to Harwich, on the far eastern coast of England, for 22.30hrs to catch an overnight ferry to Holland. Plan B turned out to be a large and very long breakfast in Dun Laoghaire followed by several coffee’s as I waited for the afternoon ferry to take me to Holyhead. As I rounded the last
corner along the coast road that brought me to the port I was very surprised to see the huge towering bow of the HSS rounding the piers as she entered Dun Laoghaire harbour. I had worked on this ship years before and had assumed the HS
S had been retired, she was a product of the “faster, bigger, forget the cost” era of the 90’s and was proving uneconomical to run as the price of oil increased steadily over time.
Checked in I joined the motorcycle lane and parked at the end of a long line of impressive machines with proud owners each with stories to tell. Motorcycle owners are an interesting bunch, they have a connection with their machines that you generally don’t get with car owners. And they stick together, always acknowledge each other on the road and will greet each other like long lost friends wherever they meet yet they tend to be  solitary by nature and seem to be fiercely independent and give the impression that nothing is too much. It’s probably unfair to generalise but from my observations that what I see. And I do admire those characteristics; the friendly, helpful, no nonsense, whatever it takes attitude.
There were a few familiar face on the ship, both on the car deck and in the cabin. I spend 5 years working on this magnificent vessel in a variety of roles, the most exciting of which was as the OBST (On-Board Services Technician) where I reported to the Chief Engineer on the Bridge and maintained the passenger deck. I also was tasked with operating a crane that ran on tracks on top of the ship. This crane hoisted containers into and out of cargo bays that were located behind the galley and shop on the passenger deck. The crane ran off the aft end of the vessel on two extended tracks, it took some getting used to as I drove the crane into what felt like thin air to drop a weighty container onto shore side.
My journey today was unremarkable, which is a good thing when travelling at sea, especially as I can’t swim and the machine that will carry me across Europe is lashed to the deck below. Thankfully disembarkation was equally unremarkable and I joined a long steady stream of other motorcycles, cars, buses and lorries as we quickly made our way unceremoniously out of Holyhead and onto the A55 heading East!
I was late! It was already 3.30pm and I had less that 7 hours to cross two countries to get to my next sea crossing in Harwich. Needless to say sight seeing fell off the agenda as I struggle to stay on my motorcycle for as long as possible between breaks.
On my last stop I had a fortuitous encounter with another motorcyclist who had just arrived back in England after a three week tour of France. I really didn’t have time to chat but I was so completely engaged in his stories and advice that before I knew it an hour had passed and I was really cutting it fine.
Back on the road my trusty GPS gave me an ETA of 22.30hrs which was cutting it far too fine. I had no more time for breaks and with a full tank of petrol I had no reason to stop. Remarkably I arrived at the port check in at exactly 22.30hrs, just as the check-in staff were beginning to finalise their lists and shut down! Relieved and exhausted I followed a winding path over railway tracks and connected with one the ships  many decks.
The crew I met were all Dutch and seemed excited to see me, I think it’s a Dutch thing… from my experience they’re generally a happy lot and easily excited. The Deckhand that lashed my motorcycle to the deck looked like a seasoned seafarer that I’m sure spend a lifetime working far-off deep sea routes and had come closer to home as he came closer to retirement.
I made straight for my cabin to change before heading to the restaurant for food, lots of food, I was ravenous and could have eaten the arm of the waiter if he wasn’t quick enough.
During dinner, and later drinks, I got stuck into my book “The Art of Racing in the Rain”, given to me by my best friend. It’s a book that looks at life from the perspective of Man’s best friend and it has a connection for me that runs deeper than I could have imagined before. Fed and watered I felt the tiredness sweep over me like a wave of calm so I closed my book and headed for bed.