| V8
goes East - 13
This
report from Gordon Hesketh-Jones records a few sundry thoughts from his travel.
(29.5.05)
In
Budapest we saw a genuine Routemaster Double-Decker Bus, ex-London Transport,
being used as a form of mobile disco and bar. Very strange, but it was nice to
hear the old five-cylinder engine again.
Wandering around Eger (being
bitten etc) we saw women standing at a central water hydrant/pump waiting to fill
5 or 10 gallon containers. There was no shortage of water at Eger so maybe they
believe in the miraculous healing powers of the water from that particular spring.
Jennifer said that the ladies' fashions in Eger were very traditional (is that
a polite way of saying old-fashioned) and totally different from Budapest just
200 miles away.
Driving along the main road when first entering Hungary,
we were astonished to see many "ladies of the night" openly offering
their wares for sale in broad daylight. Certainly not done in Cornwall!
In Romania, gypsy beggar-boys would suddenly and silently materialise by
your elbow whilst you were eating a meal in a cafe etc. Most unnerving.
In all of the five former Soviet-bloc countries we were to visit it was quite
normal to see women brushing up the sand and dust in the city streets, also to
see water lorries going around for much of the day spraying water onto the streets
to keep the dust down.
The constant use of the phrase "Have a nice
Day" began to irritate me so I began a small personal campaign to educate
the hotel staff, so that they could understand that they could use this phrase
to Americans in general, but only to English people if they really meant it.
In Greece the custom is to place a small "house" made of steel
at the point on the corners of the |
roads where people have
met their death in road accidents, and driving on the mountain roads in the south
of Greece you could expect to see 50 or 60 of these in a day, some being bright
and shiny and filled with fresh flowers etc, others being older and rusty, but
all mememtoes to someone's last moments of terror. These little houses were stark
reminders to us of the dangers, but judging by the number of new "houses",
the effect has worn off for the locals.
In the UK we go to great trouble
to disguise mobile phone masts as trees or within church steeples etc. In the
five countries visited by contrast, all of the mastes are painted bright red and
white. Who is right.
So far on this trip I have taken some 400 photos
and it has been frustrating not to be able to send some in to brighten up the
website. Providing I can get Jennifer to reduce the amount of clothes she brings,
I will definitely get a lap-top before our next trip so that I can send photos
and avoid the stress of learning a new computer keyboard every few days!
Reports
from Gordon Hesketh-Jones so far
V8
goes east 16
V8
goes east 15
V8
goes east 14
V8
goes east 13
V8
goes east 12
V8
goes East 11
V8
goes East 10
V8
goes East 9
V8 goes East 8
V8
goes East 7
V8 goes East 6
V8
goes East 5
V8 goes East 4
V8
goes East 3
Route card
Preparations
for the trip
Reports from Bob Owen on the MG Italia
Additional
photos from Bob Owen
Final report from Bob
Owen
Second report from Bob Owen
Report
from Bob Owen on the MG Italia |