THE ENGLISH CHANNEL AND THE HOME OF RUGBY

As we crossed the English channel, the sea was remarkably calm despite the storms we had driven through in northern France. The next afternoon we arrived at the home of rugby, Twickenham Stadium. It's a beautiful English summers day, rain and more rain, but who's complaining after the excessive heat of the last six weeks. This weekend sees the start of the English premiership football season and a nerve wracking wait for the results of Middlesbrough Football Club.

SAND & SEA

At midnight on the evening of the cancelled Valladolid concert the decision was made to send the trucks to El Ejido near Almeria southern Spain. After a 12 hour drive we arrived in el Ejido to remarkable cool weather for that part of Spain and found out the concert there was cancelled too. As the day wore on the wind started to blow and by evening it had turned into a stinging full blown sand storm. It was almost impossible to work outside in those conditions. The following morning I set of for Twickenham and England. A drive of 2555 kilometres awaited me! As I headed up through France the air conditioning in the truck was turned off and the hot weather we have had during the past six weeks faded into the distant past. Thunderstorms were now the order of the day as I approached Calais and the car ferry.

VALLADOLID Spain

Today's concert in Valladolid is cancelled and we are all waiting now for further instuctions as to where we are going next. I feel sorry for the people from Valladolid that were looking forward to The Rolling Stones coming to their city. Everything was ready this morning for the concert and a lot of hard work was put in by the crews to get it set up inside this stadium. The ramp to the stage, built by the steel crew was magnificent!

Estadio do Dragao, Porto

Here are a couple of pics of Gennyworld in place at the stadium which is home to Porto FC.

Nice and Porto

The cool weather in Nice lasted a couple of day’s which was good but that old thermometer is on the rise again. As I sit here in Porto Portugal its 36o and rising! The drive from Nice took a couple of days to get across Spain, then into the hilly terrain of Portugal. During my route between Palencia and Benavente I drove the national route N610 and came across some interesting roadworks where they stopped the oncoming traffic by placing a young lad in the middle of the road with a small stop sign, I hope he managed to get some life insurance! The roads in Portugal have some very steep hills to climb and descend and with 40 tons of Genny it’s no fun, thank god for the descent Volvo engine break! I must admit I do like Portugal (even if they beat us dubiously in the world cup) and Porto is an incredible old city.

The Swiss Arrows

Well, the “Open Air” concert at the Dubendorf Flugplatz certainly had it all; there was talk of up to 80000 people in attendance and a lot going on. The early morning rain held off and we were treated to an air display by the Swiss version of the Red Arrows just before The Stones took to the stage. One of the jet pilots put his jet through a complete Swiss roll, which was very tasty! I even witnessed a high ranking Swiss Government minister patting a dog belonging to a young security girl. She was impressed!
After the show with my Sunday driving permits in hand I headed through Switzerland to Geneva and the French border and beyond to Nice on the Cote D’azur and back to the heat! My route is via Grenoble, then the decision whether or not to keep to the autoroute or take the more scenic route through Provence and the Alps Cote D’azur. Given I had plenty of time the scenic route won! On arriving at the Nikaia Arena in Nice, I was amazed to find the weather very cool and an electric storm that had previously past through was now lighting up the skies in the nearby Alps Maritime.

THE GENNY HAS LANDED

Gennyworld has landed today at the Dubendorf Flugplatz located on the outskirts of Zurich in Switzerland. We all drove through the night from Stuttgart and crossed the border near Schaffhausen, it was an easy drive and the Swiss border guards were more than helpful with the necessary paperwork needed to enter Switzerland (it’s not part of the EC}. The airfield is ex-military and the stage actually looks a bit lost in this huge expanse of a field! I t makes for an easy load in and load out though.

STUTTGART

The Gottlieb Daimler Stadium is the home of VfB Stuttgart. If you stretch your imagination a bit, you could also say Stuttgart is Germany’s Motown, being the home of Mercedes and Porsche. The drive down from Amsterdam took me just under 15 hours which included a couple of stops for a nap. The lengthy roadwork’s on parts of the Autobahn created some huge jams but that’s all part of summer driving in Germany, sometimes it seems like the whole of Holland is heading for the sun through Germany on a caravanning holiday!

TWOLIPS IN AMSTERDAM

Well what can I say, that has not been said about Amsterdam,"coffee shops everywhere and not a decent cup of coffee in sight" maybe? Gennyworld rolled into The Amsterdam Arena and we parked in the usual place. On the morning of the concert next to Gennyworld the Ajax football team were training, crowds soon gathered to hunt down their heroes for autographs. After the show it was a return to the fatherland and yes! sausages for breakfast!