Mr. and Mrs. P Schultz Mrs. G Wrightson
11 Viking Av 186 London RD
Hillsborough Twickenham
Auckland NZ Middlesex UK
Dear Sandy and Pete
Had a dream about you last night.
Pete got on so well with the English and you two were a having a marvelous time here with us.
It was two days after I started this letter in which time, nothing terribly exciting has happened.
We have now only 5 weeks left in England and I must admit I am sad about it,
but we are looking forward to the continent.
We leave Dover for Ostend 18th August at 3.30am.
Our only definite places and time so far are, we must get to Munich by 21st August
where we are meeting lots of lovely people
There should be about 14 of us if all works out well, then we take our time and
go through to Austria and Switzerland, Italy Spain
(perhaps Morocco see how the time goes)
then up through France to Paris then back to England.
This is going to take about 2 months,
so now we have to buy all camping equipment
quite an expense... so fellas we are slowly starting to work our way home.
We intend to come back to England for a couple of weeks
then onto Jamaica for about 6 months
but this is not definite.
Lots of things to look forward to.
Our weather here is varying last week we had 91F this week 60F.
Some days are cold enough for light jumpers.
In fact on Wednesday there was torrential rain with a mighty thunderstorm
We were returning from the West End about 11 pm
when there was I’m sure, a cloud burst.
It was really terrifying. The motorway we were on had enormous puddles
in fact our car stopped luckily it got started again right away.
Minis are apparently bad for this.
We still haven’t been north of London yet so I can’t see me
seeing much more of England, though we must go to Wales.
Think we might go when we come back from Europe.
We did intend going to Leeds to see Dave Holey, but time is going so fast.
I’m afraid we are not typical tourists.
Well people how is the weather in Auckland
Oh did I tell you Mum thought your flat was lovely.
They were thrilled to go with you. Its now Sunday,
On Friday night
I was down at the Club and Dale and Gavin arrived,
we sat drinking quietly, ended up stoned out of minds
Marvelous ,I had 9 scotches on ice, on an empty stomach!
only we started at 7.30 and I was sober by midnight.
Boy what a horrible process,
I still go through this, other people always manage to go to
bed boozed…not me
I must sober up first. By midnight I was great,
I even drove my drunken husband home.
Well love, no more room.
Write soon and don’t forget we leave this address on 16.8.68
Lots of love Gillian and Dale
So we did leave on 18th August and drove to Dover to catch the ferry to Ostend
Our car was so heavily packed. We had removed the back seat and filled the gap with would you believe??? On advice of my British friends...Canned meats (They serve Horse in Europe don't you know!) Dozens of rolls of soft toilet paper, actually they did come in handy.
We couldn't afford sleeping bags, so we took sheets and blankets.
Lilos to sleep on.
A table and 2 little stools, Kerosine Lamps for night light.
2 camping gas burners.
Various plates and cutlery
Clothes of course, very grateful for the warm clothes. It can be colder in Europe in Summer than you would expect. Especially Northern Europe.
The car was so heavy, Dale nearly rolled it at the first roundabout leaving London.
That finally settled down and we had the best time of our lives
On arrival in Belgium we drove through to Brussels, stopping en route for Pommes Frites
Recommened by my English friends as being the best chipa you would ever eat.
They were right. First time we were given Mayo instead of Ketchup to dip them in.
Fabulous.
This is the only shot we have of Belgium, obviously we were intrigued with the Big Horn
I really thought we had a shot of the Mannequin Pise, can't find it though.
Straight through to Koblenz as mentioned in my previous post.
We were exhausted, We had driven from London to Dover, dozed on the ferry, driven through Belgium all the way to Germany, on the wrong side of the road
We found Camping Burg Lahneck, over looking the Rhine and close to the Koblenz Castle.
That was a plus but then we had to put the tent up. That was an exercise in itself. We did get it down to a fine art, by the end of our trip though.
It was cold, grey, miserable and all I wanted to do was go home to England.
But then a saviour appeared. In the camp site next to us was a German couple, who were in a camper van. They seemed old to us but I reckon they were only in their 40's
His name was Hymie.
He realized we were a bit stressed, so invited us over for a Schnapps and a sausage
My first Schnapps, I think we had 2, maybe 3. We couldn't speak German, their English was limited
In no time, we communicated with hand signals, and a few understood words.
Frau Hymie took herself off to bed and kept on calling out for her husband.
She obviously fancied a bit of the other
"Hymie, Hymie", in a whiny voice, sounded like Madelaine Cahn in a Mel Brooks movie...well, he ignored her, more excited spending time with his Kiwis. I think he would liked us to stay until midnight.
Eventually we fell into bed, slept like logs.
Woke up to a beautiful day and all was well with the world.
Auf Wiedersehen to the Hymies and off to Munich to meet up with our mates.
It was a day trip, just and hour or so to Heidelberg
What a picturesque town
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