Vacation 1999!
14/06/99: Departure from Västerås at approx. 7.45am. At about 2.15pm we arrived in Trelleborg where we took the ferry to Travemünde in Germany.
15/06/99: Arriving in Travemünde at approx. 12.30am. We took aim at Saarbrücken and headed straight for it. When we came to Saarbrücken we had to stop for refueling but afterwards we headed straight for Calais and the Eurotunnel which would take us under the English channel. At 11.30am GMT we finally arrived in Great Britain, what a relief the road-signs are understandeable ;-). We gambled a little and went to the Beachcroft Hotel where we had reservations for later this week, just to check if they were able to accomodate us Tuesday and Wednesday as well, and they were. After some 38 hours in the car a shower was certainly welcome. This is it for today Markus signing off.
16/06/99: Another beautiful day in the south of Great Britain! We went to portsmouth this morning and took a guided tour of the harbour, after that we went to London to meet Karl-Erik. After a successful gathering in the southwest corner of Hyde Park we took a trip to Karl-Erik's Hotel, an italian dinner in Bayswater and we had an icecream in Leicester Square after which we went back to the Beachcroft Hotel.
17/06/99: We Picked up Karl-Erik in London todayafter which we took a little trip to Stonehenge. In Southampton we decided that we were hungry so we went hunting for a restaurant to eat in but the only place we fancied was a pizza place which turned out nicely. After dinner our excursion in the south of England continued to Portsmouth where ofcourse Svante and i had already been but Karl-Erik wanted to see it so we took the scenic route through Portsmouth.
18/06/99: The first day at Goodwood, glorious weather and nice cars made for a perfect day, we caght some sounds and a few picures today and will be trying to record more tomorrow. Todays dinner we had at Lanna Thai in Bognor Regis, the best meal I've had so far in England.
19/06/99: Another perfect day at Goodwood, the recording went fine today except for one thing someone had come up with the great idea to play the sounds of the cars starting in the speakersystem which ruined a couple of our recordings but you can't win them all... We couldn't decide what to eat today so we went to McDonald's for a 'quality' meal.
20/06/99: The day began raining but the skies cleared and we had another beautiful day at Goodwood. The films seemed to flow thorough mine and Svante's cameras like a small stream, I think I did away with 10 films today! Todays dinner was pizza in a little restaurant in Bognor Regis and it was great!
21/06/99: We dropped Karl-Erik off at Heathrow today and Svante and I headed north for Duxford and the Imperial War Museum, after that we went to Cambridge to get something to eat, we decided it was time for some italian again and after walking around the center of Cambridge for some time we finally found a restaurant and lucky us it was an italian restaurant! The dinner we had wasn't cheap but definately the best one so far and I don't know how we're going to top this one. The name of the restaurant is: Don Pasquale Restaurant. Tonight we are staying at the Travel Inn in Newark.
22/06/99: This morning we left Newark for Nottingham, our schedule for the day was completely destroyed by the Nottingham Castle where we spent some 4 hours taking a lot of pictures. The Sherwood forest was next on the agenda but we passed through it rather quickly to make up some time we had lost in Nottingham. We arrived in Dunbar tonight and we have found a little hotel here so that's it for today!
23/06/99: This morning we were heading for Edinburg to see the Fourth Bridge and the castle, the castle came first and as usual a lot of film went through our cameras. Svante and I went into a place called Camera Obscura to buy some more film as I was standing there a man came to me and asked if my camera was a digital one or not and I answered that it wasn't but it isn't an ordinary 35mm camera it is an APS SLR camera and we chatted for a some time before I asked him where he was from and was I surprised to find out that he was from Sweden as well as us. After watching Edinburg from the roof at Camera Obscura we decided it was time for a meal so we headed for a Bella Pasta restaurant we had seen when we drove up to the castle. Unfortunately it was now time to begin thinking of the journey home so we headed south and ended up in a hotel in Pontefract.
24/06/99: An uneventful day, we went to Dover to see if we could catch the hovercraft to Calais but they were all booked up so we took the Tunnel instead. The drive north through France, Belgium, The Netherlands and Germany was also rather uneventful.
25/06/99: We made a short visit in Wolfsburg this morning to take a look at the Volkswagen museum there after wich we left for Lübeck and Travemünde for the boat journey home to Sweden.
26/06/99: In Sweden at last!
16/07/99: Unigas is doing it again! Another vacation, this time to Norway and only for a few days. We left home at about 11.45am today and headed towards Arendal Norway where there will be a boatrace in Offshore 1 this weekend, due to some congestion on the Norwegian roads the runningtime to Arendal wasn't as short as we had hoped but at least we got here. Arendal is a lovely little picturesque town on the south coast of Norway, I'd have to recommend a visit any time during the summer but we are mostly here for the boats! What could possibly match the sound of some 6-7 boats each with twin Lamborghini V12 engines without any kind of noice suppression? Well that's at least what I think :-).
17/07/99: Today it was time for timetrials in Offshore 1 and they did it again! There is a new world speed record set in Arendal Norway and the speed is 259km/h! thatīs about 160mph! Pretty fast in a boat I'd say. Actually the record was broken twice first by Matt Alcone in US 1 who set the speed at 254km/h and later by Saed Al Tayer in Victory boat number 44.
18/07/99: Raceday! We went down to the harbour in Arendal this morning and managed to see a couple of the boats as they were putting them to sea, a few good pictures from that I hope. After walking around for a while we took a seat by the water to watch the action. Unfortunately boat number 4 got into a bit of trouble during the morning testing/warmup, they ran into a wave at the wrong angle and broke the hull and turned the boat over, this made for a delay in the race, the start was postponed for about an hour. However the race got started and Victory 44 took the lead from it's pole position and Spirit of Norway took the second place immediately after the start with Victory 7 in third place. This was to change however, Matt Alcone in US 1 was running at a furious pace and he was gaining time on the Victory 7 after overtaking Victory 7 he had his sights aimed for Björn Rune Gjelsten in Spirit of Norway who unfortunately broke something in the boat and had to retire from the race in doing so Matt Alcone was in second place and still gaining time hed set his aims for Saeed Al Tayer in Victory 44 which he overtook and so he was in first position after this Alcone just pulled away from the rest even if Jolly Motor with Leonardo Polli behind the steeringwheel made a strong finish in the race when he managed to get into second place with Vicory 7 in third and Jotun with Andreas Ove Ugland in fourth. The Sea was very rough on the outside of Tromoy which caused many retirements among the entrants. After the race we went to a chinese restaurant in Arendal to get a meal before getting into the car for the drive home. That's the end of this little trip to Arendal Norway. By the way Karl-Erik made a little trip of his own this weekend, he
was in Falkenberg Sweden to watch the Swedish TouringCar Championships there.
Here you can read Karl-Erik's notes about the Unigas Vacation -99
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