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You guys seem like the sort who would prick up your ears at the words, "Free holiday". Well, who wouldn't. It's not exactly free, but near enough. Last Christmas/New Year me and the memsahib had a three week cruise around the Caribbean aboard P&O's Aurora. For free. I was there as the Port Lecturer and the memsahib was there was my assistant. My job was to give a 45 minute lecture on each of the places we visited and the memsahib's job was to carry my bags! We had a cabin in the ship's officer's quarters and dined in the officer's mess. We also did the shore trips as P&O escorts. It was a great cruise. Unfortunately, I've developed a Bell's Palsy and I can no longer talk for 45 mins without lisping. Don't look too pretty these days either, which could frighten the passengers. The medics say it's not going to get any better so I won't be doing any more free trips. But if any of you feel like giving it at try, send me your email address and I'll mail you the agency details. There are no qualifications. If you can stand up on your hind legs and talk, you can do it. I had to do a three day course at the agency's offices in Lewes which cost me £60. Once I was signed onto their books I only had to do one cruise to be in pocket. Worth thinking about?

David

Sounds great David, but we are motorhomers and love nothing more than getting over to mainland Europe and just heading South, France ,Spain ,Portugal as long as the sun is shining, the food, wine and diesel are cheap we keep going, problem is getting the time to be away from home and the kids for a couple of months at a time, even though I have retired there is always somebody wanting something done by the wife or myself, never enough days in the week,

Hello David,

Sounds too adventurous for me and my long suffering wife .. boats & water are alien territory for me ever since I nearly drowned as a young child. I have done (relatively) deep sea fishing though in the 60`s and early 70`s. Quells are wonderful pills.

But, there`s good news, and some bad news .. one of my friends ( Dave) has suffered with "Bells" ... not the Scotch the other sort "Palsy". He sufeered it about 4 years ago when he was 55 (ish). One side of his face dropped, smiling was out of the question .. in fact he looked peerfectly normal then .. no, joking aside .. he has now recovered fully from it, it took about a year for speech and facial muscles to return to normal. The bad news:- Dave does have trouble with his lips occasionallly, but he licks up what he spills .. so all is not lost. 

 

All I`m saying is, don`t give up hope just because of age  .. there is plenty of quality life in the old dog yet, shame about losing out on the free holidays though.. Regards.  

Hi David.

I can only echo Bill William's sentiments whole heartedly. You have to hang on in and teach these youngsters a thing or two 'cos there's no one else left to do it except us old 'uns and we need all the help we can get!

Regarding the free holidays, I think that's out of the question really for several reasons. One of which being that I have always been afflicted with a west country accent, born in Dorset, school at Bath and lived most of my formative years in Wiltshire, hardly surprising is it? The result of this is that I find it difficult to convince people that I know anything about anything except muck spreading, combining or drinking cider, so not the man for the job really. Mind you if you want a guide for a farm park, now I'm your man! Sound the part even if I know nothing about that either.

There's a little storey here. Our family originated around the Sherborne area, and I still have relatives there. This happened back in the late 50s possibly early sixties. My Aunt and Uncle were ordinary working class people, he was a plumber and she worked part time cleaning at Sherborne Castle. They had several kids, one of which was about seven or eight years old at the time and during the summer holidays he used to sometimes go with his mother to the Castle. The kid was very interested in history and being as the building was open to the public on certain days, when the opportunity arose he used to go around with the tour guide absorbing all the facts.

Occasionally just as the mood took her, I presume, the tour would be conducted by the dowager Lady Wingfield Digby. On one such occasion the lad joined the group, of course not knowing who the new guide was, so, on the way around whenever she made some minor error he would correct her, thinking to be helpful.

Full marks to her Ladyship, after the tour she asked him who he was and invited him to tea in the sitting room, they talked history for some considerable time. Apparently she loved him to bits, and if ever she was aware that he was at the castle thereafter she would always invite him to some treat or another. I imagine this probably continued until he grew up and became interested in other things, as we all did.

Best Regards.

Sticky.

I know all about the mouth trouble, Francis. I now have to drink my tea through a straw and catch the dribbles when I eat. But, what the hell, it's not life threatening. Sometimes people look at me as if I'm daft in the head, but I've learned to live with that. Sometimes I think they might even be right but that's an age thing.

 

Don't get the wrong idea about the free holiday, guys, I'm not pushing it, just telling you what's out there if you want it. I know people who hate boats as much as they hate aeroplanes. Enjoy the motorhoming or land-trekking as long as you can. Loved those pictures you posted of the Yangtze River, by the way, as it reminded me of a holiday in which I lost a stone in weight because of the (real) Chinese food. On the P&O cruise I gained a stone so I suppose they cancelled each other out. And I came to the conclusion no one could drown in that river - the pollution would kill them long before they drowned.

 

And don't put down that Somerset accent, it's what I grew up with. We all did at Bath Tech, didn't we? When my father was posted to Rosyth Dockyard in 1961 I had to transfer to Dunfermline High School and there was a two-way language problem - theirs and mine! They spoke Robbie Burns and I spoke Adge Cutler. The (Scottish) English teacher actually barred me from the English classes where they were taught Burns poetry! I did have to learn to slow down my speech when I started controlling aeroplanes but that's another story.

 

David

 

 

Mornin' David

 

Oi bin followin orl thys moi cocker, an oi agree wyth ee, Keep thee accent John an that, this doesn't av to pologise ner justifie.

 

Moi dad n mum both ad wonderful local Keynsham accents, wuudd a made Adge & Acker sound posh. Oi muss av once BUT thee dyd gett bullied att school fer too posh er too country less you wer gert bygg...thenn you cudd talk ollanyhow! Oi wer a squitty lyttle bugger with specs an cuddnt risk stikkin out.

 

On other matters....going posh now....I'm interested in the cruise thing or at least the chance to ponce about in front of an adoring audience. Otherwise the thought of going on a guided holiday would be my idea of hell. Like Tony we love our VW camper ( although I note his is "a motor Home"). But if I'm part of the entertainment could be a goer. Love showin' off! Twas me mother's influence....she were a leading light in Keynsham WI drama fer years...even tho she were 'shamed by her accent.

 

In my ex role as a defrocked doctor I wonder if the prospect of later corrective surgery has been discussed with you. There are a number if relatively simple procedures that can make a big diffence to appearance and function.

 

All the usual blessynnges rain upon you alle

Chris,

i do love this banter accompanied by an accent from the past .. you have indeed mastered it on paper to a "T".

 

As for surgery, I have thought of a "Lobotomy" on more than one occasion, but the other half has taken 40 years to get used to these version(s) of me .. and she says she`s not starting all over again !!! .. Not so much a case of "bipolar disorder" as "Buy Polo" fetish ..

 

We all have our baggage to carry to our final resting places, and free holidays .. I`m all in favour .. but for now I`m stuck with the "shed on wheels" - (Stu`s name) for the Sundance camper.

 

Chris, my son is into V.W.s` .. and have a look on my home page photos. Apart from a good shot of my sisters in laws` ass on the beach at "Wheal Kitty" in Cornwall, you`ll see my 1969 type 2 bay window perched on the cliff edge above .. (gave it to my son in 1998). oh, and  take a look at "Crustie" .. an imported  west coast usa restored "barn door splittie" c1966.

 

Well, now that`s off .. I`ll get back to work on the P.C.

 

(p.s. David, I`ll post a hilarious air traffic controller after dinner speech for your enjoyment into the "sound Files" folder on the Sky Drive ..MP3 format .. I`m sure you`ll relate to it.)

If you want tp see more about the free cruising lark, I've posted the agency brochure amongst my photographs. Three friends who discovered what I'd been doing went on the course last Feb and they are now really into cruising.

 

Yes, I've heard the ATC after dinner speech before. The real problem with it is that much of it is not only hilarious, it's true. The less the public know about what really went on in days of yore, the better. In the early 1970s I worked at Belfast Airport - the less said about that the better. Then I worked at an old wartime radar station in Northern Ireland, looking for aircraft coming off the Atlantic and feeding them into the UK airway system. We were based quite close to bandit country near the Mournes. If I was able to get my head down on a night shift I used to spread out my sleeping bag behind the boss's metal filing cabinets in case of an IRA shootout. I decided to ask for a move when bombs went off close to my house and I was warned my car was identical to the local IRA brigade leader's car. That was when I took a tour as an aerodrome manager in the Hebridean islands. It was bliss. One flight a day - how can you cause a collision when you have only one flight a day? Later, I worked at the Scottish Air Traffic Control centre which was one hell of an onerous job, controlling all the traffic flying through Scottish airspace. It was, in those days, housed in an old wartime building on the edge of Prestwick Airport. By then I was promoted to sector controller and I was duly issued with a red pen. That was the main tool of the job in those days - a red pen - along with strips of paper to record what was going on in the sky. There was an old wartime radar station up the road and the guys there did the best they could when the gear worked. Often it didn't and then it was all a matter of by guess and by God. When I think back to some of the things we did in order to shift the traffic I come over in a cold flush. Ah, happy days!!!

 

David

Damn shame the cruise thing came about 4 months too late for me David, having just started a new job, I was only there for 3 weeks before I went on a 3 week holiday, I don't thimk my boss would be over pleased if I cleared off to somewhere like the Caribbean this year especially if it was a freebie, never the less I will keep it in mind for future reference.

 

Thanks for comments about the Yangtse photos, to be honest I think it was the part of our trip last year we enjoyed the least, at least we never suffered from any unfortunate encounters with "real" chinese food, ate most of the time in small local restaurants, only dodgy food was in a hotel, mind you we did forego lunch on the Li River cruise, seeing the boat in front washing the crockery in the river was enough. Same thing this year only poor meal was in Western China, where we opted for a chinese meal rather than local Uigher food, even eating on the street in the night market the food was fabulous, even found a more than acceptable chinese red wine for about £2 a bottle, 1999 and as smooth as a baby's bottom, and the high octane Kyrgyz Vodka was up to standard as well, hangover only lasted a week, perhaps it was the altitude.

 

Stu 

 

Hi Guys.

Thanks for the reassurance about the accent. Glad I'm not the only one that sounded like Adge Cutler on speed.

Nice to hear aboiut the VW campers. Two of the blokes at work have cherished examples. One has just come out of the body shop after a complete bare metal to repaint job. I wind them up by telling them that they were NBG 50 years ago what makes them think that they are going to be any better now, 50 years down the line. Then they get all stroppy and start making rude comments about tractors. I can't understand it. Just an observation you undersand.

Chinese food I never had a problem with, mind you it was only ever consumed with alcahol or tea. In Taiwan I was friendly with a couple of Phillipeno guys and they told me which were the good street vendors, and all the restaurants seemed to be OK, so never had any trouble there either. Far worse I found was South America, even after taking all the normal precautions I still managed to go down with ameobic dysentry in Venesuela. I was glad to get back to Carracas and civilisation, such as it was. The only consolation being that the health service there is absolutely brilliant and free.

Have Fun.

Sticky

I'd already eaten the food on the Li River boat before I saw the "kitchen" facilities. Guess what happened in Guelin! The only good part of it was that I needed to lose weight.