By Tuesday evening 18th August everything on the list is in the van with the bike, plus anything I can think of that might be useful whilst there is bunged in as well. My pit crews camping equipment plus my other daughters family camping equipment is also in the van. The caravan is sorted so we are just about ready to set of on the adventure which is the Manx Grand Prix. My daughters and other family members are flying in later hence we are taking everything in the van. Even though our ferry is not till 2.00pm Thursday we decide if we are ready to get on the road Wednesday and stop overnight closer to Heysham our sailing port.
This on reflection was a good decision as it took any pressure of getting to Heysham from Essex on Thursday morning, we found somewhere only about forty miles from the port that was perfect for the stop over , did not even unhitch the caravan just wound the feet down for stability, job done !
Next morning was a nice easy drive to the port to join my fellow racers and spectators on the sailing across to the island. Already you can feel that buzz in the air that goes with any visit to a special occasion like this. We had a good crossing and landed after 6.00 pm in the evening. Now comes a bit of a test can the van pull all that weight up those hills to Nobles Park the paddock which would be our home for the next two weeks. Well it got up there just, the traffic light hill starts were pushing my old van to the limit ! Once up at the paddock we joined a very long queue to get into the paddock while our paddock space was allocated.We ended up in the lower part of paddock C on what I assume is a gravel car park work area. A bit of mucking about and we set our camp up. The weather was closing in and it was getting dark so the nitty gritty part of camp would be left till the morning. More by chance we got the caravan positioned along the fence which gave us an unobstructed view across the harbour and sea which was nice.
Friday morning the weather was not great and discover the water table rises around our area even if under cover , we managed to get an extra piece of wood to use as flooring so we could get in and out of the caravan without dragging lots of muck in. Along with an extra door mat this seems to work. but this area seems better that some of the wet grass areas further up the paddock. You can tell those teams that have been before they bring various forms of flooring to keep the weather conditions out !
Friday is the first time we can actually sign on and get our race clobber and out pit suits checked over. This all goes very well it just involved a lot of queuing which was something I would do quite a lot of while here. No dramas with anything and everything was approved to use and I got signed on and received my race folder. I missed the first newcomers briefing while queuing to sign on but this was not an issue as there was another tomorrow.
During the day I had a chance to catch up with friends old and new and check in with a lot of the other riders I had meet on the Newcomers introductory weekend in February . The tension builds we that's all the newcomers are only 24 hours away from out first ride down Bray Hill .