I Promised

Ok, if I don't update for this long again, it means I'm dead. Or bored of blogging.

A lot has happened since my last entry, which was made as I scrabbled together my final pieces of work for University. You'll be happy to know that for that final piece of PHP programming I got a good seventy something percent. Since then, I moved out.

Moving out was without a doubt, one of the worst days of my life. We fought hard to get everything done, and I realised, at the pain of my flatmates, that I had a lot of stuff. It was cool that we rented a Ford Transit (which is fantastic, it's so nice to drive a machine that is pure utility, I want to buy one), and it was cool to see everything I had ever brought home, but it was horrible throwing so much stuff away (including my beautiful big blue chair which Kiana was so fond of).

It was stressful. Kiana had already moved out a week or so before, and Mizuki had just returned from Japan the day before, and we were scrubbing everything from behind the washing machine to the bathroom ceiling. But we cleaned the house out, and it was done. When the stress was over, and after I had showered, I dropped Emma off in London, or, at least, I tried. I didn't watch the temperature while I was stopped in traffic, and my car overheated. The £160 repair bill was only made worse by a subsequent (and as of this afternoon still unfinished) repair job to the head gasket that will cost in the £600 range. I haven't driven my BMW in over a month, and it pains me.

But we have lots of cars, and I have been borrowing my parents' cars. Why, just last week my father and I took my mother's car (the MG) all the way from London to Fonchanina, Northern Spain. We found a twisty road on Google Maps, and decided we would make it there, tackling the winding and snaking roads of the Pyrenees, with a trip through Andorra. While I love to blog while travelling, I didn't have a computer there, nor the energy to type out my doings on a mobile phone. So I will write what I remember now.

With myself on the insurance for another week, we woke early Wednesday morning (3AM, August 1st) and drove to Dover. I was destroyed by the fact that I couldn't sleep due to my unfortunate waking hours, and the whole day that we were driving through France, I kept napping. In an open car, that's quite hard, when your father is pushing motorway speeds. But I managed, and we arrived in (near) Pui that evening, to a nice hotel with a tasty dinner. My French had entirely disappeared, and I kept speaking Japanese. Perhaps I only have room for one foreign language at a time. I confused plenty of French proprietors with 'arigatou'.

The next day we finally hit some proper roads. We only managed a couple of hundred miles, but that was because we were going on twisty roads. And roads with hairpins and chicanes are fun. It didn't take long adjusting to driving on the right, but most of the roads were empty, so it didn't matter where you were. That little car has wide tyres, and it's light. Combined with the mid-mounted engine, the turning response is immediate, and you have to be going quite fast and quite tightly just to get some understeer, and even then that disappears when you take the power off. I also drove over the Millau bridge, which was epic. The Top Gear presenters made a trip to the South of France just for that bridge, and I don't blame them. It's huge, and you feel incredible driving over it. We found a nice little hotel in Thuir, just a little north of the France/Spain border, and a wonderful buffet meal followed by a steak made the evening very comfortable. A lack of air-conditioning made it less so, but it wasn't too bad. I almost lost my wallet, but it was in the car the whole time. Lucky me.

The next day was amazing. We woke up in France, drove to Spain, then to France, then to Andorra, then to Spain again, ending in Sort with a modern and very cool hotel, overlooking a river full of canoes. The roads that day were very good fun. My father's driving scared me and my driving scared him, but it didn't matter, because the large amount of grip made it very hard to slide that car. We managed it a few times though. I even got some oversteer, which was great. However, the sun hit me quite badly that day, and my ear is still peeling a little.

Leaving Sort we drove along a variety of tiny Spanish roads, eventually locating Fonchanina, which was the closest town to our twisty road goal. The road was actually dirt, and far too rough for anything but a tractor, but we'd made it there, and could start heading back. The next hotel we found was only one star, but was reasonably comfortable. We baked that night though, and with no drinking water, it wasn't pleasant. One the plus side, a dubbed Spanish version of Independence Day was on during breakfast the next day.

We crossed back into France the next day, and with the most scenic pass over the mountain and one final twisty road, we drove all the way to Perignon, and stopped in a very swish and very expensive hotel, which made us comfortable for our last night on holiday. We drove solidly and quickly the next day, stopping only for one quick lap around Le Mans, and a visit to the Le Mans museum, which showed the history of the race, and some beautiful old cars. Mostly French. But the Mazda 787b was there, which is the ultimate race car for me right now. Then we drove all the way back to the ferry.

That makes it sound like all we did was get in the car and drive to the next hotel, and that's pretty much what it was. It was a driving holiday, seeking out the best mountain roads for pushing the car to its handling limits. And that's what we did, and we loved every second of it.

We got back in last night around 3:30AM, and now I have to go to bed because I have a job interview tomorrow at 9AM, and it's an hour's drive.

It's good to post again. I miss you people, I'll be back in a couple of days to fill you in on the rest of what I've been up to.