Homeward Bound

Happy

Hello friends.

I'm happy (and sad) to say that I'm writing this post from home.

I'm also happy because I survived the trip and the Vepsa made it.

and

SAD

because

 it's over.

Light Box
But I made it!
And the Vespa made it!
I left the hotel in Plymouth at 9am (Wow! I didn't realise quite how far Plymouth is until I looked at a map on the ferry)!
(And Wow! 08:00 in the morning. What a time to get up)!
The long lay down was getting shorter.
The day started off in traditional style with traditional english breakfast followed by traditional rainclouds-a-looming. It wasn't long after I'd set off that I started to loom along with the clouds and consequently got very wet indeed.
Oh! How I missed the english weather.
The sunny weather that is.
Right now it's raining and I don't miss it at all.

My Dirty Box
Going through Somerset I noticed a familiar place name and went in search of a company I have been dealing with last year. My search took a little longer than planned but the tea and company were worth the stop. Being able to dry my gloves out was also a who-uge bonus. Thanks guys and gals.
I set off again, this time from Martock, Somerset at 13:45. I thought I may have reached the M3 by this stage and it was getting late already. I needed to get a move on or I wouldn't be home until the next morning!
The sun made a special guest appearance and later came out for an encore so it wasn't all bad.

Dot com
Due to road blocks I had to take a long detour and one particular road looked vaguely familiar. I realised I was in Pilton, the home of the Glastonbury Festival.

Further on I passed Stonehenge. Well it wasn't moving anywhere and it wasn't going to pass me by so quickly, so I stopped briefly to take a quick picture of Japanese tourists taking Japanese photos of me and the Vespa.

We buy any car

The rain had stopped and the blue skies were trying their best to show themselves. Now that there were no head winds the throttle was once again able to be held wide open.
Road signs with more familar place names began to pass and I was approaching the M25.
But no, not again.
The Vespa started to spit and splutter. It sounded like the same problem I'd had the other day near Santander. I pulled off the motorway and decided that I was not going to ride like this for the 200km or so I had remaining. It would have felt like Norman Wisdom giving Norman Collier a piggy-back down a cobbled street, wearing stiletto shoes.

Norman and Norman yesterday

Dot com

This time I would quickly change the spark plug and set off again regardless. I took out the hot spark plug and noticed there was a small deposit of carbon? which was shorting out the sparkplug, so I simply removed this vagrant piece of ? and set off again, trouble free, all the way home.
The only problem I had was that my little piggys were getting cold. I was told once again that it was -2 degrees. That probably had something to do with it. Having wet gloves and wet socks didn't exactly help either but home was in sight.

From 50 quid to a 100 grand
I arrived back home, near Diss at 21:45, feeling rather cold but the warm welcome was enough to put the smile back on my face after the 7000km trip I had just finished.
I laid the Vespa to rest for the night, thanked it for the ride and had a nice cuppa tea.

Now, it's back to bed, back to reality.

Ciao

More photos and a summary will be added in the next few days.