The trip started off quite well with a nice little ride on the deck of the St Cecilia, courtesy of Wight Link Ferries. However all was not well soon after when I inexplicably managed to forget my pin number while trying to get some cash out of the machine for some well earned dinner. After some frantic calls to the bank to get it reactivated it still wouldn’t work even though I remembered the number; finally they told me it takes two hours to come back on… Oh dear, looks like no dinner after all.

Card still works in shops though so it’s ok, Hurrah! Get to hotel, to find another horror story, yuk, not hurrah after all and I want to go home.

The next day was sunny and that made me feel better, along with the good fortune to find Mr T’s burger and kebab shop on the way back to the hotel. I had a monster 12 ounce vampire (garlic mayo) burger which was great and could have helped to scare some of the bugs away in the hotel room. To top it all off the football (England v Croatia) was on the tv, so a few beers and a glorious victory on the path to South Africa made it better still.

Against all odds I was smiling on the ferry home the next day with the job done. I will henceforth be the first to extol the virtues of football, monster burgers and beer in the face of adversity at every opportunity…but then I always did

Simon