We Are Sailing, We are Sailing….

across the sea

It’s the 8^th of April and evening time the sun has gone and dusk is settling. The police man is reassuring us with his words and approach. “Nothing to be worried about, just don’t want you to get turned back at the other end”. The other end being Santander, as we’re currently sat in a row of vehicles awaiting embarkation onto The Galicia, a brand spanking new Brittany Ferries boat that’s going to deposit us on the Northern shores of Spain.

We have completed checkpoint one, we have checked into Portsmouth Harbour. We have for the first time, utilised ‘The Folder’. The folder is a purple see through document holder donated by my father and it’s full, substantially full, fuller than it should be but not so full that it fails at its job.

The final documents went in today after slowly filling up over the last 2 weeks, we have copies of tickets, passports and all the usual stuff. In addition to this we also have the unusual stuff, we have multiple registration documents for the countries we are aiming to enter. They are basically passenger locator forms for each country and also one for each transport provider. It means that the relevant authorities have a way of tracing you should they need to! These come in different forms, both analogue (paper!) and digital (does what it says on the tin!). We have opted to carry an analogue form of everything we have so far been asked to complete, just to ere on the side of caution. We have our negative Covid19 test results, completed at Heathrow Terminal 5 that morning. We have proof of onward travel, a letter from our previous letting agent proving we have given up our tenancy, and our Declaration To Travel document from the UK government, as at this moment in time it is illegal to travel without a reasonable excuse! That’s the UK Governments wording not mine and I get annoyed every time I look at it. “Excuse makes it sound like you forgot your PE kit or homework! The word used on a document of this importance should be reason! ‘what reason do you have to travel?’ What’s wrong with these people? They really do like talking down to people!” Later on in the year it will become apparent that these people liked having parties when others were forbidden from engaging with society, family or friends!

At the time if you had shown up at any International UK port, airport or railway station without a Declaration To Travel you would’ve earnt yourself a criminal record and a large fine.

 Covid19 isn’t the only thing we have had to deal with for this trip, no we also have another thing that requires attention. It’s a thing many have attempted to grapple with for many a year and it’s a phenomenon that is still relatively unknown, in spite of the massive amount of time, money and energy put into understanding it! Its origins can be traced but its concept is still somewhat obscure as are its consequences. Because of this obscurity I will refer to it as The Unknown Dimension, you may call it Brexit. The continuing political socio-drama had been unfolding at great speed since the transition period ended at the beginning of the year. It had become hard to keep up with the daily changes, confiscated ham sandwiches amongst them. I had made a mental note not to take any ham sandwiches, although I had the thought that if they had Spanish or Italian ham in the sandwiches then maybe they’d be legal and you could just ask customs official to try one to confirm. This seemed like quite a long shot and covid19 has put paid to the sharing of any food with customs guys/gals, so we settled for crisps and popcorn…..

Back to the problem in hand, we had travelled across Europe before, this was not our first rodeo, but Europe is different now! The UK isn’t apart of it any longer and thus can’t partake of its member benefits, like driving through customs with a wave and a smile and possibly a bunch of daffodils and a ham sandwich. This time the van is full and our life is in it and its not going to be fun to unpack it to show someone that we’re not wily international drug smugglers travelling undercover of Covid19.

Over the last month my mind had become rather over worked whilst looking at possible scenarios in this unknown dimension, so much so that it was sending ridiculous projections back at me. Add to this , the mess of media and tabloid reportage that was gushing from most media outlets regarding the Dimension and its implications, it surprises me that we made it out without too much mental scarring at all. I sensibly opted for not printing out the plethora of box and article pictures I had taken whilst loading the van. The original idea being to print them out and do a proper inventory. Something that others who had done a trip similar to this recently had said was obligatory and that they had done, but ultimately hadn’t needed. It was the word obligatory that annoyed me (not as much as excuse annoyed me earlier on I may add) I knew that if I was asked why I didn’t have an inventory I would struggle to argue my case answer, but luckily fatigue kicked in and I thought “sod it I can’t be arsed!”

Tiredness in many cases can lead to people making some truly bad decisions; but I don’t think enough is said in favour of great decisions made whilst being utterly destroyed by mental fatigue and physical tiredness! The purple folder and I both rejoiced and the photos stayed on my phone and I’m glad they did.

“Just checking on your reason for travelling today sir?

We had been building up to this for a few months, we had checked, double checked, thrice checked the regulations, the reasons and the excuses. We can travel we are allowed; we are moving! Will they accept this excuse? Will they see that it’s an elaborate ploy to fill the van full of household furniture and possessions just to blag a holiday? Or a ham sandwich smuggling operation disguised as a rather stressed-out family?

He’s reassuring with his questioning and I watch as his colleague asks questions of some other vehicles. Not everyone is selected as not everyone looks like clandestine daffodil exporters, and this makes his opening gambit fall flat on its face, or does it? What if he’s just saying…..”you guys look like you’re going on holiday”

He’s pleasantly taken back if not some what befuddled by the answer.

“we’re moving house, relocating….”

“…..ah …….you’re moving to Spain?”

“no Italy”

At this point the conversation becomes a conversation, the questioning becomes intrigue, puzzled that some Italian traffic is coming by this route (a later blog). That we’re moving house at this particular moment in time. The man beneath the uniform is evident and I’m happy we are not picked out as illegal holiday makers. I still stay guarded, during the Covid Test this morning they had got me in a slightly paranoid mood when asking the question “off for some winter sun?”.

“They know holidays are illegal! They’re trying to trick you into a confession. Say yes to this and 4 border force officers are coming through that door!” my mind screams

“Well best of luck for the future” wishes my new friend in the Portsmouth Police Force.

The ramp is down, the engines start and the vehicles rumble onto the ferry.

WE ARE ON!