Road trip - Europe

[London Stone Paving]

I'm off to Gemany for the Grand Prix tomorrow. We were all set to fly from Heathrow tomorrow at midday but it turns out my brother has booked flights to the wrong city !

The grand prix is in Nuerburg and we are flying to Numberg. Its going to work out quicker to drive there now, so thats what we are doing. Hate flying anyway, so bring on the road trip

[Pablo]

Bring on the Autobahns more like. I'll send that order tommorrow I promise.

[jonnyboyentire]

Enjoy Steve, road trip to Italy next week for us.

[henpecked]

Ha ha!
Reminds me of the time I was going to my brothers in Torremolinos, I was just going to book it,my dad called me insisting he had found a flight a tenner cheaper, so for a bit of peace I said book it, didn't look at the ticket till the week before and found the twonk had booked Alacante ,not Malaga!
Luckily enough the 400 mile journey was only £30 return so it wasnt too bad, just 8 odd hours on a coach with a few slightly ripe Moroccans lol

[GB_Groundworks]

I lived in Munich for 2 years autobahs are fun but they assume a higher level of driving ability/ awareness, ie someone will be on your arse in the middle lane at 100mph while the outside is doing 130 mph etc and then a truck will pull out and concertina braking across those two lanes.

Also there are very few unrestricted sections, only straight bits and away from towns are unrestricted everything else is 120kph. Some cool laws though like trucks on Sunday's and bank holiday etc reduce traffic. Most autobahns near towns reduce to 100kph after 6pm for noise as well.

I did 202mph as a passenger in an American colleagues gt3 scary I bottled it at 175mph.

[local patios and driveway]

yep those germans wont except middle lane morons over there, they will sit right close behind you until you pull in. we should do that more over here, can stand people who dont know to keep left on motorways

[henpecked]

yep those germans wont except middle lane morons over there, they will sit right close behind you until you pull in. we should do that more over here, can stand people who dont know to keep left on motorways

I think its great, as your in rush hour traffic. the middle lane fills up toe to tail, then the inside lane (which BTW is going exactly the same speed as the middle and outside lane) is almost empty, so if theres a huge pile up. I have usually ,between 4 and 8 miles to stop

:laugh: :laugh: :laugh:

[rab1]

I could be wrong but if your caught speeding on an autobahn the fines are in the hundreds of euros.

[London Stone Paving]

Was very impressed with Germany. Nice people, clean place and as you would expect everything is super efficient. Got to the hotel and this was the view from the room.

Thought the site could have been a bit more tidy. Those skips and the crates in the far corner were definately not parallel to eachother



There is a big old Cathedral that was being renovated. They were building some scaffolding which was suspened and evened out in weight by another scaffold hanging over the other side of the tower



I was looking for some nice examples of natural stone but the majority of what i saw was concrete. Thought I better get that one in, this is a paving forum after all.



Onto the serious stuff. The nurberg ring was very well set out. We went for qualifying and watched Webber just nick pole from Hamilton towards the end of qualifying. We were positioned in a wind swept stand which was about a 10 minute walk from the main exhibiton area.

Saw this parked up on the way down. What a motor!





Got up to the main exhibition area and there is even a helipad for the big cheeses to land their choppers



Not to mention the roller coaster





The porshes were getting a bit of attention

[London Stone Paving]

the Race itself was brilliant to watch. Loads of incidents and over taking. Hamilton was on fire. Alonso also had a brilliant race. You cant see much but the next shot was Hamilton on his victory lap.

[rab1]

you should have brought the misaligned materials in the site compound to the agents attention, he would have most likely sacked those responsible.

That audi is the mutts, not a fan of porsch.

[lutonlagerlout]

just came back from portugal
obviously pished day and night
had a couple of 3 course lunches followed by 3 course dinners (oh dear said the scales)
anyway one roaster of a morning i thought "sod it" i went down the beach at 7.30 am before the outlaws awoke for another round of arguing and drinking
sure as eggs are eggs there were only 20 people on the 4km of sand that is meia praia
all german(perhaps danish and austrian= all the same really,moustaches and speedos) and all doing exercises
I know the Germans can have a drink ,but is it any wonder they are the richest country in europe?
as i walked back from the beach i spotted groups of british /irish/and australian lads huddled over full English breakfasts,shirts off to reveal scarlet coloured, poorly tattooed skin,bottles of warm sagres nestled beside their packets of fags

it makes you proud to be british eh?
LLL :;):

[London Stone Paving]

They've just always had a reputation for being ultra effficient and productive. We source stone from Germany and its a completely different experience to working with the Indians or the Turks for example. emails are replied to within 10 minutes, stone is always dispatched on time, quality is good, and the whole thing is transparent and open. If on the very rare occasion they make a mistake they always put it right (unlike Indian and turkish suppliers)

TBH I cant believe they lost the war

At the grand prix we were seated in a stand away from the main area. We had no Euros on us for food and beer so we thought we would have to trek up to the main area and get some from the cash machine. Turned out that the stalls did not accept cash any way, they accepted a members card which you charged up from your debit card. The guy who charged the card was sat next to all the food selllers, so it was really easy. Also they gave you a 1 euro reund on your card if you took your empty cup back to the shop. The result was the floor was not littered with empty cups and glasses

[lutonlagerlout]

exactly my thoughts steve
i think it was when Hitler started on 2 superpowers his luck ran out,and no bad thing too
imagine all that exercise and money :;):
LLL

[Pablo]

Hitler lost the war because he placed to much faith in tank superiority and didn't invest in artillery. If he'd given his generals the guns they were asking for they'd have torn the Russians and Allies to bits. They may not have totally stopped the advances but they would've been held up and weakened long enough for his jet program to kick in which he was literally weeks away from mass production. Then we'd have been proper f#cked and this continent would look very different. Sorry to jump the thread.