UK January 2016

Graptolite's Sailing Log
Martyn Pickup & Heike Richter
Sun 31 Jan 2016 00:00

Monday 11 January 2016 Berlin, Germany

Back to Prussia

Flight KL to Amsterdam then Amsterdam to Berlin. Picked up from Tegel Flughafen by Roland. Berlin was grey and cloudy with blobs of melting dirty snow. Willkommen in Schulzendorf.

 

Tuesday 12 January 2016 Berlin and Rostock, Germany

Last Train

No time to unpack properly. Up at 05:30 to go to office for H to give last franchise training session. Hurrah! Late evening drive to Rostock for more cruise ship training for H.

 

Wednesday 13 January 2016 Rostock, Germany

Back to Rostock

Melting snow and ice underfoot plus jetlag makes it a bit tricky to walk around. Drove H to Rostock office.

 

Thursday 14 January 2016 Hamburg, Germany

Back to Hamburg

A day of training for H in Rostock then a drive to Hamburg.

 

Friday 15 January 2016 Schulzendorf, Germany

Reeperbahn

More induction training for H near to the fleshpots of the Reeperbahn in St Pauli and collecting new uniform from the tailors. Drive back to Schulzendorf and arrived late.

 

Saturday 16 January 2016 Schulzendorf, Germany

Packing

Pack for trip to UK for me and to Vietnam for H

 

Sunday 17 January 2016 Hamburg, Germany

Back to Hamburg

Drive to 25hours Hotel, Hafencity. An über cool hotel which uses shipping containers and other industrial/nautical stuff as décor. A bit expensive for us but as somebody else is paying hey ho! Had Lobscouse in the restaurant for dinner. This was not far from our earlier hotel in the warehouse district of Speicherstadt.

 

Monday 18 January 2016 Hamburg, Germany

Chip Butties in the Room

H goes to some more training stuff in an office in Hafencity. I run a few shopping errands. As it is so perishing cold we have dinner in the room. An excellent idea they have which is self-service-room-service. You can have whatever you want as long as you collect it yourself. We both had a very excellent fish and chips wrapped in fake newspaper. I think I may have invented the ultimate “chip buttie” along the way which was their really good bread spread with whipped butter and hot roasted garlic and, naturally, a few chips.

 

The view from the room window was up to the memsahib’s high standards and was looking across much of the docks at ships going up and down the Elbe river. The navigation lights for a dredger puzzled us for a while as it closely resembled a Christmas tree. After a huge self-service-room-service breakfast we stayed in bed until check-out time making up for lost time that we will have over the next few months.

 

Tuesday 19 January 2016 Hamburg, Germany

The Memsahib Sets Off

Then a change of hotel for me to stay near the airport to see the memsahib off on her adventures in the South China Sea. Tears at the departure gate.

 

Wednesday 20 January 2016 onboard P&O ferry from Rotterdam to  Hull

Ship to Blighty

Totally unused to waking myself up, I missed breakfast and then drove to Rotterdam across an endless snowy and forested wasteland that is north Germany and the Netherlands. It took forever and was very boring. Except on the ring road around Utrecht where every car in the Netherlands was driving.

 

Lots of text messages from the memsahib describing the perils of entering Vietnam to work without the right paperwork. Drove onto the ferry straightaway. I wasn’t late but everyone else seemed to have got there early. Watched “In the Heart of the Sea” in the cinema. Clearly the rules that stops airlines showing some disaster movies doesn’t apply to ferries. Maybe they reason that it is more likely there will be snakes on a plane that a sperm whale will sink the boat. Drank some Newcastle Brown Ale for old time’s sake and retired to my cabin. Although fairly experienced already I’m going to have to get very used to living in ship’s cabins in the future.

 

Thursday 21 January 2016, Blackburn, UK

Over the Pennines

Off the ferry in Hull and drove over the snowy Pennines to see Mom and Pop.

 

Friday 22 January 2016, Blackburn, UK

Attic Clearance

Dragged a lot of boxes of old university notes and text books out of the attic. Fixed up a few things around the house for mum and dad.

 

Saturday 23 January 2016, Blackburn, UK

University Books Finally Gone

Loaded up the car and took a lot of stuff to a charity shop at Brownhill.

 

Sunday 24 January 2016, Blackburn, UK

In Blackburn

More jobs around the house

 

Monday 25 January 2016, Rotterdam, Netherlands

Back to Sea

Went to see Johnny and Alison and then drove to Hull for an overnight ferry to Rotterdam.

 

Tuesday 26 January 2016, Schulzendorf, Germany

Back to Schulzendorf

Arrived in Rotterdam and drove 800km to Berlin. Didn’t stop much. I thought about checking out the 1944 battlefield site at Arnhem but I thought it was perhaps a bridge too far. A little joke there.

 

Wednesday 27 January 2016, Schulzendorf, Germany

Sorting Out

Paperwork

 

Thursday 28 January 2016, Schulzendorf, Germany

Ziggy Played Guitar

A day for some medical checkups at in Berlin. Stopped by Hauptstrasse 155, Schöneberg, Berlin. This is where David Bowie and Iggy Pop shared a flat in the 70’s. It wasn’t a pilgrimage as my doctor is just up the street. OK maybe it was a pilgrimage. Formative years and all that. The pavement was covered in flowers and candles.