Day 1 - Fri 2nd Sept

My intention was to travel light which, without camping gear, it should have been easy. I packed and unpacked and repacked several times. Should I pack for cold and wet or hot and sunny? 2 yrs ago, also in Sept, I had taken a tour of Austria and spent most of the time riding in waterproofs wearing almost all my clothes.

Eventually, a waterproof holdall contained clothes, toiletries and spare shoes. A top box held electronic gadgets and leads, a few bike things, waterproofs and hi viz vest, first aid kit and a map of europe. Lastly, the tank bag, held immediate essentials - money; passport; gps; phone; glasses and spare contacts; sunglasses and spare gloves.
I set off from the house with plenty of time to spare and took a casual A road route to Hull.

Boarding the ferry was relatively easy, although I dislike the steep and narrow ramp that P&O like to direct bikes onto. These days, they don't help to tie the bikes down either, so I grabbled a couple of ropes and made a vague attempt to secure it to the ground.

I had booked a shared female room & was lucky to find no one in the cabin so took a bottom bunk. But in fact, no one at all joined me which made it very pleasant.
Later, in the bar, I didn't recognise any bikers from the ferry queue so perched on a stool to read my book of Slovenia. A Belgian truck driver began to chat and I then spent a nice couple of hours discussing politics, travel and the hidden gems of Belgium. I declined the offer of a 2nd beer as I didn't want to give him any ideas of anything more than a friendly chat.