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Reports

During my travels, I received free accommodation for a night in exchange for writing a daily travel diary. This diary documented how I reached my next destination, the hosts who welcomed me, the food I was offered, and other experiences along the way. Below, you will find the archives of these extensive reports. Please note that English is not my native language, and most entries were written quickly, often around midnight. Enjoy!
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Monday, 11 June 2001
Dartmouth --> Horrabridge (UK)

Today I met the Stewart Family in Horrabridge, a small village near the Dartmoor National Park in Devon County.

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Pictures will be published later, I first need to undelete them...
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After a half English breakfast at the Barrington House around 9 o'clock, I made some nice shots of this area. With the house built on a hill, the view is just marvellous!

Later Simon and Lizzie let me use the computer to write yesterdays' report, until I was finished.

Than I packed my bag, had a last look at my rooms' view and got my stuff loaded into Simons' car.

As The Gift from James and Pauline in Paignton I handed over a window flowerbox to Lizzie and Simon. As Lizzie loves to do things in the garden, she will definitely use it.

Simone came with the idea to drive me to the next village, Totnes, where it would be easier for me to hitch-hike to my next place in Horrabridge (Village Appraisal), via Plymouth.

Around 2pm I got a hitch from Michael (around 50yo) who was on his way to the Plymouth College.

He was about to graduate in Third World Development Management and Communication. From his youth until 1994 his boss wouldn't allow him to have extra time to study or even give him some financial help. When his job ended in 1994, because he got much too expensive than 18-year-olds, the could finally continue to study, because he had always liked that.

He doesn't really know what to do after his graduation, "probably I just keep on studying something else."

Michael dropped me off at the roundabout towards Plymouth, after telling me some great history about this city.

He said it was in the 10th/11th century that tin and silver was found in the Dartmoor area. It all got collected in big warehouses, right were the river Plymp starts from the sea. That were the first foundation for what became Plymouth.

In Plymouth I called my next hostess Tricia Stewart as she told me she worked in Plymouth and could arrange a pick-up for me. She told her husband Andy about me and within ten minutes I got into his car!

He was actually the one who had invited me over after he heard about my project on the Brittish national Radio 2!

The first things he wanted me to show me was a little bit of Plymouth itself, before we'd leave up to Horrabridge.

Plymouth had been heavily bombed by the Germans during the World War II, because Plymouth (still) is the port for the British Royal Navy. Only two blocks of Plymouth survived it and the rest of the city was completely rebuilt without any beauty in it.

We had a beer in an former Gin Brewery and Andy started to talk about his work at Customs and Exces (country bordercontrol), which resulted in some nice stories where John Grisham can write several books with!

Andy has always been the man on 'the Drugs' and that involved very big things in Europe.

He told me he had been after the Tamil Tigers (located in Sri Lanka) who fund themselves by smuggling heroine into Europe.

So he tells me about how Ireland failed to catch them, and how... oops, I am not allowed to publish the following information right here...

Afterwards Andy and I got into the car and drove to Horrabridge and on the road the surrounding nature was unbelievable beautiful.

I am used to a little city while everything around it is flat like the rest of the Netherlands, but those hills, the greens, make it all a bit special.

At home at around 5.30pm I met Tricia Stewart and the cute two children Emily (14) and Jamie (8), who really enjoyed meeting me.

Before dinner their idea was to go swimming at the local sporting centre and relax a little bit. For me there was no reason to say no, because I love swimming and I haven't done it for over two months yet.

Getting back home Tricia made dinner while I checked for my latest mails on the internet.

We all had dinner in the kitchen and it was chicken curry with very spicy chili. Of course I took to much and I had to compensate my HOT tongue by eating some bread too.

It was long after dinner while we were telling scary stories to eachother and talked about each others worst fears. I still can't tell my fear, I just don't know any... And then the most horrible stories came out...

And as Emily went to babysit for Jamie, Andy and Tricia took me up to their local pub, the Leaping Salmon (across the river where in October the salmon fish jump their way up to the starting point of the river), where we had a pint of beer.

In the pub Andy introduced me to some of their friends and got them very interested into my project and I had to show the logos on my jacket several time.

When we got back home again (British pubs close at 11pm), I got a short briefing about what is going to happen with me tomorrow (huh? just read tomorrows report to understand) and I placed myself behind their computer to update everything again.

And instead of uploading my pictures from my floppy disk, I promptly deleted them. Oops! Ramon you are a smartass!!! I am now just hoping on the recovery for later publications...

For tonight, goodnight Horrabridge!

Ramon.



The Map

Follow my tracks on Ludo's map of my travelling so far!
It's in Dutch, but you'll see a lot!

>> Click here <<

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