Spa - Day 4 - Race Day

Today is Race day, so to avoid the queues we got up at the crack of dawn and got to the circuit at about 6:30. Unfortunately about 10,000 people had the same idea and the queue was mental. Luckily we'd massed the art of European queuing (pushing in) and slipped behind an ambulance that was going through the queue. That saved us about an hour so we only had to queue for about an hour in the end.

Once inside we rushed to our spot only ofind hater was already really busy. We befriended a group of 45 Dutch people and sat next to them pretty much where we were aiming for.

Time went pretty quickly watching all the support races but people were so desperate for something to do, every time a support car went past, everyone cheered and did a Mexican wave. That was until a truck full of rich people belonging to the paddock club went past, and everyone boo'd. People would do anything to pass the time, at one point our Dutch friends let off a nice orange flare.

Although we'd been in our seats since about 7am, and the place was full; dozens of people would try and push in front. This never worked, but still they tried. Right up until the race started , families would turn up looking for a spot for 5 people with chairs, bags, cool boxes and so on where really there wasn't room for an amputee midget.

The race was pretty good, if you missed it, Hamilton won, Max, the fan favourite blew up in front of us. The Italian guys next to us went off in a huff once they realised that Ferrari weren't going to win. Ha ha..

After the race we found a way on to the circuit and Tim let off a smoke bomb whilst blasting his air horn. He was the most popular person at the circuit as you can imagine. We walked around to the pits and saw a few famous people before heading back towards home.

Unfortunately, we opted to take a short cut by jumping over some fences and went through a forest. We got lost and ended up having to crawl under some fences and climb an anti-climb fence before we got back to civilisation. Tired and covered in mud we trudged back to the tent.

We sparked up the BBQ and promptly ate all of the remaining burgers, much to the frustration of the people around us. There's still europop playing on the site, but it's emptying fast, we opted to stay another night to avoid traffic.

The whole area is a strictly no fly zone for drones so we flew it around to wind up the Dutch who seemed to like it and any excuse for a party, right?

And that's it folks. In total we walked over 42km (that's about a marathon) and slept about 20 mins. I hope you've enjoyed our mini adventure. Next up, motor biking around Spain.

Spa - Day 3

Apologies for no pics yesterday, the Google blogger app screws up sometimes and we have limited internet access and battery. Currently sat in the car with the engine running to charge everything!

Somehow, despite the party music, fireworks and brass bands we managed some sleep. We did wake in the night for the worlds loudest rain and accompanying thunderstorm though.

At the crack of dawn we woke up and got the BBQ on. We cooked about 30 sausages because you know. We ate what we could and saved the rest for lunch, that's how many we cooked!

We packed our stuff and walked to the circuit, queued to get in and hunted for a spot. It was 9am and the place was already starting to fill up. We'd learned from yesterday and packed all of our rain gear only for it to be 24 degrees and no chance of rain. Probably should have checked the weather first. We found a good spot and realised we'd left our chairs at the car so Mark headed back while Tim kept the spot.

Mark was gone about 45 minutes and returned to find that Tim had defended the spot like a gladiator and is now probably on a watch list if he every goes to Holland.

We stayed in our spot for a few hours watching the support races and then qualifying. It was a good spot until we realised that the tallest man in the world was on front of us and he kept getting in the way. We weren't as bad as the two hobbits sat next to us though. They diligently sat in their chairs for 5 hours waiting for qually. Then when it started everyone stood up and they couldn't see a thing so kept saying that it wasn't fair and cried a lot. It was quite funny.

Just over from us we're a group of people who didn't watch any races and just got smashed on the grass and smoked as many cigarettes as humanly possible whilst getting sunburnt. Probably English.

After qually we walked around for a bit and tried some other spots to watch the race from tomorrow and took in some more of the support races.

After a while we walked back to the Fan zone and by chance bumped into Ross Brawn. Mark got him to sign his cap and Tim had a selfie with him. He was with Zack from McLaren and Pat Simmonds but we ignored them!

Tim then finally, after days of looking and price comparing, brought some merch. He went for a cap, and came back with 3 caps and a toy car.

We then walked to the first corner and blagged our way into one of the granstands to watch the Porsche racing which was pretty cool, and it gave a much needed rest from sitting on our fold up stools.

After the racing we faced a 3 mile march back to our campsite, aka party field. We cooked up some burgers and marshmallows while chatting to our Dutch neighbours. Obviously all around us were crazy party Dutch guys with playing The Proclaimers and letting off fireworks. In fact whilst typing this, one guy just ran up to us carrying an engine that he was revving, just to show us. No idea why. Best finish typing now, The Pet Shop boys has just come on, so I gave to go smash someone's speakers in.

Spa Day 2

Overnight, Tim and Mark had a snoring contest, and it's not clear who won.

Breakfast time and we got there just as it opened to maximise eating time. It was a pretty sweet breakfast, with extra bacon on everything.

We headed to the supermarket afterwards only for it not to open until about lunchtime. Stupid belgiums are too busy making chocolate.

We hit the road, a 3 hour drive to the campsite next to the circuit. The satnav screwed up though and we ended up doing twelve laps of a cloverleaf. Also, who has two towns with the same name, that can only make things go badly.

We eventually got to the site and was allocated our spot, barely big enough for our tent. We had Germans one side and Dutch the other, so we immediately made a land grab and extended our plot. The queen would be proud.

Others have these amazing tents and structures which put our little tent to shame but despite them having 1000w sound systems and lasers, none of them thought to bring a pump to blow up their beds so everyone borrowed ours.

We headed to the circuit and bathed in the warm sun, watching the free practice session. With about 20 mins to go the heavens opened and we were soaking wet. Not damp. Not wet. But drowned.

We went back to the tent to get changed and Sat in the car with the heater on to dry off.

Once the rain stopped we went back to the circuit but wandered into the forest to try and find some lesser known views of the track. We did get a little lost but it was worth it in the end.

We spent some time in the fan zone and bumped into Sebastian Vettel who was kind enough to pose for a photo.

We watched the rest of the action, then took that smug guys advice from yesterday and headed into the town to get food. He told us of street parties and loads of restaurants. If we ever find that bullshitter we're going to punch him. There was one bar. Despite that we ordered food and ended up eating the world's biggest chicken.

Full up we went to walk back, which was quite a walk, but the circuit was closed so we had to walk around. It turns out, this was about 5k up an 8% slope.

Back at the tent we were knackered but the campsite was in full on party mode. Someone has a bat signal light, loads of fireworks, a million different sound systems pumping out techno techno techno and crazy Dutch people with trumpets.

Sleep is going to be hard to find tonight!

Spa - Day 1

Mark and Tim are headed to Spa in Belgium to watch the Formula1 race. We left on Thursday with the race being on Sunday and then return home on Monday.

We had to catch the 12:50 Chunnel and it was a 3:20 drive. Tim, however, being a project manager, had built contingencies into every step of the journey and had us leave at 7:30am. Obviously we stopped for a dirty bacon sarnie on the way and then hit the motorway.

We made good time, even the M25 was clear and soon rocked up at Folkestone an hour and a half early. Good work Tim. All of the earlier trains were full so we chose to hang out in the super expensive service station. 

Tim wanted to buy a train for Max, and it was a dead cert that they'd sell them here. Oh no, the only merch available was branded London tat. They did have some model Virgin planes available but no trains, despite it being a railway station.

After four laps of the duty free, and trying on every pair of sunglasses we decided to have an early lunch and sat outside in the sun with our packed lunch. It was this point in to holiday that Tim found out that Mark had forgotten the sausage rolls, and as a result had to be restrained by security.

Over lunch some random bloke asked us if we were going to the F1, we said we was an he immediately turned into a know it all knob. Once he started talking, his family all looked at themselves and run off leaving his to bull shit away. Apparently he goes to the F1 forty times a year, stays with the drivers, has his own bloody seat in the best grandstand every. He stopped short of having his own F1 car, but we were pretty sure that was coming if we hadn't walked off.

We got in the car and started queuing for our train early but despite this the stupid French organisers couldn't sort their shit out and we missed the next two trains. They need to have a word with the Germans about running their trains...

On the train we broke out the emergency cookies and chilled out for half an hour breathing in diesel fumes.

After 30 mins we were in France and quickly on our way to Bruges, it was a fairly quick uneventful journey which was welcome. We arrived in Bruges and found Hotel Flanders where we were spending the night. The place is okay dokeley and we fully intend to 'borrow' as much as possible in true Simpsons style.

We headed into Bruges and quickly found a canal side bar to start the holiday proper.

Soon after we wandered around Bruges moving from chocolate shop to chocolate shop. Then we found something new ; waffles on a stick! You choose your chocolate, then your sprinkles then eat awesome choc dipped waffles. On a stick!

We celebrated this by having more beer down the road.

After walking around for a while we noticed that there were piles of cardboard everywhere in all the streets, the Birmingham bin strike has obviously hit Bruges hard.

We then decided to launch the drone and responsibility fly around the city which we did, observing all of the associated laws. Just after we landed Tim spotted a hot air balloon and we joked how much fun it would be if the drone went to say hi. Obviously we didn't do that as it would be irresponsible and break loads of flight laws and stuff.

We went for somewhere to eat and settled on a nice local restaurant. We were the only people there and the owner told us to sit anywhere, until went to sit down only to be told we could only sit in a tiny seat and not anywhere comfortable in case 100 people turned up and wanted to sit down. They didn't. 

We ordered more food than we could eat which is pretty standard to be honest. And to annoy any vegans reading, our meal consisted if 5 different animals. Om nom nom. 

After stuffing ourselves we hit a couple more bars before returning to our hotel for a night cap. It was a pretty awesome bar, Tim had some gins that were £12 a drink but were pretty good!