The BeerTrain

Not a pure Crank trip this time, more something I managed to persuade the wife she really wanted to do on the way back from a Holiday in Italy! We'd rented an apartment overlooking Lake Como in Menaggio, a very well to do resort town. View from our Menaggio Apartment View of Menaggio taken from the Lake View of the Lake taken from Menaggio As usual with these types of places pretty poor for me in respect of Brewpubs and interesting beers, apart from a good shop that did sell rarities from small breweries in the local area. This meant if we weren't in town of an evening for a meal then I was more than happy to sit on our balcony & sample some of these! We hired a car for the week, good fun down some of the Lakes VERY narrow roads some of which were single track with blind bends in the middle! I drove past George Clooney's house several times but he never popped out to wave, he's been known to have a few beers in Menaggio oft times but he was a no-show this week! I wo...

A planned Easter trip to meet up with Tim Reiner & friends in Spain to cover Easter week additionals which brought out a host of the very loud 333's every year. I had never been but they knew what they were doing! These were the days of Boarding Cards - Boarding Card for the cross-channel boat, boarding Card for the overnight to Spain out of Paris Austerlitz...…. I had boarding cards for both & a couchette reservation out of Austerlitz. Having the experience of losing 3 days on a previous Easter trip due to not making the cross-channel boat (a fatality involving my service just before it arrived at Sittingbourne where I was waiting on the platform) & having to wait until the boarding card period was over before I could travel, I had a bit of insurance this time having got FIP coupons for France/Lux & Austria just in case I got bowled somewhere. That somewhere turned out to be just outside the French portal of the Channel Tunnel! Easter Sunday 16/04/95 3216) W...