Malta - Devizes

Sunday 12th July.

By the sometime-on-Sunday time I surfaced in room 221 from a deep and peaceful sleep, to then perform all of the necessary physical sanitation and mental recalibration tasks needed to enter the day and interact with the rest of humanity, taken the leisurely stroll to camp-site Rugby Club … you lot had completely devoured the breakfast supplies - Again! Then must swiftly demolished your camping facilities and all ridden off whence you came, without so much as a ‘Cheerio, see you again in another Twenty-Five-Years-time.’

Bah.

An impotent twiddling of thumbs.

I blame the Parents. Hippies, most of them probably, gawd’bless’em and their living-for-the-moment philosophy.

Police helicopter winds up and then whines up and away and into the west.

 All that is left to see at camp-site Rugby Club is the empty Gpz OC marquee, with a bleary-eyed Mr.D., packing the last bits and pieces of the Gpz900 25th Birthday Bash into that wee Rascal of a van of his.

Sunday session of adjacent cricket match continuing under much sunnier skies than those of Saturday.

Craig looks heavenward, shrugs, mutters “Bloody Typical,” drives the wee Rascal off into the afternoon.

Leaving just the 900 and me. 

In a world of ever changing values, where we are obliged to plumb the depths of economic gloom, doom and despondency, my 900 waits reliably (fingers crossed) and patiently for the turn of the key.

Ok. Lets go. Gingerly at first, over camp-site Rugby Club grass squished and squashed by the passing of so many Metzlers and Bridgestones. Then off along the road into the long afternoon (yeah, east, opposite direction to where the copper chopper had flown), to indulge in responsible fun exploring the cornering grip offered by dry Wiltshire roads thereabouts.

Old School Wheee-hee! Maybe England ain’t become as restrictive as a jaundiced ex-patriot’s observations might have led one to conclude. No need to ponder any longer one of the reasons why Mr.WW is happy to stay down Devizes way.

More by luck than judgment (A-Z-nav non-functioning, cos I’d left the map book back in room 221), finally find my way round-and-thereabouts back into Devizes, past the now eerily deserted camp-site Rugby Club, past the tranquil Wiltshire Cops HQ, past the rows of respectable houses and on along to the left turn at the end of the trees, where the Travel Lodge is hid.

Lock and alarm the 900 down below my room 221 window. Travel Lodge lift whisks me up to the top, to amble along the corridor, into the room, kettle on, TV on, togs off, shower, towel, kettle on again, stuff face with hotel picnic nosh, tea-brewing, old film on the box … say ‘Hi,’ to Tullamore Dew. Sip tea and a wee snifter of the TD. Watch what is now called TV. Fall asleep very peacefully. Eventually reawaken in time for more tea and a light hotel picnic snack in preparation for further Climbing Mount Improbable with Mr.Dawkins.

After steep, tiring ascent, manage to reach the opening of Chapter Five ‘The Forty-fold Path to Enlightenment.’ Avidly read first couple of pages,

… then turn page to see fig 5.1.

I say, is it me, or has that snail really rather large eyes, maybe I’ve imbibed a tads too much TD?

Hmmmn. If I were at all sensible, I’d say that, by now, it might be proper bedtime.