Headlines - plonker books ferry on wrong day !!

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MisterB

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enough to know i shouldnt touch things i know nothing about ....
i wonder what kind of plonker would book a ferry to France on the 24th March and then think the ferry is on the 23rd March, so is just about to leave for an overnighter near Eastbourne ....

of course Mrs Plonker is involved because she also had all the details.

Thankfully for The Plonker family - it wasnt booked a day behind, just a day in front, so they will be sailing on Friday and not Thursday.....

so, now the question is, do they set off today anyway and have an extra day around the Kent coast somewhere (recommendations please) or stay on the drive at home - my money is that Mr Plonker will get a couple of recommendations (on where to stay NOT to check bookings in future!) from the wonderful world of motorhome fun ....
 
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Been there done that ours was a flight from Bangkok back to UK. Got back to Bangkok then found the flight wasn't tomorrow it was the next day, not too much of a problem as we had the use of our daughter's flat.
 
Many moons ago whilst going through my notes prior to visiting a customer in Cologne the stewardess announced that we would shortly be landing at Copenhagen. Fortunately I was able to justify the expense with a surprise visit to my customer in Copenhagen.
 
Long story short but we were parked up at Bilbao port two days early as we had engine problems, the day prior to sailing three fellas turned up on Motorbikes “serious road bikes” l got chatting and asked where they were staying, on the boat was the reply, absolute shock horror and one extreme red face on the fella that organised the trip,off they went for a tour around the Picos de Europe for a day.

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jollyrodger said:
Any good for you a night down the pub

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The Beachy Head Hotel

Details for The Beachy Head Hotel a Motorhome Pub Stopover Eastbourne, East Sussex, England, United Kingdom, BN20 7YA
www.searchforsites.co.uk
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Thanks, we have already booked there for Thursday night, thats the one part I, i mean 'he' got right LOL !!
 
Littlewheels said:
Long story short but we were parked up at Bilbao port two days early as we had engine problems, the day prior to sailing three fellas turned up on Motorbikes “serious road bikes” l got chatting and asked where they were staying, on the boat was the reply, absolute shock horror and one extreme red face on the fella that organised the trip,off they went for a tour around the Picos de Europe for a day.
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Can’t beat the Picos on a bike. 👌🏻
DD72A86B-320F-4706-8F92-E020A22ED027.jpeg
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6E4A071E-8917-4FA7-A0DF-FE4F91C254AE.jpeg
 
Definitely , 2023 ?
We we're standing in a long snaking queue for car hire in San Jose. The Scottish chap in front of us eventually got to the counter, and after a short while there was lots of exasperated body language, and a quite fierce face from his wife standing with a toddler in her arms. "Problems ?" I ventured " Ay " she said, " To$$ pot" , motioning to her husband, " has booked a nice rental car, in San Jose, AMERICA ", which made everyone in the queue giggle a bit as we we're in San Jose, Costa Rica. I expect he thought he'd scored a bargain, as car hire is very expensive in Costa Rica.
Mike.
 
After two years spent learning to ride again on a 90cc moped I overheard my sons discussing riding their big Rice Burner bikes to the Picos to celebrate younger son's 40th. I told them they weren't going without me to celebrate my 72nd birthday and bought a tiny Honda CBF - a 125cc as it was the heaviest I could manage (with only my left arm useable following a big biking accident two years previously)

Setting off for Spain..jpg


It took us 3 days (at my Honda's max 65mph downhill :rolleyes: ) to get to the fantastic Picos.

Pyrenees foothills.jpg


At every opportunity we sheltered in biking gear from the blistering heat.

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Due to my sons' time constraints we took the ferry back from Santander where in more blistering heat we joined the seemingly endless queue of the ship's max bike complement of 250 bikes.

Behind us.........

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and in front.........

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Cheers!.jpg
 
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MisterB said:
i wonder what kind of plonker would book a ferry to France on the 24th March and then think the ferry is on the 23rd March, so is just about to leave for an overnighter near Eastbourne ....

of course Mrs Plonker is involved because she also had all the details.

Thankfully for The Plonker family - it wasnt booked a day behind, just a day in front, so they will be sailing on Friday and not Thursday.....

so, now the question is, do they set off today anyway and have an extra day around the Kent coast somewhere (recommendations please) or stay on the drive at home - my money is that Mr Plonker will get a couple of recommendations (on where to stay NOT to check bookings in future!) from the wonderful world of motorhome fun ....
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Will you be changing your name to Dick Plonker ? :unsure:

For those of you who dont know, When Covid opened up in Europe 3 weeks before us on June 15th 2020, MisterB was second on the tunnel of the escape committee. I was Tom for a while !
 
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My son and DIL flew out on Dec 31st transiting at San Francisco and arriving in New Zealand on Jan 2nd, missing out on a New Year's Eve celebration and Jan 1st. They are flying back from NZ in a couple of days on March 26th/27th when our clocks go forward so I suspect that means they'll lose another hour of their lives, or maybe they'll get 13 hours back and lose one......:unsure:
All rather confusing. However we do need time as Mark Twain said: 'Time is what keeps everything from happening at once'.
 
We had Newhaven Dieppe booked for Monday last September but we were ready to go on Sunday. Just went anyway as you can stay overnight at the port for a fiver. Got there said any chance of going tonight? She changed the booking with no charge. So I would just go anyway and see what happens.
Dennis
 
So Mr Plonkers second cousin twice removed rolled up to the barrier at the tunnel (this is years ago) to be met with the screen saying words to the effect, "Because you are 22hrs Late, there is an additional charge of £44"

Outrageous, I'm 2hrs early for my trip today, (Friday)

Pressed the button and the humanoid at the other end repeated what was on the screen.

At this point I almost impressed myself with my speed of thought.

"What day is it? “

" Its Friday"

"Well, when we amended our ticket by phoning you, your man must have put the wrong date in because, when we go over the water, we arrive on Friday because that gives us the first two days without there being lorries on the road"

"Ah! I can see you amended the ticket. Sorry about that. Come in" . :whistle2:
 
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I booked outbound Dunkirk-Dover and same route for return to Dunkirk, I thought.

We drove up to DFDS at Dover and they just look at reg no., gave us out card to hang on mirror, which neither of us checked. I was a bit surprised at lane no. because we normally boarded via a lower one.

I was a bit surprised when they announced bars etc were closing so early, then looked at coast and thought we were close considering time to Dunkirk.

You have guessed - we were approaching Calais.

In my defence(a poor one) DFDS website shows the Calais and Dunkirk sailings interdispersed on the same page, so my finger must have slipped.

No great problem, just 25 km along the M/way.

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Back in the day , flights , ferries etc were regularly timed at 1200 pm and YES we arrived on the wrong day - the staff said they were used to it . Nowadays they are 1205 so 🤞not as many people get it wrong
 
Remember Speedferries? Some plonker rolled up to the check in there with a car full of kids and Mrs 2x2 to be told the ferry went 24hrs earlier. I wasn't very popular and buying a new ticket at the port was rather expensive.

However to their credit they credited the outward cost back to my account, which we used the next year, and we used the return portion to come back. Doubt that would happen now.
 
Our last trip abroad we turned up at the kiosk at Zeebrugge handed over documents only to be told we were a day early 🙄

Would you like to travel today sir?

Is there any cost?

£140

😳

No thanks , see you tomorrow and we discovered a brand new aire just down the road for an ‘extra’ night away

Thankfully, like OP we were early and not late 👍
 
MisterB said:
i wonder what kind of plonker would book a ferry to France on the 24th March and then think the ferry is on the 23rd March, so is just about to leave for an overnighter near Eastbourne ....

of course Mrs Plonker is involved because she also had all the details.

Thankfully for The Plonker family - it wasnt booked a day behind, just a day in front, so they will be sailing on Friday and not Thursday.....

so, now the question is, do they set off today anyway and have an extra day around the Kent coast somewhere (recommendations please) or stay on the drive at home - my money is that Mr Plonker will get a couple of recommendations (on where to stay NOT to check bookings in future!) from the wonderful world of motorhome fun ....
Click to expand...

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We stood at a car rental booth in Malta at 1:45pm and collected the appropriate keys.
Son in law, who’d booked the villa and found the best car deal, took my place only to be told “we waited for you this morning. Your car is no longer available.”
We had both entered our flight number, as required, and there weren’t any planes from Standted arriving after 9pm. Who was at fault?

Fortunately they were able to supply a larger car for only £8 extra for the week so our vehicle spent most of the time parked, thus saving money 👍

Gordon
 
My missis booked a ferry and booked the wrong port. We were on the last minute and had no time to rush to the right port. Because woman likes to be in charge and domineering as they are and do, we had to pay £250 extra to board at the port that the sweet one had taken us to. Bless, life is good . I still hold this in reserve
 
MisterB said:
i wonder what kind of plonker would book a ferry to France on the 24th March and then think the ferry is on the 23rd March, so is just about to leave for an overnighter near Eastbourne ....

of course Mrs Plonker is involved because she also had all the details.

Thankfully for The Plonker family - it wasnt booked a day behind, just a day in front, so they will be sailing on Friday and not Thursday.....

so, now the question is, do they set off today anyway and have an extra day around the Kent coast somewhere (recommendations please) or stay on the drive at home - my money is that Mr Plonker will get a couple of recommendations (on where to stay NOT to check bookings in future!) from the wonderful world of motorhome fun ....
Click to expand...
Easily done (!) - we had this problem a few years ago going to France via Dover. We left Southampton a little later than was ideal so thrashed the old Maverick to death to reach the ferry before check-in closed. How we never got a ticket I don't know but we made it with literally two minutes to spare and the co-pilot handed the tickets over with a great sense of relief - which soon evaporated when the lovely lady in the booth looked a little puzzled and said "but these tickets are for tomorrow's sailing . . ?"

We just burst out laughing and she said she was a bit puzzled as to why we weren't shouting at her, which apparently is a thing for unhappy ferry passengers when they need to direct their anger at someone. Anyway, she just told us to drive round to a waiting bay near the embarkation point (it was on a high speed ferry) and they would see if they could get us on. They did, with the tow bar on the Maverick just kissing the doors as they closed so we got to France a little earlier than intended, which was a different set of problems altogether . . . .
 
A few years ago when we briefly went over to the dark side (caravan), we joined friends for a week in a villa after our winter stay in Spain, leaving the caravan on site. We had a lovely week & set off in the car to drive to the tunnel in a single journey for the last night crossing. Somewhere around Bordeaux in a thunderstorm of epic proportions, I checked the tunnel crossing. It was for the Saturday before! I tried not to tell HWMBO straight away, as we navigated busy traffic, & I bought another ticket with a flaky phone signal! Confessed eventually, & all would have been well if we hadn’t had a puncture further up the road! The spare wheel was in a well in the back of the X Trail under all our worldly goods, the dogs crate & several boxes of Spanish floor tiles we were taking back for the bathroom & hall! Paul might have won some sort of tyre changing & boot emptying competition if there had been one! We made the tunnel with four minutes to spare!
 
Lenny HB said:
Been there done that ours was a flight from Bangkok back to UK. Got back to Bangkok then found the flight wasn't tomorrow it was the next day, not too much of a problem as we had the use of our daughter's flat.
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How about forgetting about the International date line! Booked all the flights via an American road trip for back home, booked all the flights and landed in Dublin to get the Blackpool flight ( when you could) only to be told your flight went yesterday!

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