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Thursday 12th November
We just about managed 2 hours sleep before dragging ourselves our of our beds at 3am in the morning, before driving up to Kent to meet the coach that would be taking us to France. It wasn't quite as simple as planned as we went to the wrong meeting place, but we met the coach with plenty of time to spare. We both slept all the way to Dover and had a fairly calm ferry crossing, before a long six hour drive to Metz in which I read over half a novel! Once we arrived in our hotel and piled into our room, we met up with our friends who had already arrived and went out to explore the beautiful town. Explore being the right word here; we got hopelessly lost (which was partially my fault) and took about 2 hours to find a restaurant, eventually going back to the one we first passed! After a lovely meal filled with very loud talking as we were the only ones in the restaurant, we managed to get equally lost on the way back and saw our hotel from every angle before we found the door!
We just about managed 2 hours sleep before dragging ourselves our of our beds at 3am in the morning, before driving up to Kent to meet the coach that would be taking us to France. It wasn't quite as simple as planned as we went to the wrong meeting place, but we met the coach with plenty of time to spare. We both slept all the way to Dover and had a fairly calm ferry crossing, before a long six hour drive to Metz in which I read over half a novel! Once we arrived in our hotel and piled into our room, we met up with our friends who had already arrived and went out to explore the beautiful town. Explore being the right word here; we got hopelessly lost (which was partially my fault) and took about 2 hours to find a restaurant, eventually going back to the one we first passed! After a lovely meal filled with very loud talking as we were the only ones in the restaurant, we managed to get equally lost on the way back and saw our hotel from every angle before we found the door!
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Saturday 14th November
This morning we found out for the first time the horrifying attacks that had gone on in Paris the night before. Since we couldn't get our room TV to work it was a surprise when we were flooded with messages from friends asking if we were alright. Thankfully we were far enough away from Paris to avoid it completely.
With less of a rush than yesterday, we spent some time looking around the local market and buying a few bits and bobs before getting the bendy-bus to the showground. After checking on Russell and Constance in the trailer, we got much more of a chance to look around than we had done previously. Although we'd decided not to take any rabbits, it was very interesting to see the Lionheads they had at the show and what the judges thought made a good Lionhead!! This was when we stumbled across the Bearded Giants; in the words of nearly everyone else on the trip, some of the ugliest rabbits there. In our opinions, absolutely gorgeous! We were umming and ahhing for several hours over whether to get one or not to be a house rabbit (something we'd wanted for many years), until a friend literally shoving us towards the virtually empty queue made up our minds. Our first and second choices were both gone, but that was a blessing in disguise as the boy we brought has the most incredible personality which was obvious from the moment we went to say hello. So we now have Bigwig, an handsome and very distinguished bear of a bunny!
Tonight was the big evening out, so it was in smart dress that everyone met in the reception of the hotel and walked through the town to a really lovely Chinese restaurant. After a fantastic meal, we crowded into a little pub for drinks and very long chats. It was past midnight when we finally got back to the hotel, and I think I was asleep before my head hit the pillow!
This morning we found out for the first time the horrifying attacks that had gone on in Paris the night before. Since we couldn't get our room TV to work it was a surprise when we were flooded with messages from friends asking if we were alright. Thankfully we were far enough away from Paris to avoid it completely.
With less of a rush than yesterday, we spent some time looking around the local market and buying a few bits and bobs before getting the bendy-bus to the showground. After checking on Russell and Constance in the trailer, we got much more of a chance to look around than we had done previously. Although we'd decided not to take any rabbits, it was very interesting to see the Lionheads they had at the show and what the judges thought made a good Lionhead!! This was when we stumbled across the Bearded Giants; in the words of nearly everyone else on the trip, some of the ugliest rabbits there. In our opinions, absolutely gorgeous! We were umming and ahhing for several hours over whether to get one or not to be a house rabbit (something we'd wanted for many years), until a friend literally shoving us towards the virtually empty queue made up our minds. Our first and second choices were both gone, but that was a blessing in disguise as the boy we brought has the most incredible personality which was obvious from the moment we went to say hello. So we now have Bigwig, an handsome and very distinguished bear of a bunny!
Tonight was the big evening out, so it was in smart dress that everyone met in the reception of the hotel and walked through the town to a really lovely Chinese restaurant. After a fantastic meal, we crowded into a little pub for drinks and very long chats. It was past midnight when we finally got back to the hotel, and I think I was asleep before my head hit the pillow!
Sunday 15th November
We only had very little time at the show today due to the coach arriving to collect us at midday, so after breakfast we shoved our things back into our suitcases and piled onto the bendy-bus luggage and all! Due to the Paris attacks the security was incredibly tight getting into the showground, so we were forced to endure a very tightly packed crowd filled with angry foreigners trying to shove trailers through in order to even get through the door! After this very stressful experience we simply sat in the GB stand for a while as the entire showground was packed full of people, until we rounded up Russell, Constance and Bigwig to put them onto the coach. After saying reluctant goodbyes to everyone not on our coach, we started out on the long journey back to Calais. During the journey, we got a call from a friend still at the showground asking if we'd like another satin doe! She'd managed to persuade a breeder to sell her at a reduced price, which is how we ended up with Cassandra in addition to Russell and Constance. I managed to finish the rest of my novel on the way back to Calais, before getting onto the ferry to endure what was without doubt the worst ferry crossing of my life! I'm not usually one to get seasick, but I felt so miserable I spent the entire crossing lying on the sofa with my eyes shut. I was very glad to get back onto the coach and slept all the way back to Kent, where we picked up Cassandra from our friend before getting back into our car and driving home. |
Metz in few words: incredible, unbelievable, chaotic and FBW!!! (I'm not telling you what that last one means!)
Three years to go until the next Europe show- here's to Denmark 2018!