Freedom Day

[Guided Missile]

Without doubt, the release from lockdown, courtesy of the best of British science and social healthcare, will be the most defining moment for this country since VE day. A time to remember the sacrifices and the dear departed, but after a sombre reflection, I think we may deserve a celebration.

So, there will be a point in time, a day, where victory over the virus is declared and society will open again. What will be the sweetest event for you guys? I'm hungry for it all, but in order, my first days of freedom will involve:

1. Dinner at a swanky restaurant
2. Drinks at my favourite pub
3. 5 star hotel
4. Breakfast
5. Golf
6. St. Mary's

It will be a big day and I hope there will be something to mark the event. Party time and we deserve it.

[Lighthouse]

I can’t put them in order but:

• going back to work, hopefully, for the first time since March.
• Having mates round in the garden for beers and BBQ when the weather warms up.
• Getting the pub quiz team going again.
• Going back to St Mary’s, even just to see us be sh*t and lose to someone like Brighton.
• Paintball tournaments
• Going to some cricket games with JustMike.
• Visiting family, who all live abroad and I’ve seen bugger all of for a year.
• Skiing - only 50 weeks to wait now.
• Attending F1 races. I’m hoping Belgium will be open by August
• BTCC - Thruxton is in May I believe so fingers crossed.
• Visiting mates who live in Dubai
• A f*cking good beach/sailing holiday
• Taking the dog on proper walks, further away than ‘my local area’.
• A decent massage

Im sure there’d be more if I thought about it.

[benjii]

Unfortunately, if you think the current set of vaccines are going to spell the complete end of restrictions any time soon, and via some sort of "back to normal, it's all over" big-bang announcement, I think you will be sadly disappointed. It will be a long time before any of these things happen:

- we have a clear view on the effectiveness of vaccines in stopping transmission

- we have a clear view on the extent to which transmission is driving mutations which are less susceptible to the vaccine

- we have a clear view on the long-term non-fatal damage done by the virus

- enough people around the world are vaccinated with a proven vaccine for seamless inter-continental travel to return

It feels to me as though there are bound to be relaxing and reimposing of various restrictions - perhaps on a localised basis - for another couple of years. Whilst I'm sure every effort will be made to allow people to meet each other and go to bars / restaurants etc. I think the days of packed venues and carefree travel, other than to a small number of niche locations that can't afford not to have tourists (e.g. Maldives), are over for the foreseeable future.

It absolutely sucks and please, for goodness sake, we have to hope the UK government has learnt some lessons from this and will implement them so when this happens again we can get proper track, trace and containment processes in place.

That said, I want to go the pub with a bunch of friends I haven't seen for ages, I want to attend some live-music and sporting events, and I want to be able to travel internationally without the hassle of possible border closures etc. whilst there.

[Lord Duckhunter]

Going to the ale house and standing at the bar.

 

 

[whelk]

Binge watching a series on Netflix

[LGTL]

International travel, saints home and away and being able to get into a pub without having to wear a mask or eat a poxy meal. 

[Whitey Grandad]

Travel far and wide. Seeing my family again. Going to the theatre or up to the Albert Hall for the evening. Doing some longer distance country walks. Driving to the Alps and Italy and Austria. Going on a cruise again. Flying to the Canadian Rockies and hiring a car. Going to Australia and driving the bits we haven’t seen yet. Flying to Barcelona and taking the train along the coast to Perpignan and the little yellow train up into the Pyrenees and then back down into Spain. Driving to Iceland. Driving to Norway. Seeing Scotland and Ireland again.

Going to St. Mary’s with my grandson before he goes off into the world.

[Lord Duckhunter]

1 hour ago, Whitey Grandad said:

Flying to Barcelona and taking the train along the coast to Perpignan and the little yellow train up into the Pyrenees and then back down into Spain. 

Love Perpignan, the coast from there to Montpellier is the best bit of France. Have you done Perpignan to Andora, me and the snap dragon did it and went into a spa in the mountains. Great place. 

[egg]

2 hours ago, Whitey Grandad said:

Travel far and wide. Seeing my family again. Going to the theatre or up to the Albert Hall for the evening. Doing some longer distance country walks. Driving to the Alps and Italy and Austria. Going on a cruise again. Flying to the Canadian Rockies and hiring a car. Going to Australia and driving the bits we haven’t seen yet. Flying to Barcelona and taking the train along the coast to Perpignan and the little yellow train up into the Pyrenees and then back down into Spain. Driving to Iceland. Driving to Norway. Seeing Scotland and Ireland again.

Going to St. Mary’s with my grandson before he goes off into the world.

Amen to that. Some fantastic trips in there. That Barcelona to Perpignan coastal route is a joy. Once over the border there's Banyul, Collioure, Argeles, etc, then Perpignan itself which is amazing. 

Travelling is what I'll be doing. Jordan, Tuscany, plus so many other places. If flights ain't happening, then every corner of this country. Anywhere, everywhere. 

I'm determined to never waste another weekend or day off. 

[Lord Duckhunter]

25 minutes ago, egg said:

Amen to that. Some fantastic trips in there. That Barcelona to Perpignan coastal route is a joy. Once over the border there's Banyul, Collioure, Argeles, etc,

Collioure is lovely, and stayed in Argeles a few times. Also love Sete which is slightly further north. The snap dragon wants to retire to Canet Plage and wandering too far down the beach at Cap d'Agde one day, nearly gave me a cardiac. Great part of the world. 

[Whitey Grandad]

1 hour ago, Lord Duckhunter said:

Love Perpignan, the coast from there to Montpellier is the best bit of France. Have you done Perpignan to Andora, me and the snap dragon did it and went into a spa in the mountains. Great place. 

We’ve spent many summers taking the caravan down to Argeles or the Costa Brava. I’ve got some equipment installed at the Conseil Général across the road from the giant Auchan. We’ve never gone right up to Andorra but a good friend of mine had a house up the valley at Bouleternère. I love the view up the coast from La Franqui but our favourite view is when you come over the hills going north on the motorway from Spain.

if you get the chance I can recommend having lunch in Spain at Sant Martí d'Empúries in the village courtyard square. Wonderful beaches there with Greek and Roman ruins right alongside.

Happy days.

[Whitey Grandad]

7 minutes ago, Lord Duckhunter said:

Collioure is lovely, and stayed in Argeles a few times. Also love Sete which is slightly further north. The snap dragon wants to retire to Canet Plage and wandering too far down the beach at Cap d'Agde one day, nearly gave me a cardiac. Great part of the world. 

Ah Collioure! Patrick O’Brian, the writer of Master and Commander, lived there, as I’m sure you know. Canet Plage was where Charles Trenet lived until he died a few years ago. He wrote the song ‘La Mer’ whilst he was travelling south across the salt lagoons on the train from his native Narbonne.

Who knows, we may have even walked passed each other a few times.

Edited 7 February, 2021 by Whitey Grandad

[egg]

18 minutes ago, Lord Duckhunter said:

Collioure is lovely, and stayed in Argeles a few times. Also love Sete which is slightly further north. The snap dragon wants to retire to Canet Plage and wandering too far down the beach at Cap d'Agde one day, nearly gave me a cardiac. Great part of the world. 

Haven’t been to Sete, but Canet very nice. The whole area is superb, both sides of the border, Roses a favourite on the Spanish side. Le Perthus is a bizarre little place too, part in France and part in Spain. My missus once had a conversation with a shop keeper in a mix of Spanish, French with some Catalan thrown in! That's one of the things I miss about travelling, the random little memories. 

[skintsaint]

* Get on a plane and fly back to the UK to see family.

Only thing so far I haven't been able to do in the last 12 months.

[Winnersaint]

15 hours ago, egg said:

Haven’t been to Sete, but Canet very nice. The whole area is superb, both sides of the border, Roses a favourite on the Spanish side. Le Perthus is a bizarre little place too, part in France and part in Spain. My missus once had a conversation with a shop keeper in a mix of Spanish, French with some Catalan thrown in! That's one of the things I miss about travelling, the random little memories. 

Took a school trip to Narbonne Plage a few years back spent a very pleasant day in Gruissan in the process

 

[buctootim]

Love that corner of France but still prefer the warm but greener Dordogne. Cant beat dinner in the square at Sarlat.  

Edited 8 February, 2021 by buctootim

[egg]

57 minutes ago, buctootim said:

Love that corner of France but still prefer the warm but greener Dordogne. Cant beat dinner in the square at Sarlat.  

The Perigord area generally is lovely, and Sarlat is very nice.  I like to find a little bistro tucked away, have a nice bit of Canard, and sit back for a few hours. Splendid, and hopefully I can do it again soon. 

[whelk]

Have never not travelled for a year and coming up to that now although thankful was in the Alps last Feb. Think I’ll give south of France a miss though to avoid all you fuckers😀. Tuscany it is although more realistically planning for Lake District and Yorkshire Dales. 

[Turkish]

Italy for me, been going at least twice a year for 10 years now, been all over. Can’t wait to get back. Love everything about the place. Also want to tick Iceland off, usual stuff, glacier walk, blue lagoon, northern lights and whale watching. 
 

thought the briefing today was good and realistic. There won’t be a freedom day, we’ll be living with this for a long time, controlled like flu is controlled with annual vaccines to reduce the spread and hospitalisations. I guess that means every year we’ll have some deaths too. 

[Uncle Albert]

Just give me any beach and any beer.

[buctootim]

16 hours ago, whelk said:

Think I’ll give south of France a miss though to avoid all you fuckers😀. Tuscany it is 

Ha, unlucky. I go there too  

This place is awesome for a few nights. They make their own AOC wine, olive oil and wild boar sausages. 

https://www.locandadipraticino.com/

[buctootim]

1 hour ago, Uncle Albert said:

Just give me any beach and any beer.

Southsea and special brew 

[Uncle Albert]

maybe not any beach or beer

Edited 10 February, 2021 by Uncle Albert

[Lighthouse]

1 hour ago, buctootim said:

Southsea and special brew 

That’s a honeymoon if you live in Tipner.

[Winnersaint]

Drive down to French Alps area and bugger about for a week in the mountains on my bike. Wouldn't mind where but fancy another go up L'Alpe d'Huez, have ghosts of a past failure on the Glandon/Croix de Fer and still haven't done the Galibier in real life.

[View From The Top]

Every Feb 1/2 term we go away to get some sun.

Last year it was Santa Clarita, 20 miles NE of LA, visiting good friends of ours who have settled out there.

Seems a lifetime ago.

When I can get back on a plane it'll feel like freedom.

We had to roll so many flights over from last year to this (Rome, Bologna (cycling break), Milan (cycling break), Vienna, NY, LA) and it looks like it's going to happen again so it's looking like 2022 will be packed and paid for at least.

We've flights rebooked for California in October and despite having flights for Canada booked for late July (in lieu of NY), we realistically expect LA to be our 1st chance to really get away. 

[Whitey Grandad]

We’d like to be able to go to Scotland and Ireland again. It seems unthinkable that you can’t go away for or a few days in a hotel somewhere in your own country. All very understandable but weird.