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[evilowl]

From another website - posted by a guy who runs guided trips to the Nurburgring.

Well what a weekend, 13 cars left the boat and headed for the Ring Sun was blazing, Group were great guys and all had put a lot of effort into their cars for their first trip :thumb: As we left Dunkirk and headed along the motorway to the Lille turn off , In my rear view mirror I could see a French ambulance approaching from behind at speed, I gave the convoy the signal to stay Hard right on what bit of hard shoulder there is there!

In the confusion one of our group was rear ended by a French Driver!

I took the rest of the cars to a safe place and returned to find most of the French police service there and at least 16 miles of the Motorway blocked off and all at a standstill ! :blink:

I quickly established that there was a major problem as My customers had been arrested and all cameras and video equipment confiscated

I approached the Officer in charge and tried to find out what the problem was and explained that I was the organiser and that I had the other 12 cars parked up at the local services! :argue:

I was told to follow and we collected all the other customers and headed for the Motorway police station.

After some very very akward language problembs I finally asked for an interpreter, and 2 hrs later one arrived

There were a lot of phones ringing and lots of police coming and going, I told the interpreter that I could not understand what all the fuss was as it was a straight forward case of a french driver not looking where they were going and crashed into the back of our car!

Wrong she replied, you see she said, you are all part of the Gumball/cannonball ilegal race that came through here on Friday,and that the French police had been tipped off that more were on their way on saturday :huh:

Well you guesed, it took 3 statments overseen by the "French" public prosecuter, one English/french speaking lady who had to read my website word by word to prove we were nothing to do with it !
Our lucky break came when the shift changed and one policeman reconised me and my passat has I had gave him some RING stickers one day at the services a mile down the road! :thumb:

We finally left for Germany at 7pm having been detained all furking day !


So I would just like to say a big thanks to the guys from the cannonball/gumball rally !

On sunday I had the last laugh when I read in a German news paper That all the ballers stoped in Germany were Fined a £1000 each ordered back to Germany to have points on their licence "ENDORSED" By the UK Police.....

A big Thanks to Dale who put a smile on a few of my customers faces with a lap or two in the Mazda (cheers Dale)

all In all We had a fantastic weekend, no Incidents on the Ring

See you all In two weeks time

regards

mav

and another post:

Two friends who were part of a group of Elises blatting around the Alps for the past week were detained by the Swiss police for 6 hours. A grumpy member of the public complianed then the police tailed them down the motorway and pulled the instant they crossed from 120kph to 100 (@ 127kph)

They were accused of all sorts of things, next day the teletext news had a mixed up report of them being cannonballers with various incorrect details about the size and makeup of the group, destination etc. They were appealing for witnesses.

There was no accident.

The two were relieved of 2500 CHF each (1100 GBP) as a bond, which they may see some of again if the judge reviewing the statements etc decides the fines etc are less than this (seems unlikely).

One of the other guys dad was meeting up with them at the ring at the end of the trip. He was stopped for a few hours by German (?) police soon after entering the country. They had the ships manifest from the ferry he was on and were stopping anything remotely sporty as the ferry was known to have a bunch of wankballers onboard.

The ballers all had cars impounded for 24hrs and a 1000 EUR fine for participating in an illegal rally (despite no speeding or other offence).

Basically the days of well behaved organised runs are comming to an end. Nobbers driving with no consideration for other road users are quickly ruining things and as Dale said, the cops don't care who you are. Just driving a sporty car is enough now. God help you if you have the car stickered.

[algreene]

Thanks for that Ross.. Its fukin typical. Dickheads ruining it for the rest of us.. :bigcry:

Looks like its over now. My CTR is going anyway so fu,ck it..

[Turbo5]

Well it wont be the end for us, now sing along

Oh this year i'm off to Sunny Spain Y Viva Espana
I'm taking the ferry to Spain Y Viva Espana
If you'd like to chat a matador, in some cool cabana
And meet senoritas by the score, Espana por favor


:WOOT :WOOT

[kickboxing boo]

Well I can understand where you are coming from Ross. As you can remember from this year we did have some unwelcomed attention from the police.

As for next year, count us in, David.
Lets all hire Renault Twingos or Seat Ibizas to keep in with the crowd!


:thumbup:

[Turbo5]

All it needs is small groups like we did this year, cars not stickered up and just be sensible. We don't tend to use the major routes etc and the police presence on the B roads is minimal. The UK is worse than anywhere.

[algreene]

I guess your right Dave..

What if weve not got a honda next time round though? Would we be welcome in an Evo??

[seano]

I guess your right Dave..

What if weve not got a honda next time round though? Would we be welcome in an Evo??

As a f*rt in a space suit I'm afraid.

HET = Honda Euro Tour! You'll need to find a MET and new forum, after all you wouldn't want to be driving round Europe with a load of Burberry Apes in Chav Type R's.

So so long Bud :salut:

.... unless you were to sell the car to Nick :thumbup:

Seano

[algreene]

You seem to forget a certain french car that we followed round europe last time round!

[seano]

You seem to forget a certain french car that we followed round europe last time round!

Not at all - 6 months before when the owner of the said French car signed up for the tour, he had a Honda and only took delivery of the Renault a couple of weeks before the trip! The scenario you are putting forward is that you would be trying to sign up for the Honda Euro Tour without a Honda in the first place.

It would be a different case if you sold the car to Nick and then went as his passenger leaving the evo behind.

Of course I am pedantic for fun - I'm sure you and Nick would be welcome if you both turned up with a hoop and stick. On the other hand while it does look smart to have 30 Type R's, it would be less obvious to the authorities if there was a mix of cars. There was the Scoob and the Skoda this year as well as the Renault.

Seano

[algreene]

Iv been thinking that this week. Maybe a mix of cars would be better for being a bit more inconspicuous! (how the hell do you spell that word?)

But at the end of the day, I understand that its the HET and if we arent welcome in a Mitsi then we arent welcome... Fairy Muff!!

[ps2lord5]

Iv been thinking that this week. Maybe a mix of cars would be better for being a bit more inconspicuous! (how the hell do you spell that word?)

But at the end of the day, I understand that its the HET and if we arent welcome in a Mitsi then we arent welcome... Fairy Muff!!

you going for an evo al?


damo

[algreene]

Iv been thinking that this week. Maybe a mix of cars would be better for being a bit more inconspicuous! (how the hell do you spell that word?)

But at the end of the day, I understand that its the HET and if we arent welcome in a Mitsi then we arent welcome... Fairy Muff!!

you going for an evo al?


damo

Sure am mate.. Just waiting for insurance to get back to me then hopefully its all systems go!!

Evo lX FQ 340!! :thumbup:

[Harv]

pfft Tommi mak edition FTMFW!

[algreene]

Nah.. Evo 9 with the Mivec engine!

FTMFW!!

[evilowl]

There was the Scoob and the Skoda this year as well as the Renault.

A Subaru has been on the Euro Tour since the beginning! Other makes of cars have always been welcome.

The point I was making in my original post was that if you own a performance car with a British number plate, you are pretty much guaranteed problems these days. Not just from police cars on the motorways and A roads but also on border crossings, as we experienced this year.

It's a shame, but judging by the hefty fines dished out to everyone who participated in the various *ball rallies for participating in illegal road races whether or not they were actually racing, the few have ruined it for the many - especially in Western Europe.

IMHO if the Euro Tour is to continue, we need to look outside Western Europe and either head into Eastern Europe or north up into Scandinavia

[Lady Road Runner]

Well, I'll be okay in my S2000, they won't think a woman of my age is up to anything illegal!!

Karen

[seano]

Our group (Al& Nick, Damo & Minty the Renault and Chris and I) only got followed the once for 10-15 minutes when passed the first town in Italy. The local plod was leaning against his police car in the town square enjoying the sunshine (just like something out of the original Italian Job) when we trundled past. I think the noise of Damo's exhaust woke him up TBH.

I reckon we have a much better chance of getting away with it approaching from Spain as long as everybody else hasn't jumped on that bandwagon first. I suspect your right about the channel ports being too obvious and keeping in small groups at intervals makes up more discrete.

Seano

[evilowl]

This year we had

Motorcycle policeman telling us to slow down
Targeted by laser on autoroute, my road angel went mental so we slowed down and the French car in front of us got pulled instead
25 minutes of awkward questioning by local french police as to why we were filming with video cameras mounted on front and rear of car on the N85
25 minutes waiting while border control in Switzerland checked papers and put a sniffer dog round the car. Sniffer dog did not find the weed.

There's probably more that I've forgotten but those are the moments that spring to mind.

[seano]

This year we had

Motorcycle policeman telling us to slow down
Targeted by laser on autoroute, my road angel went mental so we slowed down and the French car in front of us got pulled instead
25 minutes of awkward questioning by local french police as to why we were filming with video cameras mounted on front and rear of car on the N85
25 minutes waiting while border control in Switzerland checked papers and put a sniffer dog round the car. Sniffer dog did not find the weed.

There's probably more that I've forgotten but those are the moments that spring to mind.

I'm not going to try and teach my younger but more experienced grandmother to suck eggs but...

Motorcycle policeman telling us to slow down - slow down for a bit (maybe 15 to 20 miles - he's bound to have a mate) and then carry on
Targeted by laser on autoroute, my road angel went mental so we slowed down and the French car in front of us got pulled instead - that can happen in Britain anytime
25 minutes of awkward questioning by local french police as to why we were filming with video cameras mounted on front and rear of car on the N85 - I know you like cameras and photography, but be discrete.
25 minutes waiting while border control in Switzerland checked papers and put a sniffer dog round the car. Sniffer dog did not find the weed. IIRC that night was the day after Glasgow airport bomb and the border police had been told that one of the terrorists had got to Switzerland. They were giving all UK passports holders a good look crossing the borders that night, which is fair enough - there were pictures of UK suspects in their booths.

Just my thoughts, if we are discrete and reasonably sensible we should be OK. Maybe we could have better comms so that if one small group has an issue, the following groups know to keep clear of the area.

Seano

[Captain Redbeard]

25 minutes waiting while border control in Switzerland checked papers and put a sniffer dog round the car. Sniffer dog did not find the weed.