Caffeine, Cigarettes and a Hit & Run

At the end of nearly a year living in the UK, and at the tail end of summer, I set out on a two week road trip to the south of Spain with my good friend Matt and his brother, Andrew. The following is day one…

“A day without sunshine is like, you know, night.” – Some legend.

04:00 GMT – August 12, 2015.
London:
I am abruptly awoke by my alarm. I have only been in bed for about three hours, but that’s show business I guess. I drag myself out of bed, have a quick shower, grab my bag and jump in the Uber. I love London at this time of the morning. There’s no one around, no traffic and I’m easily distracted by sparkly things like city lights. It’s a good distraction, I prepare myself for a long stint.

07:00 GMT – August 12, 2015.
London:
I get to set, I was working on the Fantastic Beasts and Where To Find Them movie, check in and go help myself to hot breakfast and coffee. I talk with new friends and trap a wasp under a plastic cup.

19:00 GMT – August 12, 2015.
London:
I sign off on set, wash all the gunk out of my hair, grab my bag and head for the meeting place. I grab dinner in the city and find an Aussie run coffee shop. I order a double.

00:00 GMT – August 13, 2015.
Heathrow:
We decided it was easiest to meet at the airport. Matt and Andrew had already driven from Manchester and it felt cruel to make them drive into Central London to pick me up. Matt was kind enough to have an ice coffee waiting for me. We set off to Dover.

03:00 GMT – August 13, 2015.
Dover:
After waiting for the next ferry, we load Martha the Mercedes into the hull and head upstairs to the lounge. We know that to fall asleep now means our doom. We find the cafe and grab a coffee. We have small talk and I get to know Andrew, Matt’s brother, a little better. He’s a good kid.

(Inset: Matt, left. Me, right. Martha in back)

05:00 CET – August 13, 2015.
Calais, France:
I’ve been awake for 24 hours now. No big deal, not even close to my PB.
We disembark from the ferry and hit the road, but not before filling up with petrol and grabbing an ice coffee. Andrew is out cold in the back seat. Matt and I talk about lots of things, mostly cars. Time awake: 24 hours.

07:30 CET – August 13, 2015.
Bruges, Belgium:
The sun is finally up and the air is cool and crisp as we pull into a parking space in the center of the city. What an amazing place, like something out of a fairy tale, despite what Colin Farrell says.
As we arrive, the shoppes and cafes all start to liven up and there is a market in the center square. We grab a waffle and take a stroll around this magical place, taking in as many sights as we can. Much to his disdain, Matt followed me around looking for an open chocolate shop. There was no freaking way I was stopping in Belgium without gorging on chocolate.

Once my chocolate cravings were satiated, we sat down at a nice cafe in the center square and had a coffee. Andrew was still asleep in the car.

09:30 CET – August 13, 2015.
Bruges, cont:
We get back on the motorway and head for our next destination, Paris. We don’t have accommodation booked, but we figure we’ll worry about that when we can see the city.

13:30 CET – August 13, 2015.
Paris, France:
Andrew had woken up at some point between Arras and Paris, Matt was still driving like a machine and I managed to book a hotel through Trivago on my beat up iPhone. All was well, until suddenly, gypsies!
We pulled up at a set of traffic lights near the outskirts of Paris. No one in France can drive to save themselves, they are all bloody useless, but I digress. At the traffic lights, a group of about half a dozen gypsies swarmed the car begging for money. Of course, we just rolled up our windows and locked the doors, smart move, right? It turns out they don’t particularly like being rejected, so they tried to break the side mirror off the car and smash the window. That wasn’t going to stand with us. After they wouldn’t move when tooting the horn, and fearing for our wallets, our only option was to run over them.

Luckily, the streets had sharpened their reaction times. Once the car started lurching forward, they all managed to dive out of the way pretty quick. I was only a little disappointed.

14:00 CET – August 13, 2015.
Paris:
Matt speaks fluent Spanish, and knows a handful of French. I know fuck all Spanish and even less French, but even I could tell that the young Parisian at the hotel desk was talking shit to his friend on the other end of the phone while we stood there like a bunch of idiots for 20 minutes. We finally checked in. The desire to go sleep was almost overwhelming, but I’d never been to Paris and we were only stopping for the night.

15:00 – 21:00 CET – August 13, 2015.
Paris:
I could fill you in with all the details, but really, we just went and saw the sights and had another couple of cups of coffee. Paris is actually a pretty cool place, despite all the french people. The central part of the city seems so grand and I finally understood that romantic feeling that it gives off and why it features so prominently in songs and literature. We had dinner at this cool little pizza place tucked neatly away down a little one way street then head back to the hotel with every intention of sleeping… Time awake: 40.5 hours.

(Something wrong, aussie? – it’s pretty big, i guess…)

22:00 CET – August 13, 2015.
Hotel, Paris:
Oh great, of course there’s a party going on in the hotel lobby with a bunch of travelers, and of course there’s absolutely no way I can say no to drinking with strangers. The hotel sells beers for 2 Euro each, before I know it, I’ve had 16 Euro worth.

23:00 CET – August 13, 2015.
Sacré-Cœur, Paris:
At some point between swigs of beer we had been invited to go with the group of strangers up to the church Sacré-Cœur, which was only a ten minute walk from the hotel. The church sits atop a hill and overlooks Paris, it’s all very beautiful, especially at night. The place is packed with people from all walks of life just sitting around drinking and taking in the view, it’s awesome. There are even guys there, who I can only describe as entrepreneurs, that walk around with boxes of beer, selling them for 3 euro per bottle, until the police come and tell them to stop of course. We buy a handful of beers and enjoy the view. Everyone was really friendly, someone even shared their strange smelling cigarette with me. After a while, it starts to rain, so we say good bye.

01:00 CET – August 14, 2015.
Hotel, Paris:
I’m glad I set an alarm because I fell asleep before my head even hit the pillow.
Time awake: 44 hours. New personal best.