Three old dudes behind the decks II

What a night! I'd like to thank everyone for coming down. It was fantastic. I got way to messy but after working 120 hours in the first 10 days of this month I grabbed the chance to let my hair down. There are plenty of photos here for you to look at. The next three old dudes will be our new years gig at the Vesbar. More detail on that when I have them.

Crowd 'aving it large at Three Old Dudes

Three old dudes behind the decks

With there being no finger parties this year I've been hanging out to get in front of a crowed and spin some tunes. So when my good friend Anna asked me to play a few tunes for her birthday I jumped at the chance. I enlisted the help of my fellow djs Pete and Stu and Three old dudes behind the decks was born.
The night went really well and the venue has asked us to come back and play on a monthly basis. So keep watching this space or if you on face book then join the Three old dudes group.
Just follow the Facebook link here.
And you can check out the event pics here.

Beerfest '08

Well it's that time of the year again. Time for me to pack up the van and head to Munich for a few days of drunken antics that is Oktoberfest.
And what would a road trip in either of my vans be without a break down. The last few times I've been away in the van she was overheating a little. Not enough to worry about really but enough to make me do something about it. All I had to do was replace the thermostat, a pretty easy job that should take me about an hour. So I thought Id give myself plenty of time to repair it any way and do the repair the weekend before. I started to pull the thermostat cover off when I ran in to one of many problems. One of the bolts had snapped in the manifold so I had to find and replace the whole manifold. It was a pretty big job but I managed to find the part but then ran into problem number two. I couldn't get it off. But after a week of running round I managed to get it all changed and running the day before we where to due to set off.
The trip over was pretty straight forward after a bit of a hiccup at the start due to me not tightening one of the bolts enough and having a water leak complete with steam everywhere.
We got on the late ferry to France then made our way across to Germany after a few hours sleep in Belgium. Late Friday night we found a little village, where no one spoke any English, to have some dinner before arriving in Munich about midnight, where we hit the sack in preparation for the next days activities.
Opening day at Oktoberfest is madness. The first beer is not poured till midday but you have to be in the cue to get into a tent by 8.30 in the morning or you cant get in at all. We got up early and raced to the HB tent to meet up with the crew and by the time we got there there must have been ten thousand people waiting to get in. Now the HB tent only holds nine thousand so some one's not getting in, and on this day it was us. We went down to one of the side doors where I had got in a few years ago but it was the one door they didn't open this year. No matter, it was an OK day so we grabbed a table out the fount and settled in for the morning. A few of the others that didn't get in came and joined us and it wasn't long till we had a few tables full of people. We sat and watched the first barrel been carried in with the band playing then sat back and waited for the beer to start flowing. And flow it did! We had a great afternoon sitting out the front of the HB tent when some of the girls decided to head back inside, as they had got in earlier in the morning. We tried to follow but while they let the girls through the doors, us drunken guys didn't get a look in. Pete tried again and managed to push his way through securty but I had no luck. In fact all I ended up with was a quick march down to the police station and told to stop being a nusince before being sent on my way. So just when I thought I had lost everyone I managed to find my flatmates at a table outside the HB tent, so joined them for the rest of the evening after resigning to the fact that I wasn't going to be seeing Pete for the rest of the night. He stumbled back to the van at about 2 in the morning.
I wanted to get in early the next day but Pete was to hung over, he's getting old now, so we had a sleep and headed in for lunch. It was a slow start to the day and it took us about an hour and a half to drink our first steins but once we had the first one down, half a chicken and a giant pretzel in our guts we where good to go again. It was a lovely day sitting outside again. The sun was shining, the beer was flowing, lovely people to talk to, it was perfect. So why we decided to go and ruin it I'll never know. We headed inside to join a few others that had a table and that's when it started to get messy. First we had the beer wench from hell! She was bloody scary. There is a photo of Pete looking scared as she was yelling at us at one stage. Then I went and knocked some beers over on the table next to us and made some more people angry. But I brought them some more beers and they soon got over it. In fact I ended up sitting with them for quite a while and Pete wandered off to find the girls in the pigpen. I caught up with him some time later in the early evening to find Pete in a bit of a state. In fact to say a bit of a state maybe an understatement as not long after I joined him at the girls table he was dragged out by security because he had no shirt on as he had thrown it in to the crowd in the pig pen. After I found him outside talking to random strangers I manged to get him into a cab and get him back to the van and put him to bed. A good thing really as we had an early start in the morning for the long trip home.
During the night we had a late night visitor in the form of my good friend Manfeet and we sorted out giving her a lift back to London town. So we got up early-ish and packed up the van and drove down to the camp ground to pick up our passenger then hit the road.
The drive home was pretty uneventful. Everything went to plan and the van ran like a dream although sit getting a little warmer than I would have liked. We even managed to stop at another little town and tried to order dinner in another restaurant where they spoke no English, but we ended up with a fantastic feed.
We arrived back at number 6 at about six in the morning tired but happy after another great Oktoberfest

You can check out the photos by clicking here.

the catch up blog!!

Right guys its catch up time.

So way back in April I headed down to australia for Funky Mikes and Nats wedding.
It was a pretty short trip that was filled with lots of drinking, catching up with both old and new crew, games of golf (that demonstrated I still need more practice on the green!) playing with cute new additions to families and then of cause more drinking. Oh and not to forget the wedding!
There where highlights everyday and it would be a very long blog if I listed everyone but I'm sure your get am idea of the time we had from the photos.
I would like to give a special thanks to Hayley for getting all the London crew together and dragging them down to Kingscliff for one hell of a good catch up night. You can check out the pics here.

Summer here in london has been pretty slack this year but on the few good days the sun has managed to show itself we've tried to make the most of it. It's all about the out doors this summer. Pete and I took our camper vans for a run to the cheese rolling again this year. It was a shame that it rained the whole trip and we had to stand in the rain to see the cheese chasers then spent more time trying to tip-toe our vans out of the grassy hilly car park without rolling our vans before heading to a warm pub to sry out. I'd like to have some pics for you to look at but it was so wet I didnt even get my camera out!! So here's a photo of the hill. As you can see the weather's so bad you can only just make out the top of the hill.


The next outdoor pursuit was a nice picnic in the park for our flatmate Kimmys birthday. The sun played the game this time and we had a few friends come and put on a bit of music including Eric Clapton and John Mayer. We all put a bit of money in the pot and got a few drinks thanks to the good old staff discount at Mayfairs best wine store. Cheers Pete. I nearly forgot, we all had to wear a hat. We had a great afternoon in the sun and then finished with the a few more quiet drinks the Redback. Another great night was had by all. check out the pics here.

I also got to do some thing that I've wanted to do for a very long time a few months ago. As you might know I love flying and of cause I love planes. So when my flatmate Scott wanted someone to go with him to Farnbrough Air Show I jumped at the chance. Another of my flatmates tagged along and it was kind of a boys day out and a chance to be plane geeks. We had a strol round and had a look at the planes on display then headed to the runway edge to check out the air display which was amazing and included the new A380 and some classic old machines. You can check out some pics here.

Last but not least, I kicked off the summer with one of the things I love the most. The Isle of Wight Festival. We only had a small crew this year but I think it was one of the best yet. The line up was fantastic, a real old school rocks dream which included The Sex Pistiols, who blew me away, and The Police who of cause rocked! I took the van down as usual and she ran like a dream. The next big trip is in about a month when I head over to beerfest, again. I can't wait.
You can check out some iow pics here.

Well thats about it really. There's so mcuh more. I've changed jobs again and as I write this I'm working two jobs, days and nights. but more on that later as I need to go and catch up on some sleep. Later.

changes changes changes

I everyone. Sorry for the long gap between posts but I've had trouble with the photo hosting website that I use. While it's still on line they tell me that there is going to be no more development and at for the last 4 months the uploader has been broken so I can't add any photos, and whats a good story without photos! Work has been keeping me busy up until a few days ago so I didn't have much time to find a website that can offer me all the same things that zoto did. I'm gutted as I love zoto and it was perfect for me but after much searching I think I've found a good replacement and I'm working uploading all the photos that I have from the last few months. I post again over the weekend when they are all loaded up and working and give you a quick run down on what they all are and what I've been up to.
Now the new site I'm using is provided by the great people at mac using there very nice MobileMe sevice and with this service I'm able to build a website and I'm working on two at the moment. One for the trip home and one for me. The one for me will be up as soon as I get it looking how I want and it will be a test for the trip home site. I'll let you know when its up and running as it has its own blog page so ill be using that one when its up and running. So that'll mean this blog wont be used anymore. It'll still be here for you to look at but I don't think I still use it unless I can link it to the new site.
But don't worry readers this wont happen for a long while yet!
Right I have to get back to it. Those photos wont up load them selves.

Later

pod cast

Hey guys

Sorry for being so slack over the last four weeks but I've been pretty busy with trips to Australia, Amsterdam, the A1GP final and trying to work as much as I can in between.
This little post is to let you know that I finally have managed, thanks to Stu, to get a mix up on line for you to listen to. Just on the right of the page there is a nice big button for you to push that will talk you to my pod cast page where you can listen to my last mix online or you can subscribe via itunes and it will be transfered for you to put on your ipods. How cool is that!!
It's a groovy little mix that I hope you'll enjoy. I'm working on another one now so that should be up pretty soon to.
I also hope to have a few more postings up this week giving you the run down on my trip to oz and the A1GP.

boat race '08

Hi everyone.

Just a quick one to thank everyone who came down to the old ship for the boat race. It was a wicked day and it was great to look into the crowd and see so many old friends and even more new faces. It was a great way to kick start summer, even if the weather was a bit rubbish!
There are a few photos here for you to look at but most of them are on my face book event page here.

foxes, phones and new jobs

Hi everyone. You may have heard that Ive changed jobs in the last month. If not then I'm back on a building site and back on the tools and really enjoying it. I'm working in Clapham, south London. It's an old hotel that's being turned into very flash apartments. Its a great big old building that is 7 stories high that over looks the common.
Now that I'm back on a building site I have changed back to my old phone with the good camera as I don't want my lovely new touch screen phone to get scratched. So I arrive at work last week and head up to the 5th floor to start working. I set up by the window with my tools and fittings when some movement catches my eye out on the scaffolding. I look out expecting a painter or a bricky to walk past but instead I see this little fella...........

I have no idea how the little fella got up there or even what he was doing but it was kind of a nice surprise for a Thursday morning.
After digging out my old phone for work I discovered a whole lot of photos that I had forgotten about so I have made a new album that I'm going to put all my phone photos on. You can see the the ones that I have up loaded to date HERE

Partie deux de la France (france part two)

So as you may have read a few posts ago, Sams van broke down, due to a faulty fuel pump a few weeks back im France, so we had to do a recovery mission to retrieve the old girl. We also wanted to make it to Mount St Micheal as we didn't make it last time.
We made a plan. I booked an over night ferry for my van that landed first thing on Saturday morning, close to where we had left the van to be repaired. We would then pick up Alice(the van) and drive the 100miles or so to Mt St Micheal, spend the night and then make our way back on Sunday stopping along the way to check out what ever we felt like checking out. But once again the old van had different ideas. I had the Friday off so that I could make sure the old girl was up to scratch and we had plenty of gas, water, food and fuel as I hadn't used betty since beerfest last year. It was after I had filled up with petrol and was heading back home that betty broke down. The fuel pump had gone. How very ironic. Luckily I had a spare electric one on board and so after a bit of fiddling I had it wired up and running.
The girls got home from work and we loaded up and hit the road. We where making good time and the traffic was light so we stopped for dinner at the services. After filling our bellies we jumped back in the van and I went star her up and, nothing. The fuel pump had gone again. I thought that I must have wired it up wrong or that it was just a dud one so i have another fiddle with it but nothing. I couldn't do that much as I had left my tools in Alice on the last trip. There was bit of panic and as we tried to get any of the roadside assist company's to come to our rescue in the time frame we had. Finally a very nice RAC man turned up and with his trusty multimeter informed me that there was no power to the unit so after a quick rewire we where on the road again with a race against the clock to get to the ferry on time.
Mental note; don't leave home with out tools.
We arrived at the ferry terminal with only 1min to spare and luck was with us as the next leg of our journey was trouble free. We had a good sleep on the ferry and made it to the the garage to pick up Alice in good time. I got the garage to do a wheel balance while we where there as I had a bit of a wobble. Then, in convoy, we headed off again.
We arrived at Mt St Micheal mid afternoon and what an amazing place it is. If you get the chance to visit then you really should, and if you don't your really missing out. I think it's one of my favorite things in France, well apart from crepes. Its a huge rock rock sitting in the middle of some sand flats about a kilometer from the main land and when the tide comes in it makes it an island, if the road wasn't there of cause but on a spring tide even the road goes under water. On top of the rock is a beautiful cathedral built in 966 with the most amazing views. On the walk to the cathedral is a village that winds it way up the side of the rock. It's a bit touristy but it's still very pretty and the views on the walk up are great but the views from the very top, and from outside the cathedral are breath taking. It was a crisp and clear day and I could have spent all day up there just looking across the sea but there was a cathedral to look round. There where heaps of cool little parts to the cathedral like a little garden hidden on the far side of the out side of the building. And the archway on the edge of the garden that looks straight down the cliffs.
It was getting late in the day and the sun was low in the sky so it was getting chilly so we headed down the hill to get some thing to eat and warm up a little. We found a nice little pub at the bottom of the rock with an open fire and warmed up with hot chocolate and crepes. Yum!
The girls then headed back in to the village to find a camp site to park up at for the night while I stayed a bit longer to get a few sunset shots of the mount.
I caught with the girls and after Sam cooked up her now famous carrots, peas and pasta, we watched a dvd then went to bed as it was getting pretty cold. The plan to get up early and make our way back to the ferry at Le Havra kind of went out the window as our beds where just to warm to get out of. But hunger took over and I wandered in to the village to find a store that sold French sticks and cheese, for a good French breakfast.
It was another fantastic clear spring day making the drive a very pleasant one even though we didn't have time to stop along the way for anything other than petrol, so I just had to make do with sticking my camera out the window and taking photos. Not something that would recommend any one to do as the results can vary greatly and there is also the small risk of crashing!
The rest of the trip home was plain sailing. The ferry home was good if not a little to long after another action packed weekend, but we make it back to number 6 with plenty of time to get a good nights sleep.
So thats it really. Another weekend away. This time making it home in the vehicles we left in.
As per usual there are some photos for you have a look at here or check out the photo list on the right.

a pretty day in london

Now winter in London can, and more often than not is a pretty dark grey place. But every now and then we get a clear crisp day that reminds us just how pretty it can be if you get out and have a poke around some of its wonderful nooks and cranny's

looking out over London, Greenwich park on fantastic Sunday arvo

For a few more images from this outing click here