[LM24] Le Mans Diary Part 1

[Liz]

SUNDAY, JUNE 9, 2002

Greetings from a Le Mans track that looks a lot like the one we left last year: cold and damp.

We left England this morning about 5:30, traveling in a car (me and Karen Bradford) and a heavily loaded van (Noel Bradford and Steve, whose last name I do not know). We loaded the van Saturday after I arrived, and believe me when I say it was “loaded” – we have traveled to Le Mans with every creature comfort you can name, from satellite television to tents bigger than my last apartment (mine has three rooms only for me!), to two big marquee tents in which we will live if the weather does not improve. We are only four so far but more are expected by Wednesday. We sailed from Dover to Dunkirk/Dunquirque on Norfolk Ferries, which was a car ferry up until recently and has a small and quiet crew on board. We were also able to watch some of the Mexico-Ecuador football game until we got too far from shore to pick up the signal. Mexico was winning when it shut down. The food was good and reasonable in price, but there was no big shop on board to waste all your money in before you ever arrived in France, as you get on the P&O Line. We made it to Le Mans in about 5 hours with two stops along the way for food and general rest.

As happened last year, we traveled in and out of rain all the way here, saying hopefully to one another, “It’s clearing up, isn’t it?” The answer, as it was last year, was, “No.” All the way to Le Mans we hoped we were driving out of it, and in fact we were driving into it. Nevertheless, the trip was uneventful and we arrived at Karting Nord, the campsite that will be our home for the next 10 days, about 5:30 p.m. France time and set about setting up the site. This was not an easy job, as by that time of course we had a high wind and driving rain to work in, and the site is mainly dirt. Very quickly one realizes that it’s no use to pretend one is going to stay clean or dry, and just mucks in. I have been told there is a Laundromat in town and we will visit it to take some of the layers of mud off my jacket, which I am very glad to hear.

The first order of business was to raise the marquee, which is about 500 square feet and will be used as a dining room and hangout when the rest of the crew show up and meanwhile to get everything inside out of the rain if it does indeed keep up. Naturally the wind picked up as we arrived, and for about an hour the four of us struggled to raise the roof in the wind while other people looked on – probably enjoying the show. Eventually we co-opted six others to help us and within about 2 hours the marquee was up. Then we put up the toilet tent (toilets et al. don’t open until Tuesday) and our sleeping tents, and then we went wearily to bed. The temperature was probably about 6. My summer sleeping bag is barely adequate with the addition of my very damp coat.

MONDAY, JUNE 10, 2002

This morning upon arising at about 7:00 a.m., the first person I encountered was the man checking to see if we had camping permits for the very large site we had staked out. I got Karen up and she dug them out, and the little man went away happy. Then it was time to light the stove for hot water to have coffee, and further unloading, fortunately less work. We put the “staff tent” up next, which is where the cooking will be done, a much easier task than erecting the marquee as it all goes together with poles. You will see the campsite in the attached pictures. It’s quite cozy in the staff tent and tomorrow we’ll have water as well as power. No expense spared. We are very close to the Porsche Curves – in fact I am assured that we will see all kinds of action from here, including people working on their cars, breakdowns, crashes and fires. There were two campervans full of Belgians parked right up against the fence when we arrived, but the French have put a fence up just at our property line, to make a campsite for the Marshalls, and have evicted the Belgians to the other side of it. They are not happy and have already been over to complain twice about our generator and one of the guys using a secluded area for, um, personal reasons. They speak English (we’ve heard them) but they crank at us in Flamande .

That accomplished, we realized we had nothing for our gang to eat, so Karen and I took the car and went to Le Mans proper to the Carrefour, which is like one of the big Wal-Marts in the States. Everything you could imagine is available there, from computers and printers, to car tires, to exotic food and drink, to every kind of camping gear. We came out with baguettes and cheese, a cooked chicken, salad, cookies, chips, burgers and eggs. We also took advantage of the chance to use the loo at the mall, and both commented that it was lovely to have hot water to wash our hands in! We have been making do with baby wipes, which are quite a bit better than nothing. Some of the facilities will open tomorrow. The drive to and from the Carrefour is along roads that will be racetrack in the not too distant future. Karen isn’t sure which part of the track, except that one bit is part of the Mulsanne Straight, and the pharmacy we pass says it is the “Pharmacie du Tetre Rouge” which is also a hint.

When dinner was over, we set up the satellite dish and aimed it properly – and borrowed and begged the bits we didn’t have to hook it up, from a man who is very much like Charlie Hungerford in the old Bergerac series but is very nice and helpful. He’s in his 60s but is in excellent shape, and has an accent that won’t wait. He has plugged in his power to ours and aligned his satellite dish on top of his very expensive motor home (which he proudly detailed for us and added that he’d got it for half price!) but sat in the mess tent with us last night watching the Formula One race from Canada (depressing ending wasn’t it?) and the soccer game earlier in the day between Spain and somebody. It rained off and on all day long, and more people started coming in. There are several groups of Germans in this site, but so far they are restricting themselves to firecrackers and running a very loud generator until late in the evening. [We know they are German because of the firecrackers. They set them off a lot apparently because they like the noise.] The F1 race finished at midnight and we went to bed, and I was much more comfortable as I also had an extra sleeping bag Karen and Noel had fortunately tossed into the back.