We now had an itinerary planned, the only question remaining was what vehicles to take. There were 6 of us planning to go (Foggy, Me, Steve Painter, Chris Cardwell, Pete Farrell and Andy Petterson) so we needed 2 cars. I wanted to take my Merc so it could have a trip back home (and a blast on the Autobahn!!) and we needed an estate to carry the parts so Foggy's V70R was chosen. However, Andy dropped out leaving us with a conundrum - 2 cars became a litle expensive, but one car wasn't quite big enough to carry 5 adults and all the luggage. We sat humming and hahing over the options when one of us had a brainwave! Why not ask Ben Mckie if he wants to come and pinch his strecth 740 funeral car?? This would fit 6 of us easily and leave a large boot and a spare seat to pile all the luggage in/on. Ben was sent a cheeky text asking if we could pinch his car and to our surprise replied in the affirmative! Having spoken to him the following day to make sure that he was serious about it and not just drunk when he sent the text we arranged insurance cover for it and duly booked it on the 14.50 Eurotunnel crossing on the 27th. Ben was unable to join us due to commitments but was still happy to allow us to borrow it - top man!
We all met up at Ben's house at 11am on the moring of the 27th and loaded up the car. This process was somewhat complicated by the fact that Foggy now had extra parts in the shape of 2 extra exhaust systems to take to Benny AND had also brought along a young lady of his acquaintence who we were supposed to drop off in Maidstone on our way past!!
Loading the car;
Driving to Folestone;
Arrival in Folkestone was at 14.50, just as our train was meant to be leaving. Various delays on the M25 and M20 cost us the vital time needed to make check-in so we resigned ourselves to a long wait for the next available train. However Eurotunnel were running 2.5hrs late so we managed to get on our booked train, but we were still running late! We caused a few raised eyebrows when boarding due to the size of the car and it was quickly and expertly realised we wouldn't fit on the top deck due to the ramp angles so we were pulled out of our queue and put on the bottom deck, which was handy as we got to follow this gorgeous Citroen DS Decapotable;
James took over from me as the driver when we reached France which meant that the rest of us were able to relax in the back over a nice lead crystal glass of Isle of Jura single malt each! James wasn't privy to this plan and called our parentage into question........
Our overnight stop was in Leuven, Belgium where we met up with Aymat, the founder of volvo300mania.com who joined us for a few beers and a meal.
The Limo outside the Motel;
Leuven in the snow;
Chris, Rupert, Steve, Aymat, Pete;
Pity I couldn't make the meet at Benny's this year, as I was heading in exactly the opposite direction to you guys! 
