This morning everything had to be packed on our bikes again and we had to say goodbye to Tracy (Iain had already left) and thank her for the last lovely days. Our next destination was the “Fareham Live”, a theatre in Osborne Street, where I thought we would get a big stage, but the meeting room of the Fareham Rotary Club was up on a gallery in the foyer.
We met with the President Malcolm Nicholls, also present were President Maria Jewitt and Caroline Gwatkin from the Rotary Club Portsmouth and Southsea as guests.
We were able to exchange the pennants of two clubs and hand over our Saint James shells of the “Less-is-more-Tour”. Holding my presentation for two clubs at once I had at least a special treat because I could show them the newly cut short film, which I had finished last night for Robert’s birthday.
While I was giving my presentation on carbon footprint and the way we travelled from Rotary Club to Rotary Club, member Mike Hurley of the Fareham Rotary Club already made a plan for our next destination Salisbury, where he contacted the President of the Wilton Rotary Club to meet them tonight.
I couldn’t believe that they had even organised a place to stay for us in the hotel where they usually held their meetings. This meant after our lunch with the two Rotary Clubs we had to make distance and Robert had chosen a special route, which even included a little ferry at Hamble Warsash. A pink ferry shelter marked the place to call the ferryman and wait for the ferry to cross the Hamble river. It was such a small ferry that we were just able to fit our two bikes on it.
The fact that we were already for two hours on our bikes caused an urgent human need in the middle of Southampton that I couldn’t solve anywhere, because either we were biking through endless suburbs or we ended up at the Royal Victoria Country Park which reached the Southampton waters where all the people of Southampton enjoyed the beauty along the river side in the afternoon sun. So no place to hide away. We crossed the huge Itchen bridge, finding us in the huge docklands of Southampton and still no place to get some relief from the drinks I had accumulated since the presentation.
I finally ended up at a gambling hall where I asked for a bathroom, but they wouldn’t let me just get in because it was an adults-only place for gambling and there were rules to be obeyed. Before I could just jump into the toilet I needed to completely register with my passport and name. It was a bit ridiculous, but for the desperate situation I was in I even signed in as a gambler. So whenever I would suddenly discover the unknown vice for the game of chance I would be able to enter any Grosvenor Casino in England and if it would be only for a restroom – lucky me.
We could keep on going following the river Test back inland. The sun was already quite low over the golden fields and shone on massive orange pumpkins lying on a dusty dry soil as we continued towards Salisbury.
We just arrived after sunset at the Cathedral with its famous spire. We found our way to the “White Heart” hotel, where the Rotarians from the Wilton Rotary Club were already waiting for us. President Peter Edge was on the run because he still had another appointment, but we were at least getting a group photo with him and the exchange of the pennants before I held my presentation. We just attached my laptop in the hotel lobby to a TV-screen and I held a second time that day my presentation before an eclectic small audience of Wilton Rotarians. Amongst them was the past president of Wilton Rotary Club and former mayor of Amesbury Andy Rhind-Tutt, who was very interested in our story and wanted to invite us over to Amesbury the next day for a short private sightseeing tour.
We parked our bikes in one of the dining rooms of the hotel to get them charged, and the Rotary Club offered us a complementary room at the hotel. What a great generous gesture. We were overwhelmed.
