Mike's Gdańsk diary

From The Colonel's Website

Saturday 25th - Sunday 26th February

On Saturday 25th February, 2006, Reardon's tournament for mission 11 was again played in Leamington Spa at Shades snooker club. Unfortunately, Jon, Amal and Steve would be unable to attend, so it was decided that the tournament would be played with the remaining 5 members of the Colonel's Regiment. After a relaxing morning in which Mike opened his birthday presents with Chris, Rupert and David, they left Kenilworth and drove to Leamington Spa, had a quick coffee in Starbucks and then wandered over to the snooker club to acquire a table.

Dave turned up about half an hour later and the tournament commenced. With no paper or draw tiles, the order in which everyone would play was decided by randomly selecting one of 5 different denomination coins. Chris was given the break in the first elimination frame (which would be a race to 10 points), followed by David, Dave, Mike and then Rupert. Mike got through early with a break of 15, before David and then Chris got through. After a lengthy battle, Rupert eliminated Dave to conclude the first round.

In round two, Rupert got the break, followed by Mike, David and then Chris. This time, Chris did the early running and got through first. Mike suffered and went into negative territory early on, but dug in and eventually David and Mike acquired the 15 points they needed to put Rupert out of the tournament.

In round three, Mike took the break, followed by David and then Chris. At this point, Chris started to play reasonably well, potting several tricky balls with the impossimede, whilst Mike and David lost some form. Mike ended up in negative territory again, whilst Chris rapidly raced up to 18 points. It was a race to 20, so David, unwilling to be facing Mike in a one-on-one situation for a single place in the final, began to snooker Chris. He managed to get him down to 9 points again, but at the end of the frame he potted blue and pink whilst Chris potted the black, leaving himself on 14 points and Chris handily placed on 16 points. Mike was on -4 at this point. As the next frame commenced, David got through very quickly, leaving Mike with an uphill battle against Chris. However, Chris fouled immediately, was put back in and fouled again, leaving himself on 8 points and Mike with a chance. He potted a red but went in off, putting his score down to -8. However, he dug in and played a very defensive game, giving Chris no easy chances. Eventually, the tables were turned and Mike got through to the final with 20 points, leaving Chris in negative territory on -4.

Once the tournament had been concluded, the five members of the Colonel's regiment went to the Wetherspoons pub on the parade and David and Mike revealed their potential choices. David selected Berlin whilst Mike selected Riga.

The following day, Mike and David returned to the snooker club along with Rupert and Chris, to play the final of Reardon's tournament. It would be a one frame shoot out. Mike got a healthy 20 point lead early on, but the tables were turned as David grafted his way back into the match. With the colours to go, the scores were almost level again. David potted brown, blue and pink, putting himself 7 up with 7 on the table. However, after a brief safety battle, Mike sank the black to put the final through to a respotted black situation. Mike won the toss and put David in. A safety battle took place again and eventually David left Mike with a long shot. He took it on, but missed it and left David a chance to the green pocket, which he duly took to win Reardon's tournament for the second time. Berlin would therefore be selected as Reardon's choice for mission 12.

Thursday, 4th May

I woke up around nine thirty in the morning and packed. Once I'd loaded the car, I set off. Before heading down to David's house, I headed up to the A45 and made a stop off at a delivery depot on the outskirts of Rugby to pick up a modem which had failed to get delivered to my house. After I'd shown them my passport I received my parcel, got back into the car and headed down to David's house. The M40 was crowded and it took some time for me to get to the A34. Just as I was pulling off onto the A34, I had a phone call. It was Steve. I immediately pulled into the first layby on the A34 and rang him back. He didn't answer, so I drove on. He then rang me back, so I pulled into the next layby and parked between two trucks. It turned out that Steve's Dad was not well and he wasn't sure what to do about coming to Gdansk. Obviously I was very concerned and we had a lengthy conversation. Eventually he decided (quite understandably, of course) that he would have to miss the break and go home to see his Dad. I was obviously disappointed that he wouldn't be joining us, but perfectly understood - I would have done exactly the same in his position.

I carried on my journey and eventually arrived at David's house, to be greeted by David and Chris. My Colonel's break experience had begun. I informed them that Steve wouldn't be coming. They were disappointed but very concerned. We discussed what to do for the rest of the day and decided to take a trip into Reading. We finished watching an episode of Red Dwarf and then walked to Thatcham station. We bought a combined ticket on the train and wandered into the Oracle Centre, heading straight for the muffin place. I bought a french bread pizza, toffee muffin and drink. David went for a pasty, sandwich and drink whilst Chris very greedily went for a panini, pizza, muffin and drink. We chilled for a while and talked about the prospects for the break, before going off to buy some clothes. We wandered into Marks and Spencers, where David purchased some trousers. We lost Chris for a while as he went to try on some shorts, but eventually he emerged and purchased the two pairs he had tried. I bought some cut price jeans elsewhere before we headed over to Starbucks and chilled with some Frapuccinos outside. Chris and I got in banana and caramel Frappuccinos whilst David went for a java cream one. We chilled for a long while. Jon called and informed us of his plans for the following day. After a while, we were offered a sample of the banana and caramel Frappuccino in a really small cup by one of the Starbucks work Geordies. Chris and I were tempted to ask for a sample of java cream instead, but we kept our mouths shut and accepted our free sample.

After a brief discussion of what to do for the evening, we headed to Chilis and were allocated a table outside at the back. We ordered nachos for starters, whilst I had chicken crispers for my main course and David opted for a burger. I tasted my sprite, but it was really horrible so I sent it back. It got replaced, but it was exactly the same. After getting it replaced a second time, I asked for a coke instead. It appeared various people were having similar problems, as all the people on tables around us kept sending back their sprites, but the waitresses didn't seem to get the message. We chilled for a while with cappuccinos, before heading back to the station to catch a train. After the walk back to David's house, we took his car out quickly to get some petrol, before going home and punching the sack. We would have an early start in the morning so were hoping to get at least a few hours' sleep before the break started.

Friday, 5th May

My alarm went off at about 1.30a.m. and I got up. As David came downstairs to make coffee, I walked upstairs and went through the shower. Chris got up and, once we'd all been through the shower and drunk some coffee whilst watching the local election coverage on the television, we made our way outside to David's car. At around 2.45a.m., we'd loaded the car and were ready to leave. The drive to Stansted was long and uneventful. We passed the time singing along to "That Thing You Do!" and Queen, with updates on the election in the gaps. Around 4.30a.m. we arrived at the medium stay car park and were directed to zone J. We parked the car, unloaded, boarded the bus and 15 minutes later found ourselves in the terminal. Unfortunately it was too early to check in, so we made our way over to a coffee bar and got in a round of hot chocolates. We were surrounded by guys wearing rugby shirts and we soon discovered that they were part of a stag party. We hoped they wouldn't be on our flight. As we sat down at a table, a guy at an adjacent table asked us to guard his stuff whilst he went to buy some breakfast. After about 45 minutes of chilling we wandered over to the check in desk, realising that there was now rather a large queue. In the queue we spied Jon, so we hurried over to him and greeted him. Unfortunately the guys in rugby shirts were in our queue too. It turned out they would be going to Gdansk after all. Dave and Rupert arrived about 5 minutes later and joined us. At this point, the queue split into two separate lines and we made for the left line, arriving at the desk faster than lots of people in the right line. After a certain amount of dicking around, we checked in and wandered through passport control. Chris, David, Dave and Rupert headed for Garfunkels for breakfast, only to discover that it was now a Frankie and Benny's. They went there anyway, with David hoping that Benny wasn't on duty. Jon and I walked over to Pret a Manger. I purchased a coffee and muffin, whilst Jon went for a coffee and croissant. We sat on some seats and chatted for a while, bringing each other up to date on stuff as we'd not seen each other for a while.

Once we'd finished our breakfast, we wandered back to F and Bs to find the others. They were paying for their food, so I got a quick pot stop in and, once I'd done this, we walked over to our gate. Dave detoured to buy some whisky, whilst the rest of us took the long walk to the gate. We found ourselves in the extendamead area which we had flown to Oslo from for mission 8. Dave eventually joined us having bought some whisky and arranged to pick it up on his return. Dave ended up ahead of us in the queue and made for the front of the plane. The rest of us decided to go around to the back. For some reason the tables in the seats at the back of the plane were down but, not to be deterred, we put the tables up and sat down. Dave had acquired some seats in the middle of the plane, but we persuaded him to join us. The flight filled up, but were then told by a stewardess that the last four rows of the plane couldn't be used as the plane wasn't full. That was why the tables were down. We couldn't believe it and David was particularly unhappy, as we'd now be scattered throughout the plane. I managed to acquire an aisle seat next to Jon in an emergency exit row, whilst David and Rupert sat together further back. Dave started roaming up and down the plane looking for a window seat, ignoring the vacant seat next to Chris. He eventually gave up and sat in the row in front of me next to Chris. After a brief look through the guide book I settled down and got some sleep. Two hours later, our plane arrived and we joined the long queue for passport control. Dave and I chose the middle queue and were joined by David and Chris, but we ended up getting shafted by Jon and Rupert who had chosen the left queue and made it through to baggage reclaim first. Dave and Jon went through to find out how to get bus tickets and find a cash machine. The rest of us picked up our bags and joined them. I hurried for a pot stop, before following Dave to a cash machine at the other end of the terminal. I drew out 400 Zloty, which I thought would last me a reasonable while. I rejoined the others. David was a bit put out that we went for cash without him, as he only had his 5 Grolsch that Dave had given to him earlier.

We left the terminal, turned right and made for the bus stop. After about ten minutes, the bus arrived and Jon and Chris bought some tickets. We punched them in the punching machine and sat in the middle of the bendy bus. The bus journey was a long one. On route, Dave mentioned that Y in Polish could be a consonant or a vowel. We then said that this must make Countdown very tricky as you could end up with 9 Ys by picking a combination of consonants and vowels. We then passed the time by coming up with an alternative version of Countdown, using Roman numerals in the numbers game, which such phrases as, "CLXII, that's II away. And you've got?", "CLXI". "Well, that's III away. Let's hear the CLXII." After a stop for ticket inspectors to get on board, we eventually disembarked at the bus station. We walked down some steps then a big escalator and went under the train station. We emerged on a busy road, which we walked alongside for a while, before crossing over it. Dave commented on the rather strange crossing music which seemed to get more frantic the less time you had to cross the road. We walked down the street opposite, through a park and after about ten more minutes we found ourselves at the Hanza hotel. We walked inside and Rupert took the lead in checking in. One of the rooms was still made up for three people, so we had to alter this as they'd had no record of Rupert contacting them to do this. Once we problem was sorted, we made for the elevator and rode up to the third floor. Dave noticed a strange graphic on the wall of the elevator which showed the doors closing, in time with the actual doors closing. Upon arrival at the third floor it appeared that the graphic also showed the doors opening in time with the actual doors opening. Myself and Jon wandered into room 309, which was a rather nice room with a balcony. David and Rupert took room 311 next door, which also had a balcony, whilst Chris and Dave took room 313, which had no balcony and an extra bed in it.

I briefly took in the view of the city from the balcony before I going through the shower and, once everyone else had relaxed and changed, we headed outside, dropping our keys at reception, to orientate ourselves. We turned left, walked down the road and then turned left again, walking through an archway to the river. We wandered along the river, noticing a rather large boat moored at the other side of the river. Eventually we arrived at a bridge and another archway leading to the main square. The square was impressive and we paused to take it in, before walking on. Chris and David were keen on getting food and suggested a stop at the local Sphinx burger place on our right. We decided to walk on a little way first, but after getting to the other side of the square, we stopped at a big fountain and discussed what to do. Eventually we decided that we would like to go to the Sphinx restaurant, so we turned around and walked back there. We acquired a table at the back of the outside area. David slid in to the bench seat at the far right, facing the building. I sat next to him, with Jon next to me. Chris sat opposite David, with Dave opposite me and Rupert opposite Jon. We glanced at the menu, noticing some very strange dishes. We all wanted to order a Sphinx burger, but couldn't find one anywhere on the menu. Somewhat disappointed, I ordered an odd sounding chicken dish. David opted for what sounded most like a burger, whilst Rupert ordered the "Kebab of Fire". We amused ourselves by laughing at the similarity with the pit of fire from Big Train. Lots of dicking around then ensued, as the waiter disappeared for long periods of time in between delivering things to the table. He eventually arrived with the drinks, but hadn't brought one for Rupert. Twenty minutes later, Rupert finally received his drink. Eventually, our main courses arrived. I was unimpressed that I appeared to have a few lumps of chicken in strange sauce, a clump of rice and a clump of rather disgusting looking cabbage. I ate the chicken and some of the accompaniments, but left the rest, feeling somewhat disillusioned with my food. Rupert's kebab of fire turned out to be not quite as hot as we thought it would be. Once we'd eaten our fill, I went for a quick pot stop, before we paid up and left the restaurant. We decided we'd return another time to get a Sphinx burger from the takeaway stall, as they were so cheap (about 50p each!).

We walked back towards the big fountain, which had a statue of Poseidon in the middle of it, before turning right and crossing the road to St Mary's church. We decided to go inside and turned to the left to go up the stairs to the top of the tower. Chris did the negotiations and we headed up the steps. We soon arrived at a midlevel landing, which was situated above the roof of the main portion of the church. We walked along it and turned right, entering the tower section, which had steps leading around the outside of it. It was rather spooky and reminded me of the clock tower scene in Batman. Eventually we emerged at the top of the tower and admired the view. There was a man sat on a seat at the top selling 5 minutes with his binoculars. Dave stood up on his bench to get a better view but got told off by the man. We noticed that there was a large church tower in front of us which had a large red tie around it. This seemed very strange. After a while it was getting quite busy in the small space, so we wandered back down. I ended up some distance ahead of the others, so I waited for David and Chris to catch up and the three of us whizzed around the church before leaving and sitting on some steps at the other side of the square to wait for the others. Dave emerged soon afterwards. We began to speculate who would be next. It turned out to be Rupert. Finally, Jon joined us as well, so we contined with our walk up the street. At the top of the road, we turned left and arrived at the top of the main street with the square on it. At this point, I saw a child on a mini three-wheeled motorised police motorcycle appear out of nowhere, do a sharp left turn and drive straight into Jon. Jon tried to dive out of the way but couldn't quite get his feet out from under the bike in time. Fortunately the bike remained upright and Jon was unharmed but the rest of us (except Rupert) burst into hysterics. Once Jon had recovered, we turned right and walked through an archway to be confronted by a market. After a brief period of browsing we found a stall which was selling something advertised as "Gofry". We soon worked out that Gofry was a kind of waffle and decided it was worth sampling. David and I shared a chocolate one and everyone else ordered likewise. However, the woman serving didn't speak any English and communication was difficult. Once we'd got the order in, we were one short and Chris and Jon tried to make her understand that we needed another butterscotch one for Jon. She couldn't understand and Chris went for the usual tactic of just speaking louder in English and gesturing. I suggested she could be our resident mentalist and we should get a destination out of her. David backed off to take a photo and once the transaction had been completed we sat down to eat our Gofry. It was okay and bore a distinct resemblance to a waffle. Once we'd eaten our fill, we walked around the market and left at the far side. We walked around an old building and took a side road back towards the river. Eventually we arrived at a bridge and crossed the river, which led us into some kind of slum. Somewhat unimpressed, we turned left and left again to arrive back at the main bridge leading to the main square. We paused on the bridge whilst Jon and Chris checked out the menu of a potential restaurant on the river and took some photos. After this, we crossed the river and turned right to walk back towards our hotel. Just past our hotel we found an old galleon which offered river cruises down to Westerplatte, where the Second World War started. We discussed the possibility of taking a cruise later on during the break. Just next to the galleon there was a small barge with a bar on it. Dave was keen to stop for some beer, so the others got on board whilst David and I returned to the hotel for a quick toilet stop. Once we'd done this, we joined the others and had a coke, before going back to the hotel to get ready for the evening meal. Jon and I made our way through the shower and then went down into the basement to check out the gym. It was difficult to find where it was, but eventually we found a jacuzzi, an exercise bike and some weights in a room with someone sat at a desk. We concluded the gym was rubbish and decided we probably wouldn't be using it during our stay. Once everyone was ready, we left the hotel. We'd decided to eat at a restaurant called "Mestwin" as it provided "traditional Polish peasant food in Kashubian style". Unsure what Kashubian peasant food was, we thought it was worth trying simply out of curiosity. We arrived at the restaurant but, as we'd failed to bring the guidebook, Rupert decided to run back to the hotel and get it just to check that we'd come to the right place. Once we'd worked out that it was, we went inside and got a table. The restaurant was done out in the style of an old German beer hall with long tables. There were straw pigs hanging from the ceiling and an accordion player sat by the door who would become gradually more annoying as the evening progressed. I sat down with David to my right and Dave to my left. Rupert sat opposite David, Jon was opposite me whilst Chris was opposite Dave. At this point we would be initiating a new round for Gdansk - PC Bourne's mentalist's choice. I ordered vegetable broth and fried fish whilst everyone ordered similarly. We also got a herring in Kashubian style (deciding we should, at least, have some Kashubian representative on our table) and some bread with lard for the table. Tiles were passed around to determine the order of revealing our potential mentalist choice. I prepared a list which would be carried around with us and presented to any potential mentalists we might encounter over the next couple of days. The starters arrived, along with the Kashubian herring and bread with lard. The herring was a bit bizarre and the bread with lard was downright peculiar. Still, the vegetable broth was good. As the meal progressed, the mentalist choices were revealed. Rupert was up first and revealed Andorra. I then went for Vienna, whilst Dave went for Hamburg. As the main courses arrived and I tucked into my fish (once I'd managed to get a knife and fork from the waitress), Jon revealed the somewhat wacky choice of Marrakesh. David then revealed the equally wacky Douglas whilst Chris concluded with his favourite destination of Tallinn. At this point, Dave decided we should write "please choose" in Polish at the bottom of the list, in case the mentalist we chose didn't speak any English, so he looked up the necessary words in his phrase book and I wrote "Projzne Wybierac" at the bottom of the list. Once the mentalist list was complete and we'd eaten and drunk our fill, we paid the bill (which, much to our amazement, came to only 6 quid each!) and left the restaurant. I went downstairs to the basement for a quick toilet stop and met the others outside.

After a brief discussion, we decided to go to a bar in a cellar which Jon had found in the guidebook. It was near the market we'd purchased Gofry from. We arrived there and descended some iron stairs into the cellar. It was very smoky and David wasn't happy about it. There was a television over the bar showing some football. I sat in the corner with Rupert next to me and David next to him. Jon sat opposite me with Dave opposite Rupert and Chris opposite David. We ordered a combination of beers, vodka with apple juice and coke. The barman had a cast on his arm and was somewhat comedic so we briefly discussed the possibility of him being our mentalist. We decided against it, assuming that we'd meet more hilarious mentalists before the end of the break.

After a round of drinks, we left and wandered back to the river. Just before we got to our hotel, we decided to walk through an archway and up another street. We arrived outside a bar called Cafe Kamienica. It looked quite pleasant so we wandered in, walked up a spiral staircase and took a seat in the corner. We got in another round of drinks - beer for Jon and Dave, coke for David, vodka for Rupert, whilst Chris went for a B-52. After a moment's deliberation, I trumped him and went for a B-53. We chilled for a while with our drinks before deciding it was time to return to the hotel. Just before we arrived back at the hotel, we walked past a traffic cone that was chained to the ground. As we were looking for two cones, we decided it was useful as a back up, so left it be and wandered back to the hotel. We picked up our keys and returned to our rooms to punch the sack in readiness for day two.

Saturday, 6th May

I woke up at around 8.15a.m to the sound of Jon talking to me. He told me that we'd blundered and forgotton to reset our clocks to take account of the time difference. We hurried to get ready and rushed downstairs to the basement to have our breakfast. We appeared to be the first ones to arrive. We found a circular table for 5 people as there were no seats for 6 available. I went to investigate the breakfast items and finally settled on a small bowl of Cinnamon Grahams and a weird looking doughnut. I was pretty unimpressed to discover that there was no orange juice so I made do with apple juice instead. As I sat down, Jon decided to go to look for the others and discovered them on the stairs on their way down. Dave was not with the others as he'd opted to sleep in. I ate my doughnut and thought it was pretty disgusting as it appeared to be full of quince. I returned to the buffet for some rather nice looking chocolate cake but that turned out to be vile too - it was full of soggy fruit. I left breakfast and went back to the room to get ready for the day whilst the others finished eating. Once everyone was ready, we left the hotel and made for the station. On route we walked past a statue that appeared to be pissing itself and, after crossing the busy road and commenting on the crossing beep which appeared to get more frantic as time ran out to cross, we found ourselves at the station.

Chris took on his usual role of attempting to purchase the tickets to our excursion destination, the beautiful seaside village of Hel. However, Jon and Chris had decided that we should also visit Sopot on the way through so they attempted to explain their ticket needs to the ticket person. Unfortunately the person selling the tickets didn't speak any English which made communication difficult. Not to be outdone, Chris went for the tried and tested technique of shouting everything. It appeared that he was saying "Get off in Sopot!" over and over again. I then started to parody him and say, "No, not get myself off, get off!" which caused David to crack up. We then developed the joke, saying, "No, not get off with you!" which kept us amused during the transaction. Apparently we could only buy tickets from Gdynia to Hel at that ticket person and had to go to another place to get local travel cards to get to Gdynia. I followed Chris a short way, but turned around to wait for the others as Dave accompanied him to a little hut to buy the travel cards. Once Jon had finished the first purchase, I joined Chris in the hut to make the second purchase. Eventually we all boarded the local train to Gdynia. It was crowded and we ended up sat in what appeared to be the guard van at the front of the train. The train was ridiculously slow and we noticed that we were getting passed by very slow trucks on the neighbouring road. After going through Sopot and not getting off, we arrived in Gdynia, our home for the following half an hour. We therefore decided to go for a walk, so we left the station, passing an interesting doughnut stand on route which appeared to have honey crullers in stock. Outside the station, we got accosted by a girl asking for money. David offered her five Grolsch, which seemed generous, but apparently she wanted Zloty instead. As we walked away, I suggested asking her for a destination but nobody seemed to keen on the idea. Jon and Chris lead the way and very soon we found ourselves walking past two massive dogs, along a chain link fence and into a building site. At this point, David and I shouted, simultaneously, "Don't go down there! There are snipers down there!" We decided it would be more sensible to turn around and walk to the town centre. We turned round and walked down the road to the indoor market. We wandered around for a while looking at the stalls and David and I made a purchase of some interesting chocolate bars - one called "Chalwa" and another called Grenski. Once we'd completed our purchases, we walked back to the station, purchased 6 honey crullers and another doughnut which looked a bit like a walnut crunch, before getting on the train to Hel.

Just before the train pulled out, two boys got on board and hid in the toilet at the back of the train. We assumed they must be fare dodgers. I was a bit annoyed as I was desperate for the toilet. As the train made it's journey along a narrow peninsula into Hel, the fare dodgers proceeded to leave the toilet and then dive back in to hide every time the ticket women came near. Eventually she got wise to what was going on and proceeded to sit down and wait for them to emerge. They soon did and she caught them and wrote out a fine for them. I was relieved as it meant I could finally use the toilet. As the journey continued, several gags about us being on the road to Hel and such like were made. After about an hour and a half on the train, we ended up on the end of the very narrow peninsula, took the train through the gates of Hel and pulled into the station. The fare dodgers were trying to get a head start on everyone else and they leapt off the train before it had come to a halt. We disembarked and, after pausing for a quick photograph next to the Hel station sign and for Chris and Jon to check the train times home, we wandered through a nice park towards the centre of the town.

We soon found ourselves on the main street. Dave and David were keen to find somewhere to get a drink, so, after a quick walk downhill to the sea wall to take in the view across the bay, we walked back to the main street, past some comedic looking toy seals with "Hel 2006" written on them and discussed the plan. Jon wanted to grab food on the go and head straight for the beach, whilst David, Dave and I fancied some time chilling. We therefore decided to sit down outside a Cafe called Cafe Domek. Jon, Chris and Rupert (who had clearly decided it was time to support Jon and Chris) walked to a nearby Gofry stand and then walked to the beach, promising to come back to join us soon. The waiter came and David and I ordered cokes and banana splits whilst Dave went for a beer. Clearly they had no coke in stock as the waiter wandered across the street and into the bar opposite, before returning with two bottles of coke. We couldn't believe it! The banana splits were very strange, as the bananas appeared to be cooked. Still, they were pretty good. We engaged in a very interesting conversation, applying the Big Train Ming sketches, wondering what it'd be like to be lowered into a pit of beards and various other things. This passed the time pleasantly and we were about to leave when the others arrived back.

We were now ready to walk to the beach so we forced the others to retrace their steps. It turned out that they'd just about had enough time to reach the beach before having to turn around and walk back again. We walked down the main street, turned left and walked through some woods. David and I took a brief detour up a sandy slope to look at a lighthouse, before returning to walk towards the beach. At this point, it turned out that Jon had disappeared. We eventually spied him on a side path and deduced that he was detouring for a slash and would catch up with us. Shortly, we arrived at the beach and noticed a large blue slide set back a long way from the beach, full of sand, with barbed wire at the bottom of it. Rupert went to check it out, whilst I took the long walk to the beach. Chris followed me, whilst Dave and David climbed up the steps to join Rupert at the top of the slide.

I sat down by the sea and chilled out and was eventually joined by the others. We soon spied Jon emerging from the woods to our left, some way away. He meandered along the sea front and joined us. Jon and Chris then decided to go for a swim. The sea was freezing and I decided I wouldn't join them. Instead, I decided to orm on Rupert and David, which was much more amusing. I decided upon a brief paddle in the sea, but it was very cold and I was impressed that Chris and Jon were able to swim without freezing to death. After a while we decided we should go for a walk so after a brief photo of the mascots sunbathing and a rather grim discussion from David as Chris accidentally exposed himself whilst getting dressed, we headed off to walk around the peninsula. The sand was very difficult to walk on and David and I decided to cut over to the edge of the beach and go into the undergrowth for a quick pot stop. We ended up a long way behind the others and started running over the sand dunes through the undergrowth to catch up with the others. Eventually, we caught up with Rupert and told him we were going straight back to town as we were worried that we could miss the train. Rupert didn't appear particularly interested and carried on walking. However, Chris came to join us and decided to walk back to town with us. Jon was some way ahead and Dave appeared to have disappeared completely. We cut across onto a nearby path and walked down it, soon finding ourselves back on the main straight. We speculated that there was no way that the others would make the train as they had a long way to go if they were intending to walk all the way around the peninsula. We decided to head back to the bay area to purchase a seal. As we arrived back at Cafe Domek and took a left turn down the slope to the waterfront, Dave emerged around the corner from the sea wall. We thought it was hilarious and couldn't understand how he'd managed to get back to town so quickly. He had no idea what had happened to Jon and Rupert, but we decided to walk towards the train anyway. We stopped briefly to purchase a seal and Hel 2006 joined us as our new mascot. We walked along the waterfront and arrived at the Fokarium, which was apparently a seal habitat and aquarium. However, we didn't have time to go in and couldn't see over the wall, so it was a bit of a wasted trip. There was a fish made out of wire suspended on the wall which people seemed to use to chuck rubbish in, as it was completely overflowing with all kinds of waste.

We continued along the waterfront, before cutting back into the centre and finding ourselves at the station again. It turned out that Dave had lost his ticket, so he went into the ticket office to buy a new one whilst David, Chris and myself boarded the train. Dave eventually joined us, but there was no sign of Rupert or Jon. Just as the train was about to leave, Jon and Rupert appeared, boarding the train just in time. Jon sat in the seat next to me whilst Chris sat opposite. Across the aisle were David, Dave and Rupert. The journey home was long and several of the Colonel's regiment took the time to sleep. Chris got in several microsleeps before the train pulled into Gdynia. We also shared out the Walnut Crunch, which was horrible as it was full of quince jam, the Aha and the Chalwa. Aha appeared to consist of some kind of wafer biscuit, whilst the Chalwa appeared to be lumps of sand moulded together. Rupert thought it was great. Eventually we arrived in Gdynia and we changed trains to Gdansk. Jon declared his intention to get off the train at Gdansk Oliwa as he wanted to see the cathedral and gardens. Chris was keen to join him for this dicking around excursion whilst the rest of us wanted to get back to the hotel and prepare for the evening meal. We bade farewell to Jon and Chris at Gdansk Oliwa, organising to meet them in Cafe Kamienica before dinner.

A short while later we arrived back at the main station. We went underneath the main road this time, taking a slightly different route back to the hotel. We soon found ourselves at an old mill, which appeared to be a bar. We thought about going in for a drink but decided to head back to the hotel, so we carried on up the road, passed a bastion before arriving at the pissing statue and then the hotel. We decided we'd go to Cafe Kamienica on a stammtisch format, so I told Dave I'd go through the shower and then go with him, whilst Rupert and David would join us when they were ready. After going through the bathroom, I knocked on Dave's door and the two of us walked to Cafe Kamienica. It was quiet and we sat down at a table outside. Dave ordered a beer whilst I ordered a cocktail called a Kamikadze. The drinks arrived and I was presented with a blue drink in four shot glasses. We were very puzzled by this and Dave called the waiter back over to tell him we'd just ordered one. We were informed that it was one drink. We thought this was highly amusing at commented that we it was very similar to the scene from Raiders of the Lost Ark. Dave and I settled down for a good chat and were eventually joined by Rupert and David, we ordered beer and orange juice respectively. After a while, Jon and Chris arrived and ordered drinks, whilst Rupert and Dave got another one in. Apparently Jon and Chris had had an encounter with a mentalist who appeared to be collecting cans but, as they didn't have a mentalist's list, they couldn't ask him for a destination. We wondered whether our opportunity to get a mentalist's destination had gone. David was keen to go for dinner as it was getting quite late, so I downed the remainder of my Kamikadze in the style of Raiders of the Lost Ark and we left. It had been decided that, as the previous night's meal had been so cheap, we'd try the Tawerna restaurant, which was badged as an expensive seafood restaurant. However, we decided that, as it was Poland, it couldn't really be that expensive. We made our way to the market square and walked over to Tawerna, which was in the corner near the river. Chris took the lead and secured us a table at the back of the restaurant. I took the seat in the middle facing the wall, whilst Jon sat to my right and Rupert sat to my left. David was opposite me, with Chris opposite Jon and Dave opposite Rupert. Chris and David ordered fish soup for starters, whilst Jon ordered the local speciality soup, Dave ordered a different kind of soup, I ordered calamari and Rupert went for salad. The food took a long time to come and we made kept suggesting going to get a Sphinx burger instead. Eventually the food arrived. My calamari was good. However, we were most perturbed by Jon's soup, which appeared to be served inside a large bread roll. Just as we were coming to terms with this, Dave's soup arrived in a large, ornate silver pot and he was presented with a large ladle to he could serve himself. The starters were pretty good and I had high hopes for my salmon main course. It soon arrived and I realised that I'd blundered. The salmon was covered in melted cheese and on a bed of tomato disgustameads. There was also a small side salad and a very small plate of vegetables provided. I was unimpressed. We decided against desserts, so once we'd consumed our main courses, we paid the bill (which turned out to be very expensive) and left the restaurant. We noted that we could have all eaten at the previous night's restaurant for the same amount as it would cost one of us at Tawerna. As it was late by this time, we decided not to go to a bar, so we headed back to the hotel and punched the sack.

Sunday, 7th May

I woke up at around 8a.m. and, after going through the shower, Jon and I knocked on the others for breakfast. We then wandered down stairs and selected a circular table by the door. I walked to the breakfast area, getting myself some cereal and a weird doughnut. I was pleased to see that orange juice was available this time, so I helped myself to some. Once I'd finished, I left and went back upstairs to get myself ready to go out for the day. Jon soon returned and, once we'd got our stuff together, we walked downstairs again and sat in reception waiting for the others. Soon we were joined by everyone else, so we all walked outside. Immediately in front of us, as if by magic, was a white traffic cone in a parking space. We couldn't believe it. The traffic cone chained to the floor was some two hundred yards to our left. It had to be done. David moved over to the white cone whilst Dave and I made our way over to the one chained to the floor. Dave seemed to want to go for the cone and I offered him the opportunity, but he told me I could do it if I wanted. Once we were both in position, David and I lifted our cones and shouted, "Stop telling me what to do!" whilst Jon took the picture. Dave and I returned to the others, celebrating possibly the most bizarre "Stop telling me what to do!" yet. Once we'd regrouped, we walked round the corner to the Maritime Museum. Chris and Jon were keen to go in but David and I didn't want to go. It turned out that Dave wasn't keen either, so the three of us decided to go to a fort on top of the hill near the station instead. Amazingly, Rupert decided not to support Jon and joined us. We left the others, promising to meet by restaurant Sphinx for a Sphinx burger followed by a trip on the galleon in the afternoon. We made our way past the pissing statue and the bastion before arriving at the old mill. We crossed to the bridge overlooking the pub with the beer garden and paused for some photos. Once we'd done this, we crossed to look at a statue of an astronomer called Johannes Hevelius. We paused and David and I did an application based upon the Dostoevsky scene from the office. Once we'd done this, we continued our walk to the station, going underneath the tracks and emerging on the other side by the bus station.

After walking down the road for a few yards, we noticed a path leading up the hill to the fort. We walked up the slope and soon arrived at the gates. It appeared pretty deserted. To our left there was a moat with the fort on one side and a large warehouse on the other, with what looked to be a viewing platform at the top of it. David and I scrambled up the bank to the warehouse and wandered around the outside looking for a way in. All of the doors appeared to be barred and we soon concluded that there was no route to the viewing platform. We walked around the top of the bank and walked onto a bridge across the moat. We looked down over the city, noticing a tyre in the moat below us. Dave was eager to continue with our walk, so we crossed the bridge and turned towards the fort. There was another large mound on our left, so we walked up it and arrived at what appeared to be a stone pool table. Below us, on the other side of the bank from the fort, there was a steep drop to a plateau, with what appeared to be several old fort bunkers on it. We noticed a man walking towards us with a dog. As he arrived at the top of the bank, he hurled a stick over the side down towards the plateau. The dog, with no thought to its own safety, leapt off the side, down the near vertical cliff and arrived at the field below, before running to collect his stick and striding back up the bank. He repeated this procedure several times and we wondered whether we should ask this slightly crazy man for a destination. We decided against it and made our way down the hill to the furthest of the bunkers. We peered inside and were appalled to discover that it was full of trash. Somewhat unimpressed, we turned around and made our way back up the hill, round the back of the fort and arrived at a memorial with a large, rather strange looking cross, overlooking the city. We admired the view for a while, then decided to walk down the hill towards the cemetary of non-existant cemetaries, which was back on the road to the station. After a short walk, we arrived there and walked in to take a quick look. It was tiny and we soon got bored. The most interesting thing David and I found was a dog in the backyard of the house next door, which seemed to bark everytime you barked at it. David and I turned to leave, only to notice that Dave had already got disgruntled and was sat on a seat outside. We joined him and waited for Rupert. As he left, we took a photo of him dicking around in the cemetary. We crossed the road and looked at bus times for the following day, before walking back to the train station, through the underpass, down a rather dodgy side street and arriving back at the statue of Hevelius. In the park below the statue, there were lots of bums. We thought about asking one of them for a destination but decided it was too risky. After walking passed them, we arrived at a large sundial on the floor and admired it for a while. Once we'd got our fill, we walked on to the mill on the corner, intending to check out the market there, but it turned out it was closed. We decided we should head back to the river and get a drink, so we took the straight road to the river, walking past a rather weird war memorial statue on route. Once we'd got to the river, we had a quick discussion about what to do. There was a large bastion overlooking the river which had been converted into a bar, so we decided to head back to the hotel for a quick pot stop and then return for a drink in the bastion. Back at the hotel, Dave decided to use the toilet in my room, as Chris had got his key. Once we'd both been, we met the others in the lobby, at which point Dave discovered that he'd had the key in his pocket all the time. We wandered back to the bastion (stopping at the galleon on route for a quick chat with a guy working there to confirm that the boat would indeed be sailing) and sat outside, discussing what to do about getting a destination from a mentalist. It wasn't looking good. David wanted to get a destination from Poland's answer to a younger Rolf Harris, who walked past as we were chatting. A waiter came and we put in our order. David went for a coke, whilst I got a coffee and Rupert and Dave ordered beers. There was a sausage stall just underneath the seating area and the waiter kept going over to chat up the girl who was serving there. The galleon sailed past and David and I took a quick photo.

Once we'd completed our chilling, we paid up and decided to wander along the river to the Sphinx burger stall. As we passed our hotel, we noticed an old guy walking along the river dressed in a pirate's costume. He was talking to everyone and stopping to stamp children's hands with a little stamp. We talked to each other and decided that if there was ever an opportunity to get a destination from a mentalist this was it. Neither Dave nor David were willing to make the first move and talk to him and I knew Rupert wouldn't, so it was clearly up to me. I was nervous, but I swallowed my fear and turned to walk towards him. I showed him the list and said "Projzne Wybierac" in as fluent Polish as I could muster. He proved to be very friendly. He said, "Ahoy" to us several times and shook my hand, followed by Dave's and David's. He then looked at the list, repeating "Hamburg" to himself several times. I assumed he'd chosen Hamburg and then asked him to confirm this. At this point, he read down the list, missing out Andorra at the top, as he clearly wasn't interested. He then said, "Hamburg, Marrakesh, Douglas, Vienna." He paused and didn't read out Tallinn, before saying, "Vienna. Me, Vienna!" I was delighted - he'd chosen my destination. As if to prove it, he took out his stamp and placed a stamp next to Vienna, thus selecting it, and at the bottom of the list. He then said, "Ahoy!" several times and shook his hand again. Throughout the whole discussion, I was resisting the urge to break into hysterics, but I shook his hand happily, delighted to meet such a comedic and clearly friendly Polish native. He bade us farewell and we walked to the Sphinx burger stall in the square in high spirits. Rupert rejoined us, having disappeared quickly when I'd started the conversation, obviously embarrassed once again. We couldn't believe that he'd missed out on the fun but at least he'd managed to get a couple of photos. David and I decided to queue for a Sphinx burger, electing the chicken variety. When we received it, we discovered that Sphinx burgers were actually pretty disgusting. They were full of lots of crap and had tiny lumps of chicken at the bottom. It tasted really quite disgusting. Chris and Jon arrived, having taken a boat across the river to another part of the museum, but succeeding in missing it on the way back and having to walk around to the main square. We filled them in on our encounter with the mentalist, who we discovered, thanks to the stamp, was called Andrzej the Pirate. They decided to queue up for Sphinx burgers whilst the rest of us took a walk to the galleon to purchase tickets. David and I asked Chris to buy us a fillet burger when they put their own order in, hoping that it would be better than a Sphinx burger. Arriving back at the galleon, we purchased our tickets and boarded, climbing up some wooden stairs to sit at a tabke occupied by a woman on her own in the stern. Chris and Jon soon arrived with their Sphinx burgers and our fillet burger, which was only slightly less disgusting than the regular Sphinx burger. The galleon began its journey to Westerplatte, which was the site at which World War II broke out. The journey took us through the ship yard, past lots of large ships and cranes whilst an announcer told us about the sights in Polish. Eventually we arrived in the river estuary and the boat turned around at the Westerplatte monument to begin its voyage home. On the way back, I got a round of drinks in at the bar under the seating area in the stern and we chilled at our table admiring the views and laughing about our mentalist encounter. David got in a good application of Dodgeball, saying in Chris' voice, "There's a guy in Gdansk who dresses as a pirate?", with Rupert answering "Yes, you know, Andrzej the pirate. Ahoy!" "No, not ringing any bells. Oh look, it's Andrzej the pirate!"

As we sailed back through the dockyard, Chris and I walked down the stairs and up the stairs at the front of the ship to admire the view, whilst the announcer began to play his guitar and sing some songs. As we joined the others, David said, "He went home to get it", getting in a pretty good Office Application. He started singing "What shall we do with a drunken sailor?" in Polish and I suggested he should sing his own version of Button Moon, with the lyrics, "We've been to Westerplatte..." The galleon eventually arrived back in the centre and sailed past its mooring place to turn around, before docking. We disembarked and headed to a pizza restaurant around the corner from our hotel, deciding to check it out as a potential venue for our final night meal. It looked pretty rubbish and David and I weren't keen on going there, so we wandered over to the top of the main square and walked past the town hall with the big tie around it. We then discovered an Italian restaurant called "Restaurant Napoli". It looked okay and we thought it would be a fine venue for our final night meal. A waitress came out and asked us if we'd like a table but we informed her that we'd probably be back later. We walked back to the square and had a brief discussion about our plans. Jon and Chris wanted to go to the fort and then to a tiny pub in a doll's house. Dave, David, Rupert and I didn't fancy going to the fort again and preferred the idea of chilling, so we told them that we would effectively begin the stammtisch and meet them in Cafe Kamienica before the final night meal. The four of us walked back towards the river and decided to sit outside one of the bars in the square and get a round of drinks in. We noticed Andrzej walking up and down the market square chatting to people and I was keen to go over to him and invite him to our final night meal. The waiter came and Dave and Rupert ordered beers whilst David and I ordered cokes. A lengthy and rather unpleasant chat about the concept of a Chrimal occurred and David came out with an excellent Alan application which was a prime candidate for application of the break. We got in a second round of drinks and, after some more chilling, walked back to the hotel to get ready for the stammtisch. Dave said he was going to go for a walk to check out a church, so would go to the stammtisch from there. I went through the shower and got changed, before leaving for the hotel at around 5.40pm. I decided to walk along the river, pausing to admire the view. I arrived at Cafe Kamienica at around 5.50pm. I looked around and discovered that I was the first one there. I sat on a settee next to the bar and ordered a beer, before settling down to read the script for the play I was rehearsing, "The Invisible Man". About ten minutes later, Dave arrived. He sat down and ordered a beer, informing me that he would have been there earlier but he ended up accidentally attending mass and was about to leave, but had to take part in the "holding hands" section before he managed to get away. We settled back and chatted, expecting that David and Rupert would soon join us. However, after about 20 minutes Jon arrived and ordered a beer. He had apparently arrived back at the hotel room about 20 minutes previously and had quickly changed before leaving to join us. After another half an hour, no one else had arrived, so Dave and I ordered a Kamikadze each whilst Jon went for a similar cocktail called Green Field. He was hoping that his drink would also come in four glasses, but it didn't. David and Rupert eventually arrived at about 7 o'clock. David appeared disgruntled that he was so late. Dave and I were keen to recreate Raider's of the Lost Ark with our shot glasses, so I picked up my first glass, downed it, turned the glass upside down and forcefully placed it on the table. Dave followed suit, with David taking photos. As I got to my last glass, I pretended to struggle as downed it, prompting David to give some money to Jon, but I waved their hands away, before turning my glass over and placing it on the table. Dave downed his final drink, before slumping over, apparently unconscious. Jon therefore gave some money to David, thus completing the application. Chris arrived just as the application was finishing having dicked around in the bathroom for some time. He ordered a Kamikadze for himself and half attempted a recreation. We then ordered a final round - I got a White Russian whilst Chris ordered a Screaming Orgasm, David had an orange juice and the others ordered beers. Once Chris had finished his screaming orgasm, we paid the bill and wandered to the restaurant Napoli for dinner. We were guided towards a table for six in the corner. Dave took the sit in the corner whilst I sat to his left and David sat to my left. Jon sat opposite Dave whilst Chris sat opposite me and Rupert sat opposite David. Rupert, Chris and I ordered wine between us whilst David ordered a coke and Dave and Jon ordered beers.

We then prepared for the first mascot draw. All the mascot tiles were placed in the draw tin. David had already been allocated Reardon and I was playing PC Bourne as Andrzej had picked my destination. The others then picked a tile each. Rupert drew Shaft, whilst Chris drew Glogg, Jon picked the Leprechaun and Dave picked Kurt. The remaining mascot tiles were left in the tin and Steve and Amal's tiles, along with two blanks, were added. Everyone then drew another tile. Dave picked Barney, whilst Jon picked Grosser Vass, I picked Amal and Chris picked Steve. David and Rupert both picked blank tiles.

The waitress arrived with our drinks and we put in our food order. I got fish soup for starters, followed by a marinara pizza. The others ordered likewise and we did the number draw for the order of revealing of destinations. Steve was up first, but I had received no text message from him. Rupert sent him a reminder message, but we decided that if we hadn't heard from him by the time we had to start the mascot rounds, we couldn't put him in the draw. Jon was up next and explained his desire to visit the Czech Republic, but not Prague. He therefore revealed:

BRNO

as his choice. David was up next, and revealed

HELSINKI.

As our starters arrived and we tucked in, Chris revealed

HELSINKI.

I was next and I revealed

HELSINKI.

Four destinations down, three of which were Helsinki. The draw was looking good so far. It was then to be the turn of Amal, so I picked up the envelope, opened it and declared that Amal's choice would be

BERLIN.

Of course, Reardon's choice was also Berlin, so we had three Helsinkis and two Berlins in the draw so far. As the pizzas arrived, Rupert went next and declared that his choice was

RIGA.

David was disappointed, but I thought that it could have been far worse. I tucked into my marinara pizza, which was excellent, as Dave stepped up to reveal his choice. David and I began to get worried, as there was really no guessing what Dave might do. He embarked on a long description of his destination and then revealed it as

CORK.

A knowing look passed between myself and David - we had a fair idea which destination we would be trying to veto. It was now the turn of the Leprechaun's choice. I had what I thought was a good idea - budget airlines had just started flying to Canada and I thought that it might be a good idea to organise a Colonel's break to Toronto or Halifax. After some discussion, we decided that the Little Lucky Leprechaun's choice would be

CANADA.

The list of destinations were then completed as Reardon's choice of

BERLIN

and PC Bourne's choice of

VIENNA

as selected by Andrzej, were added. We then settled down to do the mascot rounds. As was customary, Glogg would be up first. The mascot tiles were put into the tin and Chris selected one at random, revealing it as the Little Lucky Leprechaun. We began to get worried. Obviously it was possible that he could be helped by Glogg, but he could also be bummed. The tiles, "Bum", "No bum" and "Kiss my face" were then placed in the tin and Chris drew one out, revealing that the Little Lucky Leprechaun had been bummed. We were gutted. Canada was therefore removed from the draw immediately. Only Shaft and Grosser Vass could help the Little Lucky Leprechaun now. At this point, the waitress arrived and took our dessert orders. David, Rupert and I went for ice cream cake, whilst Dave went for ice cream. Jon wanted to share a dessert pizza with Chris, but Chris unsurprisingly decided he wanted a whole one to himself, so Jon and Chris ordered a dessert pizza each. The diplomatic immunity round was then performed. A blank tile was placed in the tin along with "Kiss my face" and Dave pulled out the "Kiss my face" tile, meaning that someone would be allocated Diplomatic Immunity. My name tile was then placed into the tin, along with Dave's, David's, Chris' and Rupert's as we were the ones eligible for Diplomatic Immunity. Dave then pulled out a tile at random and I was delighted when he revealed my name. I had thus obtained Diplomatic immunity and would hold it until it was revoked. It was Dave's turn again to be in charge of Kurt's veto. We were each handed a piece of paper and wrote the name of the destination we wished to veto. I wrote Cork down, hoping that other people would do likewise. Dave then took the tin and said, "I'll count the votes", before saying pulling each piece of paper out in turn, opening it and saying, "Cork", "Cork", "Nothing (obviously)", "Helsinki", "Cork", "Cork". With four votes, Cork was removed from the draw. It seemed that Jon and Chris had joined David and I in voting for Cork, whilst Dave had voted for nothing and Rupert had, for some reason, voted for Helsinki. When David challenged him about this, he said that it was because it was over-represented in the draw. We thought this was a slightly odd reason to vote for a good destination. Dave was therefore vetoed for the second break in a row, but could be saved by Shaft. All mascots with destinations were eligible to be shafted, as well as Amal, and Glogg and Kurt's veto could also be shafted. Rupert received the tin, with two blank tiles and the shaft tile in it. He then drew one out, but it was blank. Dave was therefore out of the draw. Our desserts arrived and we tucked in, as it was time for Grosser Vass' round. Jon received the tin along with two blank tiles and Grosser Vass' tile, before drawing one out at random. He revealed "Grosser Vass" indicating that Grosser Vass had made something Grosser for the first time. The eligible destinations were placed in the hat and one was drawn out. It was PC Bourne. Grosser Vass would therefore have Vienna as his choice in the draw.

We ordered coffees and settled down for the rehearsal draw. Of course, two draws would happen simultaneously, as we needed to ascertain when diplomatic immunity would be revoked. Eight destinations were placed into the tin (the nine eligible ones minus mine) and it was passed over to me. I said, "Diplomatic Immunity" as Dave drew a random tile from a stash of seven ("revoked" and six blanks). It was blank. I then eliminated a tile. It was Reardon's Berlin. Reardon thus did a Barthez. David then received the tin. I maintained my immunity and David elimiated Grosser Vass' Vienna. Dave then eliminated PC Bourne's Vienna, Rupert eliminated Chris' Helsinki, I eliminated David's Helsinki on behalf of Amal and then Riga on behalf of myself. At this point, I'd survived all the rounds of Diplomatic Immunity and with only two other destinations left, my name was returned to the tin. I said, "Diplomatic Immunity" and Dave turned his head, saying, "It's just been revoked!" Chris then picked and eliminated my Helsinki. I was gutted. David then picked a tile, leaving Jon the remaining tile. Amal was still in with a shout of winning yet another draw. David revealed the runner up of the rehearsal draw as Amal's Berlin, leaving Jon to celebrate with a Shearer as Brno won the rehearsal draw.

Our coffees arrived and everyone was getting nervous as we began the main draw. As the draw began, I held up my Diplomatic Immunity tile and said, "Diplomatic Immunity". Dave then drew out a tile, which was blank. I received the main draw tin and picked a tile on behalf of PC Bourne, eliminating

BERLIN (Reardon).

Reardon did another Barthez. I maintained my diplomatic immunity before David received the tin and eliminated

VIENNA (Grosser Vass).

Dave drew another blank tile, before eliminating

BERLIN (Amal).

A pretty poor finish for Amal and both Berlins were gone from the draw. Dave drew yet another blank tile and Rupert then eliminated

BRNO.

Jon was gutted, having won the rehearsal draw. I then received the tin on behalf of Amal. Dave eliminated another blank tile and I then picked

HELSINKI (David).

on behalf of Amal. David was very disappointed. I then said, "Diplomatic Immunity" before Dave picked a tile, rotated his head and said, "It's just been revoked!" My name was then placed into the tin along with the remaining names - PC Bourne, Chris and Rupert. It was my turn again and I eliminated

VIENNA (PC Bourne).

4th place was a pretty decent finish for PC Bourne in his first draw. Three destinations were left, two of which were Helsinki. Chris then received the tin and eliminated

HELSINKI (Chris).

Yet another self-elimination and Chris was disappointed as he was yet to win a draw. We were beginning to get very nervous. It was me against Rupert; Helsinki against Riga. Could Rupert win for the second break in a row? Or could I win my second draw after a gap of two and a half years? David received the tin and drew a tile, leaving the remaining tile to Jon. David had been in a very similar position in Zurich, with it being him against Rupert and then he succeeded in eliminating himself. He was hoping that he would atone for that this time. He looked at his tile, revealing the runner-up as

RIGA.

As Jon revealed the winner as

HELSINKI (Mike)

I leapt to my feet, slid past David and ran out of the restaurant with my left arm above my head, celebrating with a Shearer. I couldn't believe I'd won and that we'd finally be going to Helsinki. I returned to the table after a quick trip up the spiral staircase to the gents. We chilled at the table for a while discussing the possibilities for mission 12, before paying the bill and leaving the restaurant. We walked through the main square to the river and wandered alongside it for a while. We paused near Cafe Kamienica and discussed whether to go to a bar for a final drink. I told everyone that I was exhausted and wished to go to bed, but didn't mind if other people wanted to stay out. After a brief discussion, it was decided that everyone was too tired, so we all made our way back to the hotel. I said goodnight to the others before Jon and I returned to our room and punched the sack.

Monday, 8th May

I woke up at 7.10a.m. to the sound of Chris knocking on our door. Not impressed, I stumbled over to open it, telling him that we'd be down shortly. Once we'd been through the shower and packed our stuff, Jon and I walked downstairs to breakfast to discover that everyone else was already there, at the circular table just inside the breakfast room. I selected some cinnamon grahams and, discovering that there was no orange juice, I had to content myself with an apple juice instead. After a brief period of chilling at breakfast, we walked back up to our rooms. Jon, David and I wandered out onto our respective balconies and shouted, "I love Poland, man!", as a final tribute to Gdansk. We then gathered our belongings, walked to the elevator, went downstairs and checked out. We took the route back to the station which led us past the bastion, the old mill and the statue of Helvetius, before descending the stairs and going under the train station past the flower sellers and honey cruller sellers. Jon and Chris decided to try to buy tickets in the bus terminal. The rest of us thought we should just get the tickets on the bus, but the insisted, so we walked up to the bus stop whilst they went into the ticket office. Five minutes later, they joined us at the bus stop having failed to get tickets. Once the bus arrived, we boarded and Jon and Chris bought tickets. It turned out we only needed two tickets for the journey, leading us to believe that we'd been shafted on the outward journey. David and I sat at the front and prepared ourselves for the long journey to the airport. On route we passed a comedy mentalist handing out newspapers to drivers in the middle of the road and as we ventured into the countryside we witnessed a car run into the back of another car alongside the bus. After about an hour on the bus we arrived at the airport and disembarked. We strolled to the check in area, noticing an armed security guard patrolling in front of the desks. Once we'd checked in, we walked upstairs and sat down in the bar. At this point we noticed that Rupert had disappeared and it turned out that he'd wandered outside to take a photo of the airport, which seemed a little strange. We scraped the remainder of our money together and ordered drinks - cappuccinos for myself and Dave and tiny soft drinks which turned out to be flat for David, Rupert and Chris. Jon decided he wanted to go for a walk outside so he disappeared whilst the rest of us chilled.

I looked at the departures board and saw that the plane was delayed by 15 minutes. Once we'd drunk our drinks, we left the cafe and walked over to the security area near the stairs. We had to undergo a rigorous "patting down" search before being allowed into the departure area. The departure zone was tiny, with two small shops and a stall selling drinks. David and I made for one of the shops along with Rupert, to assist in his purchase of some Chalwa for his Mum. We couldn't understand why he wanted it. I walked over to the far side of the departure zone and sat down with Chris. I then proceeded to borrow Chris' "Shitedoku" book and spent the next hour or so before boarding doing some puzzles. Eventually it was time to board, so we pushed through the crowd, attempting to queue-shaft as many people as possible and boarded the plane. I took a window sit on the right, with David to my left and Rupert to his left. Across the aisle, Chris sat by the window and Jon sat in the aisle. For some reason, Dave wanted to sit by the window on his own so sat behind me. The flight back to Stansted took about two hours and I spent the time doing lots of "Shitedoku". As the plane descended into the Stansted area, I hurriedly finished the puzzle I was doing, managing to do so just before we landed. Disembarking the plane, Jon and I ended up ahead of everyone else and we hurried to passport control. Once we'd arrived, David, Rupert and Chris queue shafted us by choosing a faster queue and ended up getting to passport control ahead of us. At this point I turned my mobile phone on and received a very sad message from Steve. Apparently he'd been in the hospital all night - his Dad had been very ill whilst we'd been away and Steve was fearing the worst. We were all stunned and found it very hard to believe what Steve was going through.

I told the others about the message and we walked over to get our bags. After Jon, Dave and I had taken a pot stop, we collected our bags and headed through customs. We then bade farewell to Dave and Rupert, who were making for the bus to take them back to London. We also said cheerio to Jon, who was heading back to Cambridge. He left, then two minutes later walked past us and headed in the other direction, having gone the wrong way to catch his bus. His Gdansk experience was finally over. David and I then found ourselves waiting around for Chris whilst he purchased some food at WHSmith's. We began to get disgruntled, as Chris was dicking around, but he eventually joined us. We ran outside to catch the bus to the midstay car park, but as we were arriving the doors closed and it prepared to drive off. I was about to turn around and shout at Chris for causing us to miss the bus, but just as I was doing this a woman with a pushchair managed to get the bus to stop and open its doors. We got on too, much to my relief. Once back at the car park, we loaded the car and took the journey back to David's house. The journey was uneventful and we soon found ourselves on the M4. David suggested a trip to the Star Inn for some food. It was approaching 4p.m. and David and I hadn't had anything since breakfast (Chris had greedily devoured a sandwich in the car) so I agreed. We pulled off at the Basingstoke exit and about 45 minutes later (and after being stuck at some roadworks for ages) found ourselves at the Star Inn. David and I ordered scampi whilst Chris ordered a small chicken dish as he was feeling quite full after his sandwich. We chilled for a while and discussed the break, before paying and driving back to David's house. I was eager to get on the road as I still had a fair way to go, so I packed my car and bade farewell to David and Chris, as David was off to drop Chris at the station at the same time. I drove away - for me the Gdansk experience was now over. The drive back to my house was uneventful and, after a brief stop at the services on the M40 for a pot stop, I arrived back at my house safely. The Gdansk journey was finally over.

But it's Helsinki next time!