veryoldbear

It is ever thus. You have the nail on the head.

I thought the last thing out of the barrel was residual fuel oil (HFO) like what ships used to use on the high seas. The sort of stuff that needs heating up or sawing into logs.

Chin up. Normality will resume. Sometime or other.

Oh goody ... https://www.dailymail.co.uk/money/cars/article-9748997/British-motorists-no-longer-need-Green-Card-driving-EU.html

I have no doubt of the quality of the current batch of EVs, but the price (largely dictated by battery costs) puts them out of the reach of the vast majority of car owners. The ICE is far from dead and there will be a thriving market for second-hand ICE vehicles for many moons to come. Never in my life have I purchased a new car (to be fair I have had a couple of company cars) and resent paying through the nose for a fast-depreciating asset. The ICE car will also remain the only viable option for the flat-dwellers, owners of terraced houses etc etc.

Oh well, just as well BF didn't action the Porto ferry plan ....

Yup, I've just had one for Portsmouth to Caen. Now contemplating the alternatives.

And how does this work for those of us with a maison secondaire?

In one piece. Sideways.

It's basically a mobile version of something that has been running web-based for some time. I've downloaded it and got it running. Oddly enough the web-based version on my computer shows my vaccine status but the mobile version doesn't. It may be confused because I had the AZ vaccine last summer (Aug / Sept) as part of the trials.

Won't they want to run down and do a berthing trial before going "live"?

Ah yes, the second one does look a bit like a hinged / floating one, like the one at Cherbourg.

Google Earth doesn't seem to show any linkspans either in Porto or the commercial port to the North or am I missing something?

The other problem is thaat if you do not have a cabin to park your belongings you have to cart all the bags and coats etc every time you leave your seat to go to the shop or restaurant otherwise you may have to find a new place to lurk when you come back. If you leave your coats and bag to reserve your perch you may be accused of terrorism.

We like the morning sailing from Portsmouth - Caen as we can then get some shopping done and usually arrive at the French hovel in daylight. We live near Didcot so it's a quick blast down the A34 / M3 to get to Portsmouth, but it does mean an early rise, so we do prefer a day cabin to have a nap ... in these COVID times it is probably going to be worth having a day cabin anyway. We don't do overnights unless absolutely necessary.