4th November 2008, after three days without internet connection...

We're back in the UK and parked up where we started, 11958 miles (or almost half the circumference of the earth) later, at Anathema's bungalow of rock next to the M62 near Leeds. We're here because there was no room for us at the venue in Manchester, but it meant that Les, John, Mick and Lloyd were close enough to visit their families for the night. After the show in a lovely old cinema in Lille (quite understandably referred to as the Manchester of France, though you have to be careful what you say as two-thirds of Demians live there) Vinnie headed to Paris and Jay to Utrecht for their respective days off and are flying over for today's show, in thick fog by the looks of things. Rather them than me. The channel crossing was pretty bizarre. After loading the trailer in Lille I wound down with a couple of beers on the bus as we travelled to Calais, then went to sleep for about an hour. We were then woken to show our passports in something of a daze, and I then proceeded to have three pints of Bass ale at four in the morning in a moderate swell. Having a drink on the ferry is a noble tradition which has to be adhered to no matter what the time of day or what cognitive state one is currently experiencing. As has been said many times on this tour, standards must be maintained. There can't have been more than thirty passengers (excluding truck drivers) on the ferry that night, but that didn't stop us enjoying the company of Anathema's old friends Napalm Death in the bar, or Lloyd dining with an old Icelandic bus driver friend who was on his way to pick up Star Sailor. It's a small world is the world of rock (or insipid indie toss in Star Sailor's case).

The photo is of the noble Gimli, son of Groin, preparing for the concert in Lille.

Breaking news: utterly failed in my attempt to buy a kebab by walking straight into the shop window, almost breaking it and my nose. A plaster and a tin of beer seem to have sorted things out for the time being, though we'll see what happens if I need to change a string. More information will follow...