Plans for Calvisano Are Taking Very Good Shape
All Aboard!
By KevinTheB
August 6 2003
With the exception of a few minor questions to do with Kick Off Time and specific hotel details, we're ready to finalise numbers and needs for the CALVISANO CAPER. Check the itinerary below and make sure you stake your claim.
Arrival, Travel and Accommodation in Calvisano
I still have a few details to iron out with the Hotel Master (for instance – can we use a double room as a single on payment of a supplement, and when they say double, does this also include twin!), but the basic details are sorted.
We arrive in Milan Bergamo just after 1500hrs local time. Allowing time to clear Customs and get a swift one sorted in the airport, WaspExpressOne will be waiting outside Arrivals for us, ready to whisk us off down the motorway on a 40 minute trip (unless we do another pit-stop!) to our Hotel Master in Brescia.
Assuming check-in is as reasonable as Parma last year, we should all be downstairs in the bar for a pre-dinner refresher at about 5pm. One option I am looking at is a 1800hrs Drunken Wasps Tour Dinner in the hotel, to let everyone get introduced to each other (for those newcomers to the party) prior to getting out and about the town in the evening. This will be subject to demand, and not compulsory.
One imagines that Brescia will be treated to the full force of Drunken Wasps in full cry from around 2000hrs Friday through to 0600hrs Saturday, as normally is the case. Trevor will of course be excused at 0200hrs.
Those people taking the full day excursion need to be mobile by about 1045hrs to get on the bus. We’ll get back to Brescia shortly before 2400hrs Saturday night, just in time to get out in the town again. Those people not taking the excursion will need to arrange their own travel to and from the match, as Calvisano is approximately 30km to the SE of Brescia. There are trains from Brescia, but rumour has it that these do not run all night.
Sunday is a more relaxed affair. The coach for the airport will depart at something like 1400hrs, allowing the opportunity for either a good kip or lunch and a stroll around in daylight, as takes your fancy. Hopefully the plane takes off at 1545hrs for Stanstead – independent travellers to their own devices.
I am assuming that all those people travelling in the main party will want to travel on the coach to and from the airport. If there are people who have booked onto the same flights, please let me know in advance if you want to get on the coach with us. The cost of the coach is £15 per head return. According to the description, it is air-conditioned with colour TVs and a VCR – I need to check to see what tape format it accepts, and get my tape of the ZPFinal into this! It is also supposed to have a mini-bar – again, I think this needs investigating!
Given my opening statement about what constitutes what, the prices for accommodation have been set for Drunken Wasps as below. Note prices are inclusive for TWO nights, per person on a bed and breakfast basis.
Per person in a Twin / Double Room - £70
Per person in a Single Room - £100
I don’t know about you, but this doesn’t seem too bad for a decent hotel in the middle of town to me.
A brief explanation on how these tours are costed, (or at least how I do it).
We have been quoted prices in Euros for all the Italian expenditure. To allow for some fluctuations in the Euro rate between the time I issue invoices to you for the trip and when it has to be paid (usually 6 weeks before departure) I add 10% to the quote and round up to the nearest £. If we are lucky, the trip costs less that what we have in the bank. If we are unlucky, then the 10% should cope with the increases. And, as has been seen before, any surplus gets spent in supporting very good causes , so it's all done in the best possible taste!