Wade Gravy 01 February at 16:48
We're past the worst of it.
The sun is hanging around in the sky for more minutes everyday.
It's rays are delicious on the face, though Jack Frost still lurks in the shadows.
And the Stoke Travel weekenders have officially begun.
We went up to Andorra to kick it off. The group was small. The service was intimate.
The service wasn't intimate in the sexy sense, that obviously requires a surcharge.
The guides outdrank the tourers. Such is to be expected. We are, after all, professionals.
Sleep was gained around 5am. Wake up calls were at 8am. Three hours sleep is not enough hours sleep.
But we did it. And we had fun. We slid around on the white stuff, we fell alot. I was still drunk for most of the day and when that started to wear off I went and got a beer.
That is how things work in the alpine environment.
For me, and for Stoke Travel, the apres-ski activities are given equal, if not more, attention than what goes down on the slopes.
The bar staff gave us a bottle of schnapps, lest we order eleven shots a million times.
As I have mentioned previously, we here at Stoke Towers have worked out, scientifically, the perfect balance between physical activity and internal physical activity.
We achieve a certain balance. The carbs put inside you drinking are burnt off the next day through awesomeness.
This weekend we're off to Morocco again. Hot, cool, sunny, dark, dry, wet.
We'll return after the weekend tanned. Those who are not going will be jealous. They'll pretend to like our stories whilst harbouring murderous, envious, intentions.
We, however, won't mind. Content we shall be in the reliving of our weekend surfing in North Africa.
What are you doing this weekend? I'm going surfing in North Africa.
Coming up the weekend after is another trip to Andorra. This one will fall on Valentines Day weekend. Couples in love are definitely not welcome.
Excessive drinking makes me queasy enough.
Then we've got more trips coming up. To the mountains, to the beach.
The big one is a wee way off, but worth getting excited about. Las Fallas in Valencia, in March.
Burning shit and drinking booze.
We'll be setting up the (in)famous Stoke Travel camp near the beach again. DJ's, open bars, a nightly symphony of grunts and groans that lends the impression that our tent city is populated by moose, geese and pre pubic owls.
Eeeer eeeer, oh honk oh honk, hooo hoooo hoooooooo.
Don't let the winter pass without investigating the Stoke Travel way.
Check out our trip calendar - http://stoketravel.com/tripcalendar.htm
And our Morocco trips -
http://stoketravel.com/tomorocco.htm
And Andorra -
http://stoketravel.com/toandorra.htm
And of coyrse Las Fallas -
http://stoketravel.com/valencia.htm
Or email info@stoketravel.com for more information on anything. And I mean anything.
Don't wallow in self pity this winter, get out there and make the goddamn most of it.
Stoke Travel - new and improved and operating for eight months of the year more than usual.
Stoke Towers Booze Years New Letter - thank God the silly season is over
To members of Stoke travel
Wade Gravy 05 January at 17:24
Stoke Travel New Year Booze Letter.
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Welcome to the new decade. The first things that I have noticed are the similarities between this one and the last. This is always the case, however. When the last decade was rung in it was done in conjunction with a century and a millennium. Apparently robots were going to take over the earth once the clock struck midnight, but that didn’t happen.
And I was considerably younger, as were all of you. Some of you weren’t allowed in pubs, some of you snuck in nonetheless. Some of you were looking forward to moving up a school in the year 2000. Maybe this year some of you are going abroad to study, starting a new course, a new job. Maybe you made out with someone when the clock struck 12 and you plan to marry them. That last one will never work out. Alls that I ask is that you promise me one thing, like a group resolution that we will all go into this next decade with. The promise that you will have as much fun as is physically possible. And when you’ve reached that physical fun limit utilise your mental limits, then spiritual, then abstract. By the end of the decade I want you all hacking away at your metaphoric fun reservoirs, sighing, saying, “goddamn that was one motherlicking fun decade”.
Now here comes the fun.
Our first, free, Barcelona pub crawl goes out on the 14th. These are our way to get to know some of the new arrivals, show you around the best bars and clubs and get a little drunk with you. Call Gravy on +34695487602 or email on gravy@stoketravel.com to book, as spots are limited (but if more people want to do it, well we can just do it again on another night, because that’s how we roll).
We’ve started a new format this decade. While we still offer all of our trips all of the time we have included on our website a bit of a schedule. This is so those with limited time here can make a bit of a weekend plan to get a few different things done over the months. Check it out at http://stoketravel.com/tripcalendar.htm.
What we will be mostly doing is trips to Andorra to ski and Moroccan surf adventures. These leave regularly in the winter/early spring months. The weather is, fortunately, warm in Morocco for the surfers and cold in Andorra for the skiers and both destinations are reporting great respective conditions. Check out the packages at http://stoketravel.com/andorra.htm and http://stoketravel.com/surfmorocco.htm respectively.
Another upcoming trip which is quite exciting to me is the festival of Las Fallas in May. Las Fallas is exciting because people set fire to massive paper statues. It is also exciting as it is the first event on our festival schedule, so it includes camping and drinking and beach games and parties, parties, parties. I’m excited. Can you tell I’m excited? I’ve even got a small boner over it. It takes place in March, so plenty of time to plan and we’ll be running a weekend trip from Barcelona, a day trip from Barcelona and a camping only option for those wishing to make their own way. The info will be up on http://stoketravel.com/valencia.htm over the next couple of days.
And in April we start surfing in Spain and France. The surfing, wine, food, parties, beaches and beauties (male and female) of the Spanish and French Basque country are the reasons many of us visit Europe and stay. These trips are easily reached from anywhere in Europe, and while it isn’t the height of summer the weather is mild, we have all the suits, our hotels are heated and the rum really warms you from the inside. Again the info will be up soon on http://stoketravel.com/surffest.htm, but to get a taste of what it is like check out http://stoketravel.com/biarritz.htm.
Now we do need reps starting in the European universities this semester across all programmes. Repping for Stoke is a great way to make extra cash, be a part of a rad young crew and fill your semester with festivals and surfing and snowboarding and drinking and hooking up and eating delicious food and drinking wine and beer and doing everything that is wonderful and that we were warned against by our parents but exactly what they would do if they had the same opportunity.
Remember, you aren’t here for long, the semester will be over before you know it unless you fill it with trips. We’re here for a short time, but a good time, and remember our joint new decade resolution pact…. You wouldn’t want to upset the Stoke Towers crew, now would you….?
Happy New Year/Semester/Decade/You and see you all soon.
Gravy
+34695487602
gravy@stoketravel.com
The Christmas Booze Letter - The Queen Aint Got Nothing.
To members of Stoke travel
Wade Gravy 24 December 2009 at 13:03
Merry Christmas Motherlickers!
I sincerely hope that most of you won't read this Booze Letter until after Christmas, as Christmas is a time to indulge in our other addictions - food, booze, getting new things.
So I guess my Christmas greetings are redundant, take them retrospectively. But it isn't just that one day, it's the whole season, the silly season. I prefer to call it the season of no respite, from Christmas Eve to Christmas Day, Boxing Day to Santa's Sunday, Mad Monday, Tipsy Tuesday, Wet Wednesday (New Year's Eve Eve), New Years Eve (Thirsty Thursday), Friday NIght, Saturday All Day, Sunday Sippers..... You know what I'm getting at.
Most of us are planning on doing something new in the New Year, hopefully all of us. I know many of you are planning to go abroad to study for a semester. Many are coming to Europe, even a few are coming to Barcelona. If any of you guys need any help with temporary accommodation, assistance finding permanent accommodation, someone to party with, someone to buy beers for, please don't hesitate to give me a call.
Others are off to Morocco to go surfing. I know that, as per usual, the waves, weather and food are perfect down there. 'Tis truly the season for surfing in North Africa. I also know that some fine fillies are heading down to the surf camp and that our surf instructors are going to try and plant some mistletoe smooches on them. If there are any strapping young lads that would like to head down and cock block them, please book now.
The recent cold snap made Barcelona a different beast. One day we were running around in flip flops and the next flip flops and jackets. The upside of the cold and terrible weather is that it deposited a proverbial shitload of the white stuff of everywhere. I really think we should take advantage of the cold by doing two things, 1) marveling at our, and others, erect nipples, and, 2) going up to the mountains to snowboard, and look at nipples. www.stoketravel.com has all the details.
It is also the time to make, and break, resolutions. Stoke Towers' resolutions are reliant on you guys, which is easy for us because we just make them, sit back, and let you all do our resolving work. In 2010, the first year of the Teenies, we are going to keep on doing what we do well, just do it better and bigger and looser. We want to drink twice as much beer next year. We want to keep partying four hours past the campsite curfews instead of two. We want to surf more and party more and sunbake more and run with more bulls and throw more tomatoes and drink more steins and dance in more cities than we ever have before.
We want to be responsible for tens of thousands of dancefloor pashes, thousands of one night stands, hundreds of holiday flings, a few dozen relationships, a handful of "going home together"s and maybe even a Stoke baby. Or twins.
In any case we have a stocked hedonism calendar next year. From January 1st until December 31st we have stuff going on. We still need reps in all the major European Universities, and around the world.
For more information on that, or on anything else, please don't hesitate to email me on gravy@stoketravel.com, through facebook, or call us on 695487602.
Mwah, Merry Christmas, Loose New Year, and Happy Birthday Jesus.
Ho ho ho ho.
Stoke Towers Booze Letter - Jack Frost aint got Jack Shit.
To members of Stoke travel
Wade Gravy 11 December 2009 at 15:01
After all we know, as a species, about structure construction why, oh why, did the band Starship boast that they built their city on rock and roll. Surely concrete foundations would have been a better choice.
Enough of that. Hands up who has been surfing in Morocco this year. Yep, look at that guilty hand dangling by your side. Good for nothing, that hand. I've been speaking to the amazing nose, who is down there dishing out lessons and cous cous, and he confirmed that the weather is still hot and sunny and that there have been consistent waves. Off you go, keep him company.
http://stoketravel.com/surfmorocco.htm
The season has officially begun in Andorra, also. Our team of scientists have been slaving over the beakers so now we are the only travel company that can boast to know the formula which allows one to party the most and still get up in the morning to slide down mountains. Want to know the formula? Come to Andorra.
http://stoketravel.com/andorra.htm
Remember that song that went, "there aint no party like a west coast party 'cause a west coast party don't stop?" Shithouse. I don't want to attend a west coast party. I want my parties to eventually stop, so that I may rest and recuperate. Last weekend my party didn't stop and I was delirious with fatigue and my dancemoves benefited from it.
What I am trying to say is two fold. A) I am still the dance commander, and B) come to Barcelona, it is a whole disco ball full of fun. Come for a weekend and play boozehound with us.
Finally January is going to be a mess, we've got snow trips and surf trips, party nights in Barcelona, thumb wrestling world championships....
The real finally, we're looking for reps world wide. You want to sell our trips for us, then do them, then send me an email. We need them where YOU are now, so get involved.
Stoke Towers Booze Letter, Wheels Glorious Wheels.
To members of Stoke travel
Wade Gravy 26 November 2009 at 14:57
While at this time of year the squirrels are hiding their nuts in tree trunks, I’m busy wrapping mine in flannelette, the chequered material giving my wheels both warmth, AND aesthetics.
And there is nothing more necessary, in the universe, for a man to do, than to try and improve the look of his wheels. Quite disgusting things, they are. I have always wondered how girls can even contemplate touching them after seeing them, all wrinkly and saggy and overwhelmingly gross.
Not like chest wheels, which are delicious, delightful and delectable. Why the female of the species was endowed so pleasantly and the male covered in vile I will never know.
Or I should say that I would be busy wrapping my wheels in flannelette if I wasn’t currently holed up in sunny Barcelona. I spent today down by the wharf and it was delightful. The shirt was off; sensibilities were offended; chest hairs were fried to a delicious golden brown.
And by night we’ve been keeping warm by filling our livers with deliciousness. The Stoke Bar is open in central Barcelona, under it’s winter name – Grandma’s Place. If you are in the area, be sure to call in. We serve the cheapest beers in town, we throw shithouse parties, and the music is predominantly from Fleetwod Mac.
But we have too much fun here. And every night we serve dinner for free. And you can pretty much do what you want. And Nan left a couple of flat screens so we’ll be watching sports galore, including the upcoming ASP world title showdown at Pipeline. It’s the best shit bar in town.
And Stoke Travel continues to be the best shit travel company in town. We’ve sent that clandestine frog, Allan de Carne (that’s right, Allan) down to Morocco to push people into waves and teach them how to drink. We’ve set up in a house down there, the dinners are cooked by a real life Moroccan cooker, the weather is hot, everyday. I don’t think it has ever rained there – a Moroccan river is merely a slightly lower line of dirt and rocks than the rest.
And there are goats in trees.
But if you don’t feel like surfing don’t forget Andorra. We’ll be heading up there from December onwards. The mountains there are as mellow, or extreme, as you please. The range ranges, the slopes slope, there are various angles and pitches and a low temperature combines with precipitation and manifests itself in snow. Delicious delightful snow, which can be slid down on various snow sports crafts.
But don’t get me wrong, Stoke Travel snow guides aren’t the base jump off the back of a mountain lion jumping off a wakeboard going over a frozen waterfall type. We don’t sweat Red Bull. We sweat booze. So fully expect to spend your evenings drinking and dancing horribly and trying to pash mountain goats.
And that’s this Booze Letter. Any questions about anything in the world can be sent to gravy@stoketravel.com.
Also, if you aren’t easily offended, check out Gravy’s World at www.gravysworld.blogspot.com. Where some bloke called Gravy takes a bigoted journey through the countries of the world from Z to A. Though it is prudent to add here that the opinions in Gravy’s World are by no means the opinions of Stoke Travel, Stoke Towers Booze Letter or Gravy himself.
Have fun and protect your wheels, chest or otherwise.
Stoke Towers Booze Letter
To members of Stoke travel
Wade Gravy 02 November 2009 at 14:40
It finally happened. Despite being favoured by the warm, smiling face of the sun during the weeks of Stoketoberfest, I am afraid that our round-faced firey friend has made like the migratory birds and headed south for the winter. That leaves us, the hard core Europhiles, with six months of soul crushing darkness, the nightmare that is four hours of piss weak sunshine a day, leaving home in the dark and getting home in the dark, resulting in moon tans and skin so translucent amphibians ask you for your phone number…
So what I am going to do is propose three courses of action to alleviate the dreariness and combat those inevitable suicidal thoughts. I am also going to reignite that Stoke summer feeling by throwing out the first round of job offers, so lets get into it, my pasty little chickadees…
1) Alcohol. Many a brave winter campaigner has survived the winter months through the liberal self-application of alcohol. Yea, to lubricate oneself day in and day out is a proven escape from the day-to-day shittiness that is a life lived sober. Choose a watering hole near your place of residence and make it a daily point to enter. Here you will see a new world, greatly contrasted from that outside. Warm, smiling, red round faces, songs being sung and nuts roasting over open fires. Various meats cooked to juicy, and all manner alcoholic beverages, from beers and wines to chase away the hangover to tequila, rum and sambuca to inspire its revival the following morning. Stoke Towers’ holidays are over and we are now back Barcelona, with a liver full of ideas for nightly, and daily, mayhem. If you are going to be around we have lots going on, as well as VIP cards for Barcelona’s next best watering hole, call us if you want to get shitfaced - +34695487602.
2) Sand. We flew Royal Air Maroc, and if that is the airline the actual Moroccan Royal Family fly, then I wish them the best of luck. It’s not that the airline failed to provide what I wanted from them, they picked me up from Spain and delivered me two hours later in the desert, but I am not accustomed to the same level of comfort as Royalty. People complain about airlines, about flying, but I feel quite spoilt every time I take to the sky, I eat delicious meals I wouldn’t normally eat, and watch films that aren’t yet out on DVD and am waited on by attractive foreigners, who give me all the wine I please. Royal Air Maroc didn’t provide these services, the food they put into my belly was uninspiring, the in flight entertainment non existent, the most attractive stewardess looked like a female Elvis, in the latter stages of his obesity, and there wasn’t wine. But it was cheap, and it got me to Morocco. Which turned out to be fantastic. Warm weather, plenty of sun, good waves and cheap. And oh so accessible from the European winter. You should see Stoke Towers’ tan, we look delicious, like hash cookies. And there are plenty of hash cookies down there, and camels and goats in trees, and sand and rocks. A truly amazing, albeit quite different, experience for anyone marooned on the European continent over winter. The Stoke Surf House is fantastic, with big rooms, and three delicious meals a day and the rooftop terrace looks over some of Morocco’s best breaks, which are a short walk, and an even shorter drive, away. It’s open from now until the start of next summer, so book your flights and get down there.
3) Cold sand. Otherwise known as snow. European winters can be a bit of a pussy sometimes, with the celsiuses hovering above zero but below five. Three degrees is as cold, if you ask Stoke Towers, as minus five, effectively. But London and Paris and most of Western Europe stay, for the walrus’ share of winter, in the temperatures that promote mist, drizzle and fog. Sometimes, however, in the cities the temperature does drop, for a day, and we are treated to a sprinkling of delicious snow. Oh how the mood changes, grown men slide at breakneck speeds on plastic bags down slight declines. Mothers throw snowballs at police officers, and kids build snowmen, their genders identified by perpendicular carrots protruding from the upper part of their bottom segment. But by the afternoon it has all but turned to slush, stained by general city detritus, and now the home to a thousand frozen dog poos. The wise, however, don’t wait for the seasonal slush dump, and take themselves to the mountains, vast areas of steep angles, where the altitude favours the temperatures required for fluffy cold sand, and the aforementioned angles facilitate the sliding. In true Stoke fashion we’ll be running a couple of booze filled ice odysseys this winter, with our Andorra house, for Pyrenean shenanigans and base Austria (no not basement Austria, you horrible Fritzls you) where we do our three country snowarama (Austria, Slovenia, Italy). Stoke Towers is going to be there, and we hope that you are too, as we are probably the only tour operators around that really understand that when it comes to Alpine holidays the sliding on the mountains always comes a definite second to the warming of oneself with schnapps and horrible dancemoves. All details are available on the website, or by email – gravy@stoketravel.com…
Classifieds.
Every season we get some fantastic staff and after every season said fantastic staff, mostly, head back to the real world, where they work as accountants and philosophers and semen moppers in peep shows. Which gives us the opportunity to, every year, employ some new faces. For next year’s surf camp (France and Spain), festival (San Vino, Running of the Bulls, Tomatina, Stoketoberfest) and tours schedules we need a few people, tour guides, DJs, bus drivers, surf instructors, drivers, chefs, rub and tug artists. So send me your expressions of interest soon and we’ll keep you in mind.
Of course these jobs are all quite sought after, and we will no doubt be inundated with requests from below minimum wage seekers. We also have a year round rep system, world wide, where go getters can sell our products, make some cash, and put themselves at the top of the list for the summer jobs. We need reps yesterday, so email me today and get started.
And that is that, this week’s Stoke Towers Booze Letter. And remember what we say here at Stoke Towers – winter ain’t so bad if you have a belly full of rum and you’re up to your guts in nuts, or vice versa.
Stoke Travel – better than killing yourself this winter.
Stoke Towers Boozeletter - what befell our heros after the wonderous Stoketoberfest.
To members of Stoke travel
Wade Gravy 15 October 2009 at 10:21
Stoketoberfest is finally over. After some seventeen days, ten thousand litres of beer, two thousand people, two hundred tents, three hundred sleeping bags and mats, what seemed like a million sausages and chicken wings, countless horrible dance moves, way too many cigarette burns, two arrests, one hospitalisation and a couple sexual encounters – we made it to the other side. I think it is the right time now to blame everybody that attended for Stoke Towers’ physical decline and to consecutively thank them profusely for an impossibly good time. There are some amazingly horrible and incriminating photos out there, and please keep them coming and keep on a tagging. Stoke Towers is going to put together a compilation of the best and make it available to everybody.
Once we cleaned up everybody’s vomit and used condoms we left. We chucked everything on the bus and got out of there. First stop was Austria, which while being spelt, and sounding considerably like, Australia, has actually zero similarities to the Great Southern Land. What it is, really, is Germany with mountains. And it has spawned its fair share of celebrities too – Arnie, Hitler and Josef Fritzel. Last time Stoke Towers was there they visited Vienna Zoo, which was full of pandas (two) and saw many shooting stars, which has no relevance to this trip, but nicely stretched out a boring segment all the same.
Next stop was Switzerland. Oh Switzerland, the Jessica Alba of countries as it never ceases to give Stoke Towers a raging, friendly, erection. I don’t know if it’s the mountains, or the lakes, or the colour of the water, or the people, or the fondue, or just the fact that when you buy a sandwich they put enough sauce on it, but Switzerland is fast becoming Stoke Towers’ favourite country. One word of warning, however: beware all roads in this little mountain wonderland that aren’t major highways. I, in my infinite wisdom, guided the Stoke Bus through a ‘short-cut’ which led us through a series of cliff side hair pin turns on a road barely wide enough for two hatchbacks, though populated by renegade truck drivers, to a top altitude of some two thousand and something metres. Needless to say that when it was all done underwear had to be changed en-masse and a million beers immediately consumed.
But it got us to Interlaken, where we were able to catch up with the rat bags from bus2alps.com and Outdoor Interlaken. After a night in Balmer’s hostel bar on the beers, getting drunk with these guys, and a little bit of sweet talking, Outdoor Interlaken let Stoke Towers into their canyon. Now Stoke Towers has to admit that, being their first time and having heard all of their friends talk about it, they were a little bit scared about plunging into such an odd looking cavity. Nevertheless, Stoke Towers donned its protective rubber suit, and when sure that everything that was about to happen was above board, got stuck right in there. Now I must admit that it did start a little dry and slow, and was sometimes painful, but the deeper we went into the canyon the moister it got and by the end we were moving at a really rapid pace due to the lubrication on the canyon walls. It got fast and wet. It was all over too quickly, and while Stoke Towers may have felt like they were superstars, the canyon barely even noticed their presence and at the end when there were infinite secrets to learn about the canyon, and how to better attack it next time, Stoke Towers had a cigarette and went to sleep. We would like to thank Outdoor Interlaken for letting us into their canyon, but wonder why they haven’t been answering our calls.
Next on the agenda was Italy. Italy is a nice place, but is unfortunately populated by Italian males.
After that we cruised the French Riviera. Unfortunately Stoke Towers had too much money and nowhere along that stretch could accommodate our expansive needs, so we had to simply drive straight past it. If it improves its standard in the future I assure you that Stoke Towers will be back.
Then home to Barcelona to plan our winter. And what a winter it will be indeed. Stoke Towers is going to be partying harder in that fair city than anyone has before. We’re also going to be snowboarding as often as possible in Andorra, just up the road, and surfing in Morocco. As a matter of fact this booze letter is being written from opposite the beach in Morocco, from the Stoke house down there, and I must admit, through my biased fingers, that it is looking mighty fine. Stick these stats in your eyeballs: thirty degree air temperature with the water a balmy twenty one. Couple that with a delicious Moroccan dinner costing about four euros in a restaurant, and consistent, high quality, waves, and you’ll find Morocco to be the perfect winter get away for thrill seekers of all ages….
Now I just copied that from a Moroccan tourism advertisement. But it really is a good, albeit different, place. And when I get around to filling in the next Boozeletter instalment, I will tell you allllll about it.
Stoke Travel – balls deep in the autumn of innuendo.
Stroke Towers Boozeletter Number 46
To members of Stoke travel
Wade Gravy 23 September 2009 at 10:34
Stoke Towers, coming at you alive, dangerous and twitchy, like an epileptic cobra fresh out of the Stoketoberfest Munich Fart Farm. The scene in front of me is horrific, horrifically fantastic. There is party detritus littering the dancefloor; bottles, cigarette butts, humans. I can see, imprinted perhaps forever, the fossilised foot prints of a million bad dance steps; I can still smell the vinegared remains of innumerable bad pickup lines; our camp is unnaturally moated by vomit with an unusually large liquid content. There is not a head around that isn’t sore, and there are plenty of heads, but despite that I don’t think spirits could possibly be any higher. Beer is for breakfast around here.
We arrived here three days before the festival after two weeks on the road. That two weeks on the road was proceeded by a long, hot and amazing summer. We were chased by bulls, drowned in tomatoes, we surfed in four countries, over two continents and in three distinct waterways. We crossed the iron curtain; we crossed the velvet curtain; some even crossed the beef curtain. Not many. Now, though, now is reasonably fresh in Stoke Towers’ collective cerebellum. Surely Stoke Towers can dredge up something to paint a picture of what it means to be here, now, at the famous Oktoberfest. Maybe.
Rewind a year, exactly, and the temperature plummeting to positively negative levels. Stoke Towers were wearing jumpers coupled with jackets and shirts with singlets, scarves, beanies. Stoke Towers slept each night in a hamster’s nest of blankets and sleeping bags and humans. Stoke Towers still got pneumonia. But that is a different story.
A really different story. This year it is all shorts. Shorts and singlets, and dresses and light flowery fluffy gear. Spain wear, sombreros and chorizos have replaced moustaches and bratwurst. During the daytimes it has been hot. Can you believe that? If you were here last year you wouldn’t be able to. The nighttimes, also, have been hot. So hot that the Stoke girls have been forced to lift their tops to let the cooler air in. So hot that the Stoke boys have rolled in mud, in a quasi-homosexual armadillo impersonation, in order to cool down. It works, I’ve seen it on the discovery channel. Soon there will be photos up, they’ll show in full graphically gross detail that what I’m writing hasn’t been a fantasy.
But it’s not only the beer, though it overwhelmingly is. Yesterday Stoke Towers went into Munich proper – and it isn’t as boring as you’d think, being the capital of a boring countries most boring region. There are beautiful buildings, there is a surfable wave in the river. There are fantastic specimens of humanity all over the place. Stoke Towers with their perma-sickness stood out. That is what living the good life does to you.
Today? Back to the beer halls, back to town, surf the river again, soak up the sun, eat a sausage. Dance and drink. Just have fun. Prost, party, play harmonica, pick a pack of pickled peppers. Punch a porcupine in the pit of its paunch.
And after here? Another road trip, Southern Europe this time. And then Morocco, and then Andorra, and then Barcelona, trips to Rome, the Alps, Eastern Europe, more surfing, more partying, more living.
Stoke Travel – camp as fuck.
Stoke Towers Guide to Europe's Worst Tour.
To members of Stoke travel
Wade Gravy 11 September 2009 at 19:48
Hi,
I don't have time to write an in depth and intelligent newsletter today. OK I have the time, I just don't want to. The beers here cost 4 cents each. The kebabs are called kebaps and coast 2 euros something. I'm in Dresden, on the real side of the river. Let me tell you somethings about our trip as it has panned out so far.
Day One: We left late and drove far. We decided to stop near Lyon in France and we slept on the bus. The sleep was fucked but spirits were high. People started farting almost as soon as we left Barcelona, which started a vile trend.
Day Two: Paris in two hours. While I shopped for pates and wines and cheeses for our picnic that night the tourers had a grand total of two hours to see one of the world's greatest cities. They took three, I was furious, I sulked, we stopped for our picnic and the wine made me happy. We slept outside on a hill that was eventually named 'hillbilly's loin'. It was nice until the pneumonic morning slid its cold belly across our chests and a double decker bus 30 screaming, tree climbing children into our dreams. The next morning we left at 8am, a record that still stands.
Day Three: Brugge. Shithouse. Boring, old people, bricks. A medieval town that was deserted due to the salination of its only access to the sea, which was its access to trade, its reason to exist. Enterprising Belgians decided to rebuild its medieval architecture and entice tourists. It worked, but tourists are boring. Then the movie, 'In Bruges' came out and Colin Farrel's lovable psychopath made us want to check out what his character described as something that would be liked by a 'retard raised on a farm in the country'. Unfortunately Europe's touristic patrons, the elderly, still blow in there en masse. We sat in a bar after the briefest of walks and got pissed. Had a ball. Bruges - shithouse, our time there? Fucking sweet.
Day Four: Amsterdam. Mind altering drugs are illegal here now, magic mushrooms can no longer be purchased in the 'smart' shops. Due to a silly legal loophole, however, magic truffles can be. Some members of the tour partook in said mushrooms and saw monsters and goblins and magic unicorns riding magic walruses. I reckon they all just got a little paranoid and saw the opportunity to plague my earballs with cliches. 3 stars.
Day Five: Amsterdam again. I said to them, I said, "why would you guys take natural ecstacy, it is never going to be as good as real ecstacy, which is pretty shit and not at all condoned by Stoke Towers".... The next day everyone wanted to cry, or be hugged, or left alone, or all of the above. Comedowns off 'herbal' ecstacy apparently sucks arse. If you are going to be a monkey you may as well be a motherfucking gorilla.
Day Six: Berlin on three cylinders. I sat in the hostel common area drinking beer by myself. See day five.
Day Seven: Berlin au go go. The walking tour starts with an Irish coffee and finishes with a beer in a beer hall. We saw the sites, looked at buildings that once meant something important to someone (in)famous. We went out. Some members of the group stayed up drinking all night and carried it onto the bus. They gave me the shits.
Day EIGHT: Dresden. If someone blows up your city, don't rebuild it in its olden appellation. But please, please, do sell beer at next to nothing on the grungy, non Baroque, side of the river. And do, please, populate your city with punks and skin heads, and sell kebaps for peanut sauces and yeah, keep that up.
And on that note I am off to continue drinking beers and eating kebabs. Oktoberfest starts next week, so get involved.
We're off to Prague tomorrow, a city full of stuff. I wonder what we'll find there.....
Stoke Towers Booze Letter; the number after the last one.
To members of Stoke travel
Wade Gravy 31 August 2009 at 11:58
I think that now is a pertinent time to do an orifice count. Shall we do it together? Let’s go! Ears = two. Eyes = two. Nostrils? Why that is two. Eat hole is another one and then you’ve got the downstairs mix-up, which would add another one for the jap’s eye and another for the balloon knot, bringing the tally to a glorious nine.
Why have I subjected you to an orifice count? Because post La Tomatina I know of a good sized crew of really good people who are pulling tomato pulp out of each of those glorious entry points. If you didn’t make it, check out the photos and we’ll see you next year.
Next on the agenda is the ‘Rolling Festival’, Europe’s first, only and, of course, best events tour. But enough about that, that sounded like I was trying to talk us up, and that goes against our manifesto. How about Stoke Towers gives you the ‘Stoke Towers’ Guide to Certain Cities in Europe’.
Barcelona: Founded in 1977 by failed wizards, Barcelona is the fourth biggest city in the autonomic community of Lower Shazza BahBah. There are some sixteen people living here, specialising in the exportation of tourists with lighter, or missing, money carrying units and the importation and distribution of magical potions and powers that keep people awake all night and alters their mind in such a state that they think dark caves with flashing lights and repetitive sounds are places to be sought after.
Paris: Known as the city of lights, Paris is a city lit up by means of electricity. Before electricity people lived in the dark, making it much easier for ugly people to pick up better looking people in discoteques, which, by the way, were boring affairs due to the lack of music and lighting. Modern Paris is lit up and lies on the banks of a river, which is born at the top of a mountain and dies when it hits the ocean, kind of like a Sherpa, who aren’t renowned for their ability to swim.
Bruges: If you were to fill your mouth with round lollies and go camping in the Siberian wilderness, in summer, at night, with a gas lantern you would say something like, “what arrre orrr theshe bruges” because there would be a million mosquitoes trying to fly into your orifices and the lollies in your mouth would make your voice funny. And you wouldn’t know the difference between a mosquito and a bug, because you would be an idiot for camping in the Siberian wilderness, in summer, at night, with a gas lantern.
Amsterdam: Is below sea level. Other things below sea level are fish. Fish are one of the few house pets never to have marijuana smoke blown in their face by stoned teenagers. I have seen mice, cats, dogs, birds, lizards and other domesticated beasts, red eyed and paranoid. It is ironic that fish haven’t ever been stoned, as everything below sea level in Amsterdam is.
Berlin: There have been some great walls in history. The Great Wall of China was built to stop dragons from entering China and eating all of the fried rice. This wasn’t because the Chinese wanted the fried rice for themselves, but because the high levels of msg were detrimental to the health of those flying, magical lizards. There are many chinese people all over the world, even in Berlin, on both sides of the wall, as Berlin also has a wall. There are no dragons, with the exception of those tattooed terribly onto Germanic shoulder blades.
Dresden: Is a city whose name begins with D. D is also for Danger, Doctor, DeaDly, Doosh bag. These can all be founD in Dresden, though not exclusively. There are also some great things in Dresden that start with D and some things, gooD and baD, that start with other letters. Like builDings, though most of them were DestroyeD (D) in WorlD War Two. Haha, good times.
Prague: Is full of vampires and communists. I hear that they eat almost exclusively potatoes and blood and that they have nuclear weapons aimed at garlic factories.
Cesky Kromlov: I am stuck on this one. I think it has a castle and a river. Some people ride down the river on tyre tubes and tyres are sweet as are the tubes inside them. If it wasn’t for tyres we wouldn’t be able to drive our bus to Cesky Kromlov, and wouldn’t that be a shame, given the breadth of interesting history there.
Munich: Otherwise known as Munchen. When in Munich I really enjoy munchin’ on delicious roasted swine and guzzling super sized beers. Mmmmm. This is not only the home of Oktoberfest, year round you can drink oversized beers and shorten your already shortened life further with super fatty, salted meat dishes.
So we are heading off this Friday, taking on all of these cities and whatever we find in between of interest. If we see a nice field of flowers, we can stop the bus and frolic. If we see a pack of wolves, we can stop and take photos of them, pat them, maybe be raised by them.
If you are interested in coming along, please email me or call me, on, as per usual, +34695487602.
Stoke Towers Newsletter Number Minus Seventy Three
To members of Stoke travel
Wade Gravy 24 August 2009 at 12:25
Stoke Tower's is on holidays! Yep, we've rellocated from the luxurious, monkey filled, penthouse for six weeks. That's right, bored reader, six newsletters from exotic locations, six cllections of letters, more erratic and nonsensical than before, due to the pina coladas surging through my cerebellum and the hot, hot sun boring into the back of my melon...
And on that note:
This week's newsletter.
Valencia, a city so orange and round it was named after an orange.
Like the rest of Mediterranean Spain the beaches cover you in dirt, and this time of year the weak potato soup they call the sea inspires more sweat when you’re in it, then when you’re out of it, being relentlessly beaten by that radioactive tomato in the sky.
But it isn’t as dire as my whinging ramblings may imply. It could be worse if it was raining, which it never does here, or colder, which it isn’t. Overcast would be worse, not on my watch buddy. And as for the sea, well a cold sea sucks, and this one is fringed by all varieties of scantily clad senior citizens, and let’s not kid ourselves – a comedy boob or ball is better than no boob or ball at all.
We’ve got more cans on ice than the Russian figure skating championships.
Now everyone observe a moment of loudness and skull a beer for the tragic loss of our ashes.
After here the drunken road trip is heading up to Barcelona. Barcelona is a really good place to get red faced, a root and robbed. Or loose, laid and (have your wallet) lifted. Or smashed, screwed and stolen from. That’s enough. We’ll be having a massive party, an annual event whose name I haven’t yet conjured up. Actually, here is a promotion. Name our traditional annual event and you can win the prize of buying me a tequila and redbull, otherwise known as dancing juice, or, tomorrow’s worse hangover.
Post Barca we leave for Paris. The city of French people. There we will grow little moustaches, wear blue and white strips, hang garlic around our necks, put baguettes in the basket’s of our girls’ bikes. Berets, and snails and arrogance. We’ll dance under the Eiffel tower and head into the Louvre to marvel at how you have no idea why you like the Mona Lisa, and the amazing way that her facial expression suggests that she is aware of this. And, of course, we’ll be eating Gallic deliciousness and sampling the most fantastic cheapest wines by the litre.
After which we roll of into the sunset. Things get weird(er) after Paris. Bruges, which is full of Belgians, Amsterdam, say no more, Berlin, the German capital – Germans, and Prague. I am quite excited by the whole trip, but Prague I am particularly looking forward to. I am looking forward to the vampires, and Russian spies and beer that is cheaper than potatoes, but more expensive than a human life. Yes, life behind the Iron Curtain is sure to be fun.
We still have some seats on the bus, so if you want to either come for the whole trip, or just for one leg, email me, gravy@stoketravel.com, or call me on +34695487602. We’ll also be putting on a party in every city, so if you are around let’s drink too much, dance horribly, be creepy and generally make a fool out of ourselves together.
I’ve already given you a promotion, you greedy bastards, but tell me the shittest thing about one of the cities we are visiting and you can win a free trip from that city to the next one.
Stoke Travel – making nonsense sexy.
More lies, some of them slightly humorous. Newsletter 675, April, 1976.
To members of Stoke travel
Wade Gravy 11 August 2009 at 16:57
Following the overwhelming success of last weeks newsletter (we received at Stoke Towers three entries in the “Stoke Slogan” competition and a never-before-seen four candidates for the “Worst-Job-In-The-World)”, we’ve decided to infect your eyeballs with another five minutes of half truths and complete lies.
That’s right ladies and ball lifters, it is….
This Week’s Stoke Newsletter!!!
Where, oh where, have the bulls run off to?
Given the unprecedented volume of calls pertaining to the running bull’s well-being post San Fermin, Stoke Towers decided to call the A.H.T.D.M (Association of Half Tonne Death Machines) and find out what becomes of our testicled friends once the final tourist has been gored.
The press officer there was pressed for time, but sent me a press release, press. So here it is:
“Contrary to popular belief the bulls are not actually killed in the ‘bull fights’ which take place every evening after the morning’s mad scramble. Like in all good, professional, shows our bulls are highly trained actors who practice for months in advance with the ‘matadors’. For those of you who watched the ‘bull fight’, the blood you saw was little more than corn syrup, and the violence choreographed, like in your WWE. The spectacle is only believed to be true by the mentally challenged, young, and, of course, ignorant tourists.
All of the bulls, having completed their yearly goring obligations, pass the off season in the Pyrenean foothills frolicking amongst daffodils and mounting saucy milker after saucy milker, enjoying both their time away from terrified humans and the emptying of their ample testicles”.
So worry no more, concerned hippy, all of your favourite bulls will be there next year, ready to scare the absolute shit out of you again.
Water Sports.
And I’m not talking about people pissing on each other (we here at Stoke Towers understand and even participate in all of the sexual fringes, we just try not to mix business with sticky pleasure). I’m talking about surfing, chucking on some rubber, waxing up your stick, and trying to slot your way into some tight, wet, caverns.
The Stoke Surfari runs year round, passing its summers in Zarautz, North West Spain, and its winters in Taghazoute, way down in South Morocco, where the Atlas Mountains meet the Atlantic Ocean. Both locations are regionally, and internationally, renowned surfing locations during their specific seasons. We cater for beginners, and experienced surfers, and offer, blah blah blah. This isn’t the Stoke Towers communication that you have come to know and delete. So let’s get back to some familiar territory.
Long before your dad sprouted his first pubic hair all life lived in the sea. That’s right god botherers, I said it – ALL LIFE CAME FROM THE SEA (we here at Stoke Travel respect, and represent, all of the major, and minor, religions – what is written here is merely Gravy’s opinion. See the upcoming newsletters; “Buddha, Surfing for Fatties”, “Will Your 40 Virgins Look Good in a Burkini?”, and “Jesus, Surfing Without Surfboards” – ed). That’s right, humans can claim a direct ancestor in the humble mermaid/man, just as sea bears gave evolutionary birth to the humble grizzly and trout are a close cousin to pigeons.
It’s just that, like Ariel in the Disney classic “Mermaid Tails”, we got the idea one day that we’d like to leave the sea and pass our time on the land. I’m not sure if our ancestors were pursuing princes with dutch hairstyles, but between you and me I hope they had better taste. But we made the journey out of the soup, and we stayed, because it proved a practical environment for the maximum enjoyment of some of our favourite pursuits. Drinking beer in the sea sucks, as salty, fishy brine breaches the bottle from time to time. Smoking durries? Come on! And as for copulation, if one of the scrowlers breaks the seal, all the lube is washed away. Shithouse. So it is for good reason we have stayed on the land.
But we still have a connection to the sea, going back to our merman and maid days, when we’d hunt oceanic hares, the elusive aquatic ostrich and deep sea racing wombats with our tridents and whips made of seaweed and peppered with tiny, stingy, barnacles. So it goes, summer in, summer out, that we make the pilgrimage home, back to the sea. And that is why surfing, that’s right, surfing, is so much more than a really fun sport, that makes one inexorably attractive to the opposite sex. Check out this passage from Charles Darwin’s “Boozin’ and Cruisin’ the South Pacific” I found in the Stoke Towers’ library:
“… and part of the ceremony, after the beers had been finished and Bundy and Coke just cracked, some foolhardy souls would grab their thrusters and, cheered on by those too pissed to stand, let alone surf, paddle out the back. When I inquire to one of the savages what exactly the ceremony signifies, he says in a dialect that I can barely comprehend, “they’re juz, fuck it, surfin’ out, like, there man. Where you from anyway? New Zealand”, at which point I retreat and he vomits. It wasn’t until I was on my boat, and with the aid of my translator that I could discern what he was saying, “They are just, for God, surfing, out like mermen”. Which completely reinforced my early claims that man is descended from the merfolk (I came to this conclusion after seeing first-mate Downes in an erotic situation with that dugong off Cairns), and that, indeed, they have combined their new worship of a Christian God, with an age old, internal, primal, knowledge that their ancestors rode these waves, with scaly man-tails.”
It is only a fool that argues with Charlie. So there you have it, it is our evolutionary responsible to go surfing – if you don’t you can really only expect to live half a life. Shithouse. This weekend we are running the Surf Fest weekender out of Zarautz, with buses leaving Barcelona on the Friday, and everybody cruising up the coast to sniff out whatever France has to offer, wave wise, over the weekend, before partying the night away at the annual and infamous Stoke Travel Surf Fiesta. So get involved, get your fish on, jump in the sea and lets go for a wiggle, yeeew!
Giveaway.
We have a spare seat to give away on Surf Fest. In order to claim it send me an idea for a promotion, as my brain is fried from years of drug and alcohol abuse. We’ll call it the, Promotion Promotion. Actually, if you can’t make Surf Fest I’ll even consider giving you a double pass to Tomatina, or Oktoberfest, if your promotion is worth stealing.
Stoke Travel – on the beach drinking piss since 1996
For comments, questions, death threats, indecent proposals or hate mail email gravy@stoketravel.com.
Prepare your eyeballs for a visual pounding
To members of Stoke travel
Wade Gravy 04 August 2009 at 16:02
Buenos dias Lifers and Liftees,
We are now balls deep in another unproductive summer, and in an uncharacteristic moment of sobriety I have taken it upon myself to inundate your inbox with an unsolicited Stoke Spamzine.
Cow Boarding.
The bulls have now been run. We have maintained our 100% safety record, despite 100% of the Stoke Travel runners being 100% wasted, and the general concept of being pursued by half tonne horned death machines through narrow streets a 100% bad idea. Despite the attempted suicide by bovine, our campsite rocked, with tunes playing all night long, the concept of unlimited beer and sangria being seriously tested, and a nightly symphony of half-hearted grunts and groans as the small penis brigade set about their disappointing nightly work.
Surf Report.
It is here where I usually insert a mildly amusing anecdote about riding things that swell. This is because our market researchers have told us that sexual innuendo sells. In the spirit of not wanting to argue with the science of market research, hi ho, here we go. The swells have been small over the summer, rising usually early in the morning, and not rising at all after a night on the unlimited beer and sangria (5 euros per night, see www.shamelesspromotions.com). As for the riding, overheard in the lineup were such surfy calls as, “is it in yet”, “is that it?”, and, “gee you’ve got a shit dick”.
Surfing rules.
Promotion time.
Like all not-for-profit (intentionally or not) organizations we here at Stoke Travel like to give free shit to shitty bastards. But unlike those do-gooder mobs, we want something in return. So here is what I want, and here is what you can win:
Promotion number one.
Like any self respecting travel company Stoke Travel needs a slogan. We have been bandying this concept around Stoke Towers for a while now and have come up with some maybes. I particularly like, in no particular order:
Stoke Travel – just when you thought we couldn’t get any shitter, we did.
Stoke Travel – there isn’t a decent erection between us.
Stoke Travel – we’re not the best, but we’re alright.
Perhaps you can do better? If you do you’ll win yourself a free trip to either La Tomatina, Oktoberfest or the Surf Camp, if we remember to give it to you. Second place prize is free fellatio for any and everyone who makes an reasonable effort.
Promotion number two.
Following the success of the Queensland government’s best job in the world promotion, we at Stoke Travel have decided to run our own, parallel, but completely opposite promotion (we love the word promotion). It is….. The Worst Job in the World Promotion!
To win you have to tell us, in fifty words or less, why you deserve to be negatively endowed with this dubious honour. The winner will be from henceforth gainfully employed by Stoke Travel, and will be expected to:
Arrive at festival locations a week before the festival begins, when there is nothing to do but put up tents and marvel at how shit the town must be the rest of the year.
Wake up at 4am to prepare breakfast, after going to bed at 2am because the bar isn’t going to run itself.
Clean up used condoms and beer cans, cigarette butts and vomit, curiously all left together, every morning after making breakfast.
Be answerable to drunken bosses, who will throw their arms around your shoulders, declaring their love for every fibre of your being, all the while breathing a putrid vinegar breath in your lucky, lucky face.
Be answerable to hungover bosses who will yell and scream because you haven’t done half the things that you were never told to do, all the while with vinegar breath.
Do all the above, plus plenty of other things, blind drunk, slightly fed and unpaid.
So to win this bad-dream job, or a free trip, send your entries to gravy@stoketravel.com today!
What The Fuck Else?
The worlds biggest bolognaise sauce, La Tomatina, is on again this year. We’ll be running our Stoke Travel squat camp. We’ll throw our shanty town up near the beach in Valencia for a couple of days before the puree, have beach parties, drink too much and try and cop off with members of the opposite sex, then heading out to nearby Bunol to try and nail Italian and Spanish sex pests in the head with green tomatoes, before condimenting the night away at our (in)famous and annual ketchup party.
Also the Surf Camp will operating from atop a mountain in Zarautz until October, and the swell report is, well, good. No innuendo. But I was just there and let me assure you that not only is the Stoke camp pumping, but the whole town is. On my visit I surfed once, played handball (Australian version), volleyball, garbage soccer and had a skateboard time trial world championship. All fuelled by beer.
And just so you know the deal, if you want to book for any of our trips as per usual go to stoketravel.com. If you can bring along four friends you get your stay for half price, just because you are a member of our facebook group. Bring eight and get the trip for nothing. Bring anymore and get a handjob.
And that is that, from the jerk-offs at Stoke Travel. And now that my thirty minutes of work are done for the day, I’m going to the bar.
Lets go surfing motherlickers
To members of Stoke travel
Wade Gravy 07 June 2009 at 15:17
To celebrate Stoke Travel's new motto, "small dicks and floppy tits", we are opening the super special Biarritz surf house. It's a stone's throw from the sea, run by super radical dudes, sea views and populated by the stoke travel cat, Pepe Le Peu. Whether you want simple hostel accomodation (we are the only hostel in Biarrritz) or the full surf camp experience (restaurant meals, wine, surf lessons, San Sebastian party trips) we probably aren't the guys for you, but it would be nice if you booked with us because we have fairly elaborate lifestyles to uphold. Check the website, stoketravel.com, email me Gravy@stoketravel.com or give me a call on +33609218832, and come and stay. Especially if you are a sweet hot chick. Yeeeeew, Stoke Travel, by party animals for naive wallets, I mean travellers.
TwoThousandAndFine
To members of Stoke travel
Wade Gravy 01 April 2009 at 22:48
Hi Kids,
Well another European summer is nearly upon us, and as the various Smashed! snow camps and the Moroccan surf camp wind down, there is a whole lot of shit ready and raring to wind up this year.
This year we have surfcamps in France and Spain, surfhouses (for a little salty luxury) in Biarritz and Santander, our now infamous free booze festival tours to the running of the bulls (Pampalona), the tomato fight (La Tomatina), and that filthy rotten piss up, Oktoberfest (which landed me in hospital last year). In addition to this there are city tours in Barcelona, San Sebastian and Biarritz, sailing tours in Croatia, disco tours in Ibiza, and the big grand daddy, the european road trip, which takes in more cities and has bigger parties than any of the others out there at the moment. Well probably not the more cities part, but definately more parties.
So if you're around this summer, if you know someone who is, or if you want to stay tuned for some rad stories, we'll be updating this page and our website regularly. We've got photographers and film makers and writers rolling with us again, so the demise of our individual health will be well documented.
Also, everyone's third favourite surf camp rat, Gravy, has been contributing to an Australian surf magazine. Read what he has to write and vote accordingly. If he wins the competition he gets to edit the magazine, and has made a solemn oath to fellate everyone that has read his shit:
http://www.stabmag.com/littleweeds/the-littleweeds/Gravy-Noname
Thanks for your kind attention, hopefully we'll hear from you soon,
Smashed
Wade Gravy 29 August 2008 at 16:20
Hello all,
Just in case you didn't know and in the off chance it is something you may want to know, the SiroWak Rolling Circus 2008 is well and truely underway. We have been to San Seb, Madrid and La Tomatina and now we find ourselves in yet another bar drinking yet another beer, this time in Barcelona, trying to get some work done. We are having problems with web style stuff because we are mostly a pack of computards, but....
The Blog is up on www.sirowak.blogspot.com
So check it out, make a comment and join us on the bloody magnificent Rolling Circus.
I reckon we might just pull this off.
SiroWak
