Paul,
Why did you deleted your first post that started this topic ?
On many fora is forbidden to do such a thing.

Marco

Hi Paul D,

Thanks !

I don't know his (or her) name, the line with salespeople was 1 kilometer (!), so I can not remember them all.
Most seller with interesting 00 Marklin were from Germany.
The seller you mean was the only one who displayed his for sale treasures safely behind glass.

Marco

Hi Sander,

Now you say it....I think it was Molekamp Modelbouw.

Marco

Good Morn all, We are now back from our 10 week jaunt around Europe mainly by river boat, recovering from jet lag & the joys of going back to work the next day after arriving home.

I will only mention M related things in this small epistle to the converted. We picked up a Rv from Frankfurt & immediately started driving south to Mother "M" arriving there early Saturday morning, after a quick bit of essential food shopping in Goppingen we drove round to the Museum & went inside hitting the warehouse area first & delveing deeply amongst the shelving I pulled out a 42765 express passenger car set & a 41928 Rheingold car set on special for Euro 189 & 210 respectivly. A bit more scrounging round & not finding anything to my likeing I went looking for the FD who was wandering around the Museum show cases & we both went looking for more valuables to put in the shopping bag, I eventually decided that I should save my hard earned ozzy $'s for Utretch for later in the trip. Heading for the checkout I asked for the latest museum car & also was offered last years from under the counter. All in al,l a bit disappointing about what was available for sale but still happy with the goodies.


No more purchases till we hit Utretch NL next weekend even though we stopped in to MiWaLu in Hamburg for a few hours nothing really caught my eye as a must have. MiWaLu has changed their admittance procedure in that when you buy a ticket at the door, an entry time is then allocated for you to be allowed to enter, this is the same way that Neuschwanstein allow entry to the castle, a lot of sitting & waiting for the allocated time frame for entry & to make it harder for the older visitors there is no designated waiting area with seating or refreshments to while away the time. Anyway on with the travels.

We arrived in Utretch on Thursday afternoon & on making enquires we were directed to a parking area that had been leased by a caravan & RV association to cater for people with Rv's attending the caravan & camping show being held in some of the other halls at the same time. Bingo, what luck; on the door step for 3 days to Eurospoor, with entry to the caravan exhibition included with the overnight price for our Rv. Friday Morning we walked over to Eurospoor to find the doors didnt open untill 10;00 am,'so a cup of tea /coffee & a quick bite to eat before attacking the slowly growing number of old, unwashed retirees who looked to be on their last eurodollar; a couple of gallons of deodorant would not have gone amiss trying to smother the aromas wafting around the lines of eagar buyers. It was an eye opener to me that most were carrying suitcases, carry bags & very large shopping bags from supermarkets & I had no idea what for until when the doors opened right on time, there was a MAD rush towards the rear hall with very few stopping to view the large number of layouts on display. Anyway we decided to follow the aromas & found down in Hall 3 that there was so much on sale to this poor ozzy train driver. Almost had heart attack & thought he had gone to the great round house in the sky.

Mention has been made that the amount of stalls was near to 1 Kilometer long but when there is so much to see & haggle over it looks much longer. I found the MAJOR draw back in hall 3 was the poor lighting on most stalls which made it extremly hard to see what was on sale let alone the condition of items. Anyway after walking the length & breath I ended up buying just a few items with the FD also buying 2 items much to my amazement.

Her spending included a complete digital King Luwig set M2680 & 4396 slightly worn boxes but in very good condition. Euro 525 & then she spied a N scale Neuschwanstein castle which had to be brought to go with the set already purchased, for E$55

I purchase a M3600 Digital set of 3 engines for the Berlin Anniversary E$259, A M37703 Digital set of 3 early Diesels for E$ 455 & a ROCO 78524 Swedish Eloc for E$ 419 with sound etc, a couple of different waggons for E$20 each finished off my spending for the 2 days we spent there. Sunday we spent in the Caravan / camping show just looking & wondering why we dont some of the items on display back home in Oz'.


A WORD OF WARNING FOR OVERSEAS TRAVELLERS. From what we saw, none of the 2nd hand stalls had VAT exempt forms for refund of sales tax; it was a all cash buisness.
The ATM at the hall entrance would only allow a single withdrawl per card of E$500 each day but this could also depend on what cards were being used & it ran out of money early Saturday leaving a fair walk back to the main station to find another machine.


WE would recomend that anyone thinking of going to Europe at the end of October next year definetly consider a trip to EUROSPOOR just to see the amount of M & other brands on sale. It is amazing considering the age of some items that they have remained in pristine condition all these years considering that they have survived a war period etc.

Hi Tom,

Thanks for your report, I really enjoyed it !
You're absolutely right about the "couple of gallons of deodorant" story !

In Holland there was the past years a lot of fraud with those cash machines, by criminals using copied bankcards ("Skimming").
That is why some machines does not payout > € 500 a day at each client.

Did you taken some photos on Eurospoor ? (I would love to see those).

Marco

Tom,

I told you so!

Utrecht is spelled Uniform-Tango-Romeo-Echco-Charlie-Hotel-Tango.

Now waiting for your photographs,also the non-train ones!

Paul.