- Untitled
- The season begins
- Jan 2010
- Feb 2010
- March 2010
- April 2010
- May 2010
- Ski Pictures 2010
- June 2010
- July 2010
- August 2010
- September 2010
- October 2010
- Late October
- November
- December 2010
- January 2011
- February
- The European Youth Olympic Festival
- March 2011
- The season ends
- May and June 2011
- End of June
- July
- August in Yorkshire
- September 2011
- 28 October 2011
- November/December 2011
- Season 2012
- February 2012
- March and April
- June
- 'Summer' 2012
On the road
‘What would you do, Mum, if the lorry blew over and we were left
hanging by our seat belts?’
‘Could we talk about something else?’
‘Just imagine, upside down, arms and legs wiggling.’
‘Honor, that’s enough.’
It is a force something serious gale and we are on the M1
somewhere south of Leicester Forest East. Not as far south as I had hoped (we
should have arrived at the Milton Keynes Eventing centre by now) . It
took two hours to merge from the M18 to the M1, not helped by the fact that I
managed to get into the left hand slip road and then, too polite to barge back
in, got shunted onto the M1 North. And there is only one thing worse than
sitting in stationary traffic, and that is travelling in the wrong direction,
looking at the queue of stationary traffic that you will join when you manage
to turn round.
The bold and brave Sooty, Honor’s ride for the cross country riding section of the Regional Tetrathlon finals, has suffered my incompetence with remarkable fortitude and I am trying to banish visions of him upside down with no seat belt to hang by when he starts to stomp rather dramatically. My first thought is that the back door of the lorry has burst open as we managed to lose the key at the start of the season but no, far worse, even my unflappablle daughter is distressed:
‘Mum the side has blown open’. Our lorry is a side loader with a ramp that goes down and a flap that lifts up. I glance in the wing mirror and see this flying wildly while poor Sooty, who is on the ramp side, is shifting uncomfortably in the breeze which is more like a hurricane. I reckon the force of the wind could rip the flap right off. There is no option but to slam on the hazard lights and pull over onto the hard shoulder. I don’t feel great about letting Honi get out on the edge of the motorway but she is on the inside and
moves quickly. Minutes later we are on our way again; the flap is safely clipped
shut though, worryingly, not locked as the missing key also does the side
flap.
I drive even more cautiously than usual. Poor Honi is instructed keep her eye fixed on the wing mirror and let me know if there is any movement. The wind seems louder than ever, and I keep hearing creaking noises, but I tell myself that my ears have become super sensitive. We cover another five miles or so.
‘Mum, that noise, I think its because my door is open.’ She pulls on it. ‘Yeah it is – shall I open and slam it or do you want to stop?’
I tell her neither of the above. One stop on the hard shoulder was hairy enough and my knowledge of physics is sufficiently limited to leave me unsure whether there is a risk of the very strong cross wind catching an open door and ripping it right off.
‘Just keep hold of it until the next service station.’ I would like to say it is not far but we have just passed one. ‘And pull hard.’
‘Mum, my arms are going to fall off….......... I wonder if I would still
be able to compete with no arms? I couldn’t really shoot, but running would be
okay, and I might be able to ride – and I think I could swim.’
I can’t resist the joke about the swimmer with no arms and legs - called Bob. Then we are back to the upside down scenario but minus arms and legs. We are
still laughing when a neon sign flashes up warnings of a 30 minute delay between
junctions 21 and 20 – had we not been I might have cried.