In which Sid and Doris witness a miracle.
If you have read the post on Teal you will know just why Minis are more averse to water than someone in the late stages of rabies. Setting out from home the wiper mechanism began to make hideous squarking noises, suggesting the wiper motor would pack up under the strain. Happily the noise abated.
The rain continued and as we sploshed up the M11 Sid turned down the opportunity to divert to Owen’s workshop in Bury St Edmunds and switch onto winter tyres from our current 008s, which are really for happy dry tarmac. Surely it can’t rain like this for three weeks? Surely??
A key aspect of running a Mini is moisture management. Doris took the first stint and toggled between front and rear screen heaters until the switch for the front screen failed. (We later found the switch rusted because water was coming in round the screen.) In the meantime the fan directs warm air onto the screen and forward visibility is maintained. It continues to rain. Many parts of the country have already had all of October’s rain; it is the 3rd today. We see no motorbikes. Or cyclists.
We were planning to have a playlist accompanying our road trip and had packed a powerful little BlueTooth speaker. Tried out in the kitchen at home it was deafening. Tried out in the Mini it was inaudible. Bob Dylan, Don McLean, Cat Stevens and other male singers on today’s list were not going to cut through the noise. Female singers were audible at the top end of their range, but then so is Mifter Bat and nobody wants to listen to him all day either (don’t tell him that).
Sid takes over and we wear away at the A1(M) past RAF Wittering which has a fine (if unphotographed) Harrier as its gate guardian. This was where the RAFwaffe assessed captured German aircraft. Sid has just read the period appreciation of the ME109. You can borrow it if you like.
There really is not much to see, and if there is we couldn’t see it through the cloud and road spray. We pull off the Great North Road to go cross country to our hotel in Hexham on Hadrian’s Wall, built to keep the Picts and Scots out of Roman Britain.
On a good day the bikes love it along here with long sight lines and crests and dips. About 25 a year die, and citizens across the country awaiting organ transplants feel guiltily grateful. Just now these roads are awash and I suspect that nothing short of a forest tyre that would feel comfortable here. A modern Mini gives us a cheery flash of the lights, hits its own puddle and swamps our windscreen. Well meant thoughbut.
Now there are sheep in the fields and they must weigh about double the usual being so rain soaked. If they fall over they sometimes can’t get back upright. We pass signs to Hamsterley forest. We have certainly been down these roads in the N3 rally Astra. The forest roads in Yorkshire go: 600m, 9Left, 800m, etc. Point squirt, brake to a near stop, turn, go. In Northumberland they are fast and sweeping: 4L into 5R, 200, 3R, 40, long2R and long 2 left over crest.
Soon we are in Northumberland where Sid’s family had their summer holidays in the railway station at Edlingham. It rained a lot then too but living on a railway station with sheep on the old line and fathers Meccano to play with meant we didn’t mind. We walked the farmer’s sheepdogs and went to country fairs where we ran races where parents’ entry money was returned to the children in prizes. We saw sheep dog trials and went in the tents where cakes and carrots were judged by knowledgeable old judies in sensible shoes and well worn tweeds. And eventually Sid got to drive his grandmother’s Mini van in the old station yard. Parp, Parp.
Not far from Hexham we have the delight of signs to Wallish Walls. (“So, can you tell me, what do you call these walls that are made from rocks piled on top of each other?” “Well, they are…”) No other wall would be so good. And at last we hiss into Hexham with the racket of the A Series engine vibrating through us like bells.
Can we stop now? Here is the hotel, large room, big bath, beer, dinner and blog central in a tidy sitting room.
And the miracle: we have made 280 miles through wind and storm with no hint of a stutter. I will touch this handy wooden chest here though I know the real power is in the icon Sid was given in Serbia.