On the way to Frome Our first obstacle after leaving the Nav's sister's house was negotiating a roundabout on the "Great North Road" (A1) before heading vaguely South West to pick up the Foss Way en route to Somerset. We seemed to sit in a queue for ages "giving way" as nose to tail lorries ( mostly ) trundled over the junction going North and South.
"Some people have to endure this every day of their lives" Sue commented.
The empty highland roads North of Inverness could have been on a different planet, it must have been the earliness of the hour that was making me wax Phil O'soffical, because before long we were off over the roundabout and making progress along some of the excellent English "B" roads that at times put the Scottish "A" roads to shame. Everyone down here seems to prefer the speed and convenience of dual carriage and motorway leaving these excellent routesrelatively traffic free.
As we proceeded some of the town names began stirring old memories of my early motorcycling days as a young airman, newly out of training, exploring the countryside around Brize Norton on my then "cutting edge" machine, a Honda CB 175 for which I was paying the enormous monthly hire purchase sum of £11.00 ! No test needed in those halcyon days, just a provisional licence and a set of L plates. Jeans, Levi jacket and helmet were the dress code of the day!
We received a call from Sue's cousin David to tell us he had got the afternoon off work and was heading for the RV on his Pan European, we set the Tesco car park in Stow to meet and he was to lead us to his mum's new house in Frome as neither Sue or I had visited her in the chez noueveau.
Coming to the end of the old Roman Foss way we entered the outskirts of Stow and admittedly I was dithering a bit as we came upon the superstore quicker than expected and missed the car park turn off. It was at this point the car driver felt justified in his TANGO WHISKEY ALPHA TANGO comment. After dragging him from his car and giving him a damn good thrashing ( in my mind ) we did a u turn and stopped in the car park of the store where "every little helps"
We chatted to a friendly local trolley collector who was also a member of the biking brother/sisterhood until David arrived scant minutes later, perfect timing!
We rode into the market place where parking on anything but two wheels would have been impossible and smugly reversed the bikes into a perfectly sized slot just outside a quaint "Olde Worlde" hostelery. After a quick look round we found a table out the back and refreshed ourselves with food and drink, the interior dining room being filled to capacity with a coach load of diners, dining as only OAPs can dine. ( Refer to Desmond Morris's " Life on Earth, Chapter 2, African veld, feeding frenzy ." )
Back on the road the weather was still hot, sunny and breezy. David rode with skill on roads familiar to him and I more or less kept up, well kept him in sight anyway. One fond memory is of a glorious overtake of at least ten vehicles stuck behind a tractor on a winding country road. Now who were the TWITS? ( Spelling changed to protect the innocent!)
We arrived at Aunt Lizbeths at 5.30pm, about 30 minutes ahead of our eta.
To be continued:
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