Sue's notes to self

So, we recently enjoyed a short break in the Cotswolds, and a few of our experiences got me pondering the topic of roads.

Not much to see here, you say, and indeed that can be very true on one of those long journeys along a motorway when there truly is not much to see. They do tend to cut through the countryside so the outlook can be beautiful. It all rather depends on whether you are the driver or not. In this case I wasn’t. It also depends on the volume of traffic accompanying you on this journey. My last trip driving myself along the M25 was somewhat leg-crossingly slow. Thank goodness for South Mimms. Why are there so few services on such a slow road? This time was not so bad, and when you can get up speed, for the passenger, there is the soporific affect of the rumbling road, punctuated by the occasional stop for ‘traffic calming’ speed limits and the odd pothole. Yes, even our motorways have potholes it seems.

When you get off the motorway you are confronted with the niceties of a road system that has been messed with over years. You have to pick the right lane, often with little to go on, and thank goodness – or not – for SATNAV, provided it is up to date. The South Mimms roundabout is a prime example of the opportunities to get it wrong and incur the wrath, or at least the ‘beeping’ derision, of other equally perturbed motorists. You can’t blame them, they have likely only just sorted it out themselves. At least we did not have a car load of screaming or moaning kids to contend with.

Now, we come from a part of the country where there are little lanes, and it isn’t that far to get from the bumpy A and B roads the said little lanes. What struck me in the Cotswolds was that their A roads were smaller, their B roads more like our lanes and their lanes ….. well…. woe betide you if there was something coming the other way! The other difference I noted was that where Essex roads are riddled with potholes right, left and centre, their little roads and lanes had them at the sides. So if you did perchance have to get out of the way, there was no guarantee that you would get back on the road again. There was a definite fear of being grounded in the pot-ruts (bigger than holes) in the verges. We were lucky, but I did experience quite a few bumpy rides along the way. I may even have shut my eyes at times, given I was closest to the hedges and ditches.

One adventure we had was trying to get to a particular village that we wanted to visit. The first turning off said ‘road ahead closed’ so we did follow the diversion. When it became clear that the diversion was going somewhere entirely different we tried to be clever. We headed where we thought we should be going, thinking it can’t possibly be cut off in all directions. However, the next signpost was also accompanied by a ‘road ahead closed’ warning. We decided to see what lie ahead nonetheless. After travelling along an open lane across the middle of a field and getting the car splattered with mud, and then ignoring another similar sign, we discovered that the road we were on was indeed closed. Bother! So we turned round and found another place to go, avoiding one small market town that had a road but so many cars parked that it might as well have been a lane. On our way home from our visit we spied another signpost to our original destination, which had no warnings. You know, we had had enough by then. We never got there, preferring to stick to places with open (if narrow) roads.

So, much time on our short break was spent in navigating the rural lanes across three counties in the Cotswolds. It was beautiful, of that there is no doubt. However, I think I will stick to the local roads for a while. At least I know where the diversions might be going, and they will not be across the middle of any fields, or down lanes bordered by deep ravines … at least not mostly.

Sue October 2024