Coming and Going

What a busy fortnight it's been.  Work, a holiday, more work.  It seems so straightforward; and yet, two weeks ago with the holiday in prospect, I had no idea what I would be reporting to my readers now.  I had been planning this holiday for several weeks.  A few years ago I had sold my camper-van because I didn't feel I could justify owning a second vehicle that I only used a couple of weeks in a year.  But the idea of a 'home on wheels' hasn't properly left me, and every so often I wish that I had another one. 

Ready to go ...

So, a few weeks ago, I decided to make myself a rudimentary 'bed' that I could assemble in the back of the van I use for work, using some scrap wood from our old office partitions and an unwanted pallet.  I followed up an offer of money-off tokens for tourist attractions, and last Thursday, with all I felt I needed for a long weekend, and a detailed plan of campaign, I set off.

It couldn't have been simpler: go, see, do, and in amongst it eat and sleep.  The first day went swimmingly.  Stoke Bruerne canal museum in the morning, and Althorp, the stately home of the Spencer family, ancestors of Princess Diana, in the afternoon.  That night, on my way to Friday morning's planned venue, the Black Country Living Museum in Dudley, I parked in a lay-by to sleep on my make-shift bed.  It was quite exciting.  Although not by far the first time I'd slept in a lay-by, it was the first time in these circumstances.  I had been afraid that I should be cold.  Far from it; I was too hot to sleep.  And the traffic!  I'd clearly not chosen a good place, for the noise and vibration from passing lorries didn't seem to let up all night.


That was really the point when the whole plan began to unravel.  Being used to a pattern of 'drive there, deliver, drive home', I hadn't made due allowance in my plan for the time it would take me to do justice to the place I was visiting.  This was apparent when I got to Dudley and discovered that, far from the conventional museum-in-a-building that I had expected, here were acres of houses, shops,

"... and if you couldn't afford a doctor?"

streets, in fact a whole village to see, peopled by knowledgeable guides in costume of a past era who explained the sort of lives our ancestors had lived.  There was a coal mine to be investigated, and then to round off the experience a canal trip into the tunnels that had originally been dug to exploit the rich limestone deposits of the area.

My plan for the afternoon simply evaporated; even more so when I considered that my intended visit to the town of Ironbridge would itself have demanded a whole day, rather than the mere afternoon I'd allocated.  As I lay down to rest that night - quieter than the night before, I admit - I had no clear idea how to proceed the following morning.  Sleep was no easier, however, and when I got up I found that the bedclothes were distinctly damp.  On inspection I also discovered the van walls to be running with condensation.  I quickly realised what I ought to have anticipated.  This van, with its solid bulkhead, has no ventilation to the goods area, unlike previous vans in which I have slept to meet the demands of long-distance jobs - vans with mesh bulkheads and a free exchange of air throughout.  The unhealthy prospect of more sleepless nights in damp bedclothes, and the effect of this on driving safety, combined with the new uncertainty of my programme, led me to reconsider my plans entirely.

After a Saturday of discovery, enjoyable in itself, which included a visit to the preserved Battlefield Railway, I made my way home. The next day was spent recovering, and I relaxed on the Monday at home with my family history records, before returning to work as arranged on Tuesday.  I had thought that, starting from scratch, it would be a long wait for work, but the first pleasant surprise came at 10.30, when I was asked to collect nearby for Cardiff!  A trouble-free journey there and back, preceded a fairly full Wednesday, and I was glad to be heading home by about 4.30, when a phone call brought the second pleasant surprise of the week.  In ten years on the road, there have been the occasional jobs to Ireland, and two years ago (almost to the day) I spent a delightful Saturday returning by road and ferry from a beautiful village in Holland called Goudriaan; but this was the first time that I'd been asked to take a consignment by air!

Naturally I said 'yes', and the next few hours were spent in frantic planning and preparation, as a result of which I carried a component valued at little more than £5, for the repair of a luxury yacht in Copenhagen.  I met the engineers at the airport, made the delivery, and then had the rest of the day to amuse myself before getting the same flight back as they did, after installing the item I'd brought for them.

Yes, that is Sweden in the haze!

When I discovered the distance and cost of getting into the city, I decided to stay in and around the airport.  However, this was far from boring.  In the morning I walked up to the motorway that leads over a toll-bridge into Sweden and took some pictures, and when it was raining in the afternoon I was content to sit reading or people-watching in the terminal building.  Apart from the prices, which seemed considerably higher than at home, the other thing that struck me was the fact that all the signs were bi-lingual, with the second language being English!  Presumably the similarity between Danish and the other nearby languages renders signs using these unnecessary.

After that excitement, the routine job yesterday of taking five cases of Coca Cola to a hotel in Norwich seemed quite mundane.  Life is good, but now it's back to normal again!