Lake Tiptoe

Floods


The weather was very British tonight; wet, with a wild squall.

By the time I arrived on the A32 and commenced re-entry for the 50mph limit at East Meon the traffic train slowed and red lights and headlights went pretty crazy up front. The nearer we approached the more detail I could make out of strange shadows erupting from the road surface in the glare of the lights; ah ha, water. Lots of it. Deep-looking water sploshing up over car bonnets!

As soon as I recognised the hazard, and already plodding at about walking pace, we entered the 300m long lake and crossed the multitude of bow waves being washed out from the traffic in it. Being dark with headlamps and tail lamps dancing around reflections off the verge and hedgerows it soon became a little disorientating and I became concerned I could feel the wash over my boots! The cars in front were down to above their sills already. All we could do was to keep moving and hope nothing untoward would go wrong right now.

Artist impression of view through the visor!

Coincidentally, I'd re-proofed the Gortex leather boots the previous evening - quite a test then, and they did us proud. Shadowfax, too; the water was above his spindles but we didn't float off under the buoyancy of all those plastics and I didn't have to stop to wade out, either.

What I will express is my relief I was constrained to following a line of slow traffic and hadn't "bothered" to start my usual overtaking run. With these halogen bulbs I'd like as not have seen the surprise lake only too late and had a wobble, or worse, a spill.

That would have been embarrassing.

I need more light!

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Picking up Sherbert

Image
To recap, we'd been awake and travelling to Offenburg, Germany since 2:30 am. Bikemoto's offer of a free coffee felt overwhelmingly generous while we waited for Sherbert's paperwork to be readied. There was a hire agreement to cover our ride back to Ireland, the ownership documentation, Certificate of Compliance, manuals, sales agreements, and more. It all took time. All the time I was taking stock of the enormity of the day and second-guessing the plan. Self doubt I'd not ridden for nearly 5 years since fixing Arod's speedometer sensor and finding his fork seals were leaking. COVID 19 and working from home were little motivation to set things right. Now I am about to ride a new-to-me model of bike I've not ridden before. Sherbert is heavier than an ST1300, a weightier insurance liability, and has a dual clutch transmission (DCT). He's extra expensive to buy and more-so to fix. I'm riding on the right side of the road in Europe and with my wife rid
Read more

28 February - Jammed Screen Blues

Head Trauma The LHS winder for the screen is jammed. I’ve had the screen at a medium-high stetting for the cold and rain but this really gives some buffeting in some conditions – especially at speed on the M-ways. It was so bad on the way to Stoke I had to stop and hand-force the screen all the way down for some relief. It needs either another overhaul (gave it a good oiling when symptoms first appeared) or replacement, which is just so expensive. Even a knackered one from a ‘brakers seems to command an inflated £100+ tag. Daft greedy b’stards. Anyway – the jobs waiting for a quieter moment. Too much going on to rip the plastics off Shadowfax just now. We both have a job to do.
Read more

To Offenburg from beyond

Image
Offenburg is a couple of hours south of Frankfurt.  Initial plans were to fly to Frankfurt, catch a train to Offenburg, and then a taxi to the bike shop. Unfortunately, RyanAir fly to Frankfurt Hahn airport and don't hint at the fact Hahn is two hours west of Frankfurt. We discovered that gem after booking the flights. No plan survives first contact, right? So we adapted and hired a car to drive the 3 hours to Offenburg. Adapt or fail We learned that RyanAir will only allow helmets on spare seats–one helmet per seat by the read of it. Otherwise your life-saving equipment needs to go in the hold to be crushed, battered, and invisibly compromised by damage. Our new Shuberth C5s had arrived only a couple of days ahead of the flight in two smart boxes within a single purpose sized box. Mrs G called RyanAir and confirmed a 'suitcase' can be a box and what the maximum dimensions can be.  The box fitted the bill. Into Hahn Typically, the Friday flight out was at around 6am and w
Read more