When it’s in your DNA, habit is hard to change, and so it was with
our early departure time. We had agreed that we should not poke our nose out of
the Old Farm compound until after 9 am, given the school traffic out on the
road all about our exit route, but it was right on the dot when I opened the
gates for our departure. At the same time, our hostess emerged from her garden
gate to gather the day’s poultry offerings. She asked after our travels
yesterday, the plans of which we had briefly conveyed to her yesterday morning.
We told her that we had had a fabulous day, that the weather had been most
conducive, but we regretted having to leave now, but our forward bookings
elsewhere gave us little choice. She suggested we should return; I agreed,
although such enthusiastic statements really do have to be taken with a grain
of salt given our circumstances. New Zealand is an awful long way from the New
Forest!
The first part of our trip this morning echoed that taken a few
days ago when we travelled south west to Poole, but this time we left the A35
for the A30 through Wimbourne Minster, then re-joined that same A35 at Bere
Regis. The road was busy but of good surface, and we pushed on westward with
good heart, skirting around the south of Dorchester and venturing into rolling
rural countryside that became more hilly as the kilometres passed.
We were travelling through Thomas Hardy country, he who wrote
“Far from the Madding Crowd” which was recently made into a film, “Tess of the
D’Urbervilles” and “The Mayor of Casterbridge” better known to those of a
certain age who had to compulsorily read these dark novels as part of their
English secondary curriculum. For us as we travelled through today, we found
the countryside positively inspirational rather than the scene for tragic
characters.
By the time we reached Bridport, the road took us up and down
relatively steep hills, steeper roads than any travelled this year in England. We travelled close to the coast, once passing
Chideock near a spot on the map marked “Golden Gap”, evidently where the
valley reaches the sea.
As we drove on over the hill to the west of Brigport, we found
ourselves behind a rubbish truck, and given our unfortunate encounter with a
rubbish truck a week or so ago, we should have known better than to take it on.
As we pulled out on the dual carriageway to overtake, our engine stalled and
Chris had to pull back in and coast on down to a lucky layby. Fortunately the
brakes, both foot and hand were still functioning albeit in "manuel" mode. He tried the ignition –
stone dead, shades of our saga with the landcruiser in South Sydney a few years
ago. Chris decided that it was a case of the engine having been immobilised, so
locked the car with the key, then unlocked it, then tried the ignition again
and away we went, although wary of the situation.
The countryside we travelled through was quite beautiful, not
unlike that one might find in New Zealand’s South Waikato, and we discussed the
fact that farmland taken up in the past by English immigrants DownUnder must
have seemed so much more familiar than say, that in Australia. Then we
remembered that the rolling fertile pastoral country in New Zealand was not
immediately recognisable as such to those pioneers, as it was all covered in
heavy bush.
We crossed yet another county border, now in Devon, and near Honiton,
as Chris pulled out to pass another slow vehicle, we stalled again. We managed
to roll into yet another layby, and repeated the same process to get going once
more.
The third time the vehicle stalled, this time just west of Exeter,
we were not so lucky as to make our way to a refuge, safe from the streams of
traffic. We pulled to the side of the road and fortunately the speeding vehicles
were able to swerve around us. This time a warning light came on the dashboard,
one which took us a great deal of research and frustration to identify. It
seemed to relate to the emissions control within the computerised system.
Further reading suggested to me, the non-mechanical Backseat Driver, that the
repeated turning of the ignition in attempts to restart the engine was contrary
to the recommended emission functioning . We could apparently proceed with
caution (if able) providing we consulted the nearest Kia dealer as soon as
possible. On we went, nana-ing the engine, crawling across the northern border
of the Dartmoor Forest National Park, on to a service centre just east of
Okehampton.
There the bowser service attendant gave us the name of a garage
some distance up a series of narrow rural lanes, but given that we still had
our caravan in tow, we were not keen to pursue this. In fact by now, our
destination was just eighteen or so miles south, so we pressed on, fingers and
toes crossed, leaving the A30 for the A386, a winding country road despite its
“A” appellation, following the River Tavy down, then just before Tavistock,
heading east again across the National Park, but only for two and a half miles
to reach this Caravan and Camping Club site.
The friendly hosts soon had us sorted, and once set up, I attacked
the great piles of dirty washing which had been accumulating for just over two
weeks, hence the need to buy more “smalls”. Two loads and relatively fine
weather, had the greater part dry, folded and stowed by nightfall. While I was
dealing with this, Chris was chasing up a mechanic to consult regarding our
woes. Until this is sorted, we cannot really embark upon our planned week of
exploration of this part of the country. Alas the nearest Kia dealer is not
near at all.
No comments:
Post a Comment