Bridging The Gap

The weekend just gone was a sad one. It had two leaving parties, one in Machynlleth and one in Pilsdon, West Dorset. Much as I wanted to be at both, this is not (to my knowledge) possible. I'd previously arranged to head down to Pilsdon to wish farewell to Chris and Jane, long-standing members of the community, so had to miss saying my goodbyes to Sam at a Blossom Party on the Ffriddgate field.


It was also a happy one. Several other ex-volunteers returned to Pilsdon for the occasion and it was quite a reunion. It is always a pleasure to revisit the community and catch up with my friends there. The place is in full bloom, a feast for the eyes that I rarely get to appreciate on my winter sojourns.

Heading back home again on Monday after too short a stay, we shared the driving, Anna and me. I was behind the wheel as we crossed the Severn Bridge into Cymru (Welsh for “Wales”, pronounced Cum-ri). As always seems to happen I chose the slowest queue, and we sat there watching the driver in front fail to pay with his credit card and having to call an assistant with the button.

Eventually he seemed to be waved through without paying. I nudged forward and waved the contactless card past the reader, feeling ever-so-slightly smug when it worked first time. The barrier lifted. My smugness almost instantly vanished as I found myself unable to move the car forward. What was going on? I was in first gear. The handbrake was off. The accelerator seemed to work. But the clutch pedal wasn't behaving. It refused to go down!

Very aware of the cars behind us getting increasingly impatient, there was nothing we could do. I pushed the “help” button outside the car and a woman's voice came through the speaker. I told her the car wasn't working. She thought I said the card wasn't working so it took us a little while to get on the same wavelength.

Eventually someone turned up and were very pleasant to us. “It happens once a day” they said. The cars behind us were asked to find other lanes. The Highways Agency car arrived and towed us to the side of the road, having temporarily closed all the lanes on the left hand side to allow us to cross safely. I felt a little pang of embarrassment.

Cabbages are feeling safe from butterflies under this netting

As it was Anna's car, it was her breakdown recovery we had to rely on. After 45 minutes or so a chap turned up, winched the car onto his truck and drove us to the nearest service station where he spent quite a long time banging things inside the engine. If he couldn't fix it, Anna's insurance wouldn't cover anything else so we were facing the prospect of spending the night down here in a hotel and trying to sort something out in the morning (when Anna should be back at work).

Relief flooded through us as the repairman informed us he'd fixed it, although he didn't offer a 100% vote of confidence in the repair. “You'll probably be alright getting back” he said, “Just stay in fifth gear if you can”. So we drove the last 100 miles of the journey using the clutch as little as we could and were mighty glad to get home. 

The first runner bean plant to find its pole