Minimal

White knuckle ride

Following a particularly scary drive down the A1 on Friday night, I’ve decided that the next time I hear the words “Drivers are advised to stay at home unless the journey is absolutely vital,” I’m going to heed the advice. To be fair, the warning was intended for later in the weekend, but it really should have been issued for that very night.

Weaving slowly across a featureless, white expanse of dual-carriageway, your vision was restricted by the glare of your own headlights in the monster snowflakes that were falling. Even a straight bit of tarmac like Dere Street suddenly becomes a nightmare to navigate when the only means of judging your position is the occasional rumble of tyres on cats’ eyes.

Perhaps most worrying, though, was the fact that 40-ton lorries were doing nearly twice my speed (which was 25-30mph), steaming up behind you and expecting to be let past. When you don’t even know which lane you’re in, you’re bloody reluctant to go too far left. In the end, if the lorry didn’t move out to pass, you figured you were in the outside lane and promptly got out of his way before you found yourself flattened under a tanker full of Fosters. If that’s the way I’m to meet my end, the lorry could at least be carrying Caffrey’s. :)

Update: Of course, I’ve not got any photos to prove the conditions were that bad, but Phil has some nice ones of the snow in Gateshead.