Trapped on the M1

My journey to work takes me about half an hour door to door, with about twenty minutes on the M1 motorway going one junction from fourteen to fifteen. The snow started to fall very gently about Saturday lunchtime and didn't stop for the whole afternoon. Jack and I were let off work an hour early and off we started on our journey back south. Coming out of the Tesco car park there was a queue, the start of many, we saw a Land Rover slip and slide coming round the roundabout, not the best advertising for one of those monster cars I see around, which I thought would do better in the snowy conditions. I guess if you can't use 4x4 drive, it doesn't matter what car you're in.

The roads were moving no faster than about twenty miles per hour, there were massive snow banks building between the lanes, cars were going up the hard shoulder after an ambulance went up it. People were ducking out of cars to have a cigarette, Jack included, then catching the cars up a few meters down the road. I even turned off my engine at one point as we were going no where. We saw a stranded old style mini, a motorbike whose owner we saw further up carrying back a can of petrol. And at MK, a guy on a moped with nothing but a Adidas jacket on. 

The view for the most of the time on the M1

Getting of the M1 at Milton Keynes was a pretty awesome feeling, having spent the best part of three hours crawling along. The roads in MK were even more covered in snow, saw a car getting stuck up a little incline to a roundabout, if I had more than a fleece and my leggings I might have stopped and got out to help, actually, who am I kidding, at that point I just wanted to get Jack and I home. Next time I go out, I will have the 'survival kit' in the car.

With Hannah due to fly back to the UK on Thursday, I've been following the travel chaos fairly closely, hoping and crossing all my fingers that she gets back in time for Christmas. The temperature is not predicted to rise above zero most of the week, so there is little chance that the snow is going to melt. With no snow tyres it is pretty slow on the roads as slipping will happen and braking is not fun at any speed over thirty miles an hour.

Digging out a path to the house

I had a snow day from work on Sunday and spent the day very much like a day I would spend at Niseko in the snow. Out in the snow in the morning, back to the house to lounge around in my thermals, watching a movie in the arvo and of course eat. And the snow was of Niseko quality, soft, light and fluffy, very fun to frolic around in the white stuff again.

Out and about in the snow