Nightmare motorway journeys

Any journey on the M6 between Knutsford and Birmingham…..

Being towed home in a roofless car with only an aero-screen on rain soaked, salted motorways at night on a short rope (a bar is now a legal obligation). The goggles were so filthy all I could see were the tail and brake lights in front, when they got further apart I braked. Having no way of communicating my predicament to the driver towing I had to grimace and bear it for two hours.

Manchester – polzeath. Not bad going, got up early & got there in 6hrs. Dearest daughter of the family I was providing respite for forgot her body board. Back to Manchester to pick it up then back to polzeath, all on the same day. At least this trip only took 7 hrs altogether. She never used it..

Towing the caravan back from France, stuck for ages on M25 & M1.
Pulled off M1 at Luton, double parked to get fish & chips, then pulled onto some factory car park for a few hours. The factory night shift must have thought we were travellers, but gave us a friendly wave & left us alone. (Least, I think it was a wave). 😀

Many years ago I was nicked after a bit of fisty cuffs watching Villa play at Ipswich. Locked us up till last orders. Set off home & my Hillman Avenger broke down few miles out of Ipswich. So my mate towed us 100 miles with his Cortina. Had to backtrack to collect one lad who fell asleep on a verge when we stopped. I fell asleep at one point, woke to screaming & horn blaring as my car was rolling diagonally past his with the tow rope still attached. Casually tried the car when we stopped & it fired in to life. 🙂

While back now, but stuck in a jam on the M6 where a tanker full of cows blood had crashed and overturned, spreading the blood on the carriageway, the fire brigade started to hose it down then some bright spark said what about BSE? (This was right at the beginning of BSE so hysteria was at its height) so they downed tools for a while, got a bit whiffy waiting in that jam.

Driving from Glasgow to bham got stuck in almighty closure and jam caused by truck crash just outside Carlisle turned into 16hr journey, also got stuck in the one when the bikers got shot that added bout 6-7 hrs to journey.

Came round the corner onto the norf circular to find people strewn across the road, some dead some alive. That wasn’t all that great seeing as I was the only person there. Turned out 4 of them had been pushing a car that had broken down and another one rear ended them. Unpleasant.

Plymouth to Co Durham.
With diarrhoea.
Had to stop at nearly every available, and often unpleasant , lavatory. Took a very long and uncomfortable time.

Driving back form a weeks ski trip in France we got about half way to Calais and my mates Landcruiser rear wheel bearing collapsed.

The resulting skid was very exciting indeed , as was the next few miles at 3mph to get to a garage. We hoped it wasa brake shoe fault , but no , a few minutes of head scratching and borked bearing was identified.

Mate had breakdown cover so we limped into the next town and found a weird old 1970’s version of faulty towers. Car is collected about an hour later by a full on car transporter crewed by 3 french likely lads.

Found a pizza restaurant and spent a good few hours organiosing travel home as my mate suffers from horrendous sea sickness so cannnot use a ferry.

Next morning we get a bus to a TGV station. where we encounter about 10 Africans ( Ivory Coast IIRC ) who are travelling to England as illegal imegrants. Helpfull chaps carried our kit bags in exchange for info on what Engerland is like , the weather , jobs etc. 3hrs on a TGV to Paris. Tube across Paris with out illegal imigrants for company who again helped with out bags. Bunged them a few Euros as we got on the Eurostar to Waterloo and they headed for Calais.

Got to Guildford around 6pm , 36hrs after leaving Geneva. Car turned up 4 days later complete with skis and beeers and wine still onboard.

M5 driving from Somerset to meet friends in wales to go kayakaing. Motorway shut, cars turned round at junction as it was flooded, never made it.

The A1/M seems to have a habit of being shut and you just get directed off with no diversion, always enjoyable in the dark on your own with no map (company hire car).

I live in Orpington and commute to Basildon, 29 miles with the Dartford crossing in the middle.
I’ve had several journeys which have taken 3+ hours, two over the last 5 months due to high winds this winter.

About 10 years ago I drove from Southend to Bridgwater to deliver some machinery in a 300TDi Landrover with a 16″ trailer.
As we pulled out of the car park having dropped of the goods, the clutch failed (pivot ball punched through the actuation lever – gearbox out to repair) we got home about 12 hours later via an RAC flatbed.

February a couple of years ago 20mile journey home in less than 4″ of snow and main roads were all relatively clear. Left office at just before 6pm. Walked through the front door at just after 2am. 8 hours on the m27. On the way not a single accident or broken down car.

Others spent the night on the a3 that night so my night was better than some!

The other one that stands out is being stuck on the A12 for 4 hours stationary after some **** cretin chucked a brick off a bridge and killed someone. I was proper pissed about the delay right up until I found out what happened six hours later. It was sadly the first of a number of incidents on that road and it must be a decade ago.

That second incident has tempered my temper when getting stuck. You never know how much worse some one else’s day has been.

Dodgy Curry the night before, then drove from Stoke to Eastbourne. At times the Focus I was in was doing Warp 9.9, somehow I managed to get to each set of services before the next motion.

Train Journey, whilst working in a railway control the guys out on the track informed me that a landslip at Balcombe had occurred, blocking the mainline between Threebridges and Brighton. I left Croydon at 0700, got the train to Threebridges to find a near riot in progress as no buses were laid on. I got on the train to Horsham, then to Bognor, changed at Barnham, train to Brighton before getting a train to Eastbourne, finally walked in the door at 1300. I had to be back at work at 2300!

3 years ago, left Bourg St Maurice in a convoy of 3 cars.
Blasted through France for 500- odd miles, not a single hold up or problem.
Finally arrive at M25 – knackered but only half an hour from home to be confronted by miles of stationary traffic. At bloody midnight. Only 1 lane open due to road works.

I hate that road.

Do you fit much machinery in a trailer that size?

2 years commuting between the lakes and warrington

Surely that can’t be beaten…

Queuing to get out of Glastonbury festival (onto motorways so kind of counts), any year, filthy, with no food or water and on a massive comedown. My lowest ebb(s)

Not the worst journey ever but I got stuck on a massive jam on a hot day travelling south on the m23

There was an ice cream van stuck in the same queue which opened up for business

Thats quite a coincidence, cos on the ice cream van forum I lurk on, theres a legacy thread about this guy’s best day ever stuck on the M23 in a day long traffic jam 😉

edlong – Member
2 years commuting between the lakes and warrington
Surely that can’t be beaten…

Kendal to Manchester everyday. It’s not that bad, it’s better than this looks:

M25 j6 to Marlow. Can be done in under an hour comfortably if the roads are clear. Took us just over 8.

Took two hours just to get from j7 to j8. Then onto the now overwhelmed surrounding roads, which kept us delayed long enough to hit rush hour traffic (we’d left after the morning rush).