It’s been ever so cold today! This morning it took quite a while to defrost the car, using the internal heaters and an ice scraper. I don’t use de- icer as it doesn’t really work long enough..
However, I’m not grumbling, I was happy to do the defrosting, it’s so much better than waking up to the endless rain that we experienced up until recently. In fact, it wasn’t nearly as dark today either as the frosty clear sky was brighter and lighter than usual. The grifters had been out on the main roads, so the driving wasn’t too bad either.
The sky was bright and had a pinky glow, suggesting that the sunrise was going to be stunning. But by then I’d be at work and facing the opposite direction!
A tiny waxing crescent moon was visible, a silver sliver against a dark blue sky. Gorgeous!
Then I drove into the A66 microclimate. I believe I’ve mentioned it before in this blog and it fascinates me. A little area of weather all it’s own. I came out of the winding dual carriageway, the only bit of dual road between Keswick and Workington, on which there is a maximum speed limit of 50 mph, plus speed cameras. And emerging from the dual carriageway I encountered the freezing fog of the microclimate.
It was pretty dense fog and in felt the temperature drop even within the heated car. A strange, eerie light was trying to pierce the fog from above, making a yellowy fug.
But it was tremendously beautiful. Every blade of grass on the verge was coated in ice and frost, each strand alive with crystals of ice. It was as if I’d entered a parallel universe, like I’d gone through the back of a wardrobe and entered Narnia.
For several miles the microclimate continued, then as always as I passed under the footbridge just before Cockermouth, the fog suddenly stopped. A line on the road, where the fog ended. Thick fog, then nothing….
Looking in the rear view mirror, the fog was still there, it just ended in a definite line.
The cold didn’t lift all day, although it was brilliantly sunny and clear, not a cloud in the sky. I had a walk around the block at lunchtime, about 1.25 miles and it was great. But freezing.
The only down in the whole day was during the drive home. As I approached Braithwaite, the traffic was stationary, so I pulled up. To my utter dismay there’d been an accident of some kind, with a couple of vehicles on the verge. But the dreadful thing was that directly in my line of vision was a shape lying on the road, with a policeman doing CPR and a Wpc doing mouth to mouth. With all the police there, I didn’t get out to assist, would only have even in the way. But because the traffic was stopped, I couldn’t avoid watching this awful scene, thinking all the time that someone would be waiting at home for this person, wondering why they were late…
Oh god, I hope they were OK.
Eventually, we were let through, but news later said that the road was still closed four hours later for investigation.
It was so unsettling and I’ve been thinking of that person all evening, hoping against hope that they survived.
Hmm.
Barbara Murray Art 