Those of you who live in the USA or in the colder areas of Europe will probably laugh at how us Brits got totally nailed by the sudden cold snap we had at the end of this week, but it literally brought the country to a standstill. I even had to take my first ever snow day!
When I left work (early) on Thursday evening I was faced with this. It doesn’t look like much, but there didn’t appear to have been much in the way of gritting, and our cars here aren’t cut out for this kind of weather – I drive a Peugeot 107. I set off at about 5pm with two of my colleagues in tow, who later bailed on me and walked – I don’t blame them, they got home before I did in the end!
My “usual” commute of 10-15mins took me a total of 2.5hrs on Thursday night. I am not even kidding, it was horrific. I have a choice of hills to go up to get home, but regardless I have to go up a hill. I opted for my usual one and almost made it to the top without help – a group of teenagers pushed me the last 5m or so, bless them. I travelled the whole way back doing 10mph and under and got stuck once more, when two lovely men came to my rescue and pushed me over a hill again – big thank you to all of the wonderful strangers who were helping people get home! It then took me an hour to travel the last half a mile to my house. I refused to abandon my car at this point – it was just going to get smashed up or cause more problems by being left on the side of the road, so I was determined to make it, and eventually did! It is the most snow I have seen in my adult life, and it fell pretty quickly. People panicked, got stuck in the their cars and some slept in them – it was ridiculous.
Woke up early the next morning, with the intention of making an attempt to get into work, and was faced with a thick layer of freezing rain on top of the snow we’d had the day before. Nope.
That’s my driveway, by the way…
The back of the house had some really decent icicles and the snow was pretty thick out there. The ice was where the issue was though!
Beautiful but evil! Even our windows were covered in a thick layer of freezing rain, which actually lasted all day – it was madness.
Dave decided to make an attempt to get out of the road and try and get into Bournemouth to work. After he’d hacked into his car (again, freezing rain…) he managed to get it just off the drive and got stuck. There is a slight incline on our road, but his car was having none of it! He then decided to try and get back on the drive, again with little luck. I, and two passers-by, had to push.
Upon calling my boss I found that only 5 or 6 people (plus a handful of doctors) actually made it in to work. I didn’t stand a chance getting out of my road so stayed put. Dave decided to work from home in the end, as did all of his colleagues. I have never heard the roads so quiet out there!
Stuff is beginning to thaw out now. I managed to make a trip to Tesco this morning to stock up on essentials – namely milk and toilet roll! Also got some food to get us through the next few days, as I wasn’t able to collect my shopping on Thursday night due to the weather conditions. Luckily, my order is going to be refunded, so it’s not the end of the world. Annoying though!
So that was our little British brush with the cold. There wasn’t lots of snow, but more an ice issue that was the problem. I’m not sure why we seemed to be so unprepared, as the news had been talking about it earlier in the week. At least everyone I know is safe and well though. On a plus, I got to do a bit of crochet yesterday and read some of my book. Now going to make a cup of tea (hooray for not needing to ration milk!) and have some lunch. Hope you’re all keeping warm, wherever you are!