Brief encounter?

In 1978 I enjoyed driving anything that would start. 

😉

I had an MG Midget in 1978. And a Retriever called Will. He liked the car but his head was always above the top of the window so his ears used to flap. If I had a human passenger, he was relegated to the "space" behind the seats. He objected to that, especially if the roof was up. Wouldn't be allowed now I suppose.

As I alluded to yesterday......

Around 1978 (I think in retrospect it was 1979) I had a Vauxhall Shovit in a natty two-tone shade of gold and rust. I did quite a few miles in that car, spending many weekends (and weeks) away in it, pursuing outdoor exercise in, amongst others, The Lakes, Scotland, and Snowdonia (and it was EIII's comments about Snowdonia and rain that stirred the memories).

For a good amount of time, the starter motor was reluctant to engage, but this could generally be overcome by putting it into gear and rocking it rather robustly back and forth (only the odd occasion required a visit underneath, and use of a spanner and/or a blow from a Sunderland screwdriver to fix the problem). I was putting off replacing said starter motor, since the Haynes manual stated that the engine mount had to come off to achieve the task - something I frankly didn't quite believe, but wasn't in a hurry to find out.

Anyway, one weekend, the climbing club had a hut booked in the bleak wastes off the A4086 between Capel Curig and Pen Y Gwryd, and the weather forecast wasn't good! In all my travels over the years for outdoor pursuits, that is the only trip that I completely failed to pursue any outdoor whatsoever (if you exclude running to and from the car). The hut was basic to say the least, but in torrential horizontal rain that continued from Friday into Sunday it was (other than exploring the liquid delights of Cobdens and The Tyn Y Coed), by far the best place to be.  

In fact, only one of our party of around 12 ventured out at all. One who we shall name Steve (mainly because his name was Steve) announced on Saturday morning that he was b*ggered if, having driven all the way to Wales, he wasn't going to get some walking in. Accordingly, he dressed top-to-toe in Gore-Tex, packed his rucksack, and set off out through the door. Less than five minutes later, the door crashed open, and back in he came. The weather had bypassed the best outdoor gear then available, he was totally soaked through to the skin, and his rucksack was like a filled bucket! Only the pub(s) remained on the agenda after that. (Steve bore a more than passing resemblance to Rowan Atkinson at the time. It wasn't unknown for him to be "recognised", and I've certainly seen him sign (forged) autographs).

Come Sunday, we all decided to leave fairly early, and my best friend Dave and I were the last to leave. This was largely due to the fact that though my car started first time he'd parked his car facing into the wind (and rain) and it steadfastly refused to fire up and I stayed behind to help. We resorted to driving to Capel to see if we could source some "Quick/Easy Start" with no success, so returned, pushed his car round through 180 degrees, and proceeded to strip and dry all the ignition with whatever cloths we could find. 10 minutes of work in the still torrential rain  finally got the thing to start (thank god we don't have mechanical distributors any more), and Dave climbed into his car, stated he'd better get away before it stopped again, and bumped off down the track.

I returned to my car, stripped off my waterproofs, and climbed into the driving seat, somewhat moist. I turned the key, only for the starter motor to jam! The car was, by then, parked in a puddle inches deep, and my GF of the time was far from impressed when, having till then been sheltered inside the car, she had to get out and help me push it to a (slightly) dryer spot. Then, underneath with a spanner to free up the starter, emerging absolutely covered in mud. The car was left running (well you would, wouldn't you), whilst I recovered some clothes from my rucksack, chose the most (but not very) sheltered side of the hut, and stripped to the pink and crinklies to put cleaner togs on (the first people to leave had taken the key after we'd locked the hut up).

I remember that hut with great affection (not!) and it has rather coloured my thoughts of Snowdonia ever since.

Shortly after, the starter motor was replaced (and yes, it did need the engine mount removing - a strategic pile of bricks substituted for a hoist), and not long after that, the GF, became the ex-GF   .

As a postscript, EIII's mention prompted me to check whether the hut was still there. It was, and the research helped me to solve an almost-40-year mystery! Some 'huts' we used were quite swish, others were (very) basic, but they all had (albeit sometimes basic) toilet facilities. This particular hut was in the middle of a field, in the middle of nowhere, and there was no sign of any toilet facilities at all. Over the external door, on the internal face of the lintel, someone had roughly painted the word "Toilets" (complete with the quotation marks). Well, of course, through that door was...........the outside........no toilets at all! We all took it a some sort of joke in bad taste, hence, it was brave the weather to the leeward side of the field wall, or wait for the pub!

Having now found the hut information on-line on the website of the owning club, the mystery is solved. They've obviously only recently added a small extension with a toilet and shower, but the info (which it would appear that we didn't have at the time) also recommends the use of toilets in a barn, somewhere between a quarter and half a mile away - which were obviously there to support camping in the field adjacent to them. It was well outside camping season, so no wonder we didn't find them!.

Anyhow, I obviously survived the experience, and wasn't scarred for life by it, so.......as you were.

 

I suppose what briefly occupying me was that of the 30 million years or so of Homo Sapiens roaming the planet, it may well turn out that the microscopic fraction of that time we've had with personal cars may be coming to an end, as we understand it anyway.

At least our descendants will know more about us than we do of our forebears as so much of our activity has been recorded. Far less chance of the purpose of spaghetti junction being misunderstood than our attempts to understand Stonehenge for example.

Some sobering speculative thoughts though, imagine them looking back at the way we lived, and pondering on how we just shrugged off as inevitable, the thousands of deaths and injuries each year we inflicted on one another with our vehicles.

Yeah, but I think the major difference will be that it may no longer be personal. As in generally speaking, you had your own horse or your own car, in future I think that won't be the case.

While that is likely to come for many people who live in towns and cities I think it is less likely for those who live in villages or remote areas where specific uses are not likely to be any better covered by public transport or shared / self drive vehicles than at present.
Similarly, unless it becomes culturally wrong (i.e. like drink driving or wearing fur coats) to have your own transport there will always be the desire to have personal flexibility, especially for the better off who can afford it or can afford the space to keep it.
As a general direction I agree with the "brief encounter' possibility but I see it as a return to 1920's level of personal vehicle ownership.