It has passed!
It has passed, it has passed, we have an MOT.
Obviously I mean the truck, the new aspirational motorhome, and we are very pleased indeed.
We did not go back to the previous MOT station, the one with the grumpy job’s-worth inspector. When we arrived there last time the girl behind the desk said cheerily: First time? It’ll be your last.
She was absolutely right, although I am a bit sorry about that since it is opposite an absolutely splendid truck stop, where the food was ace and you can stay for the night if you like.
This time we went to Maryport. We had got up early, or what passes for early in Ibbetson Towers, by which I mean about nine o’clock, and Mark went off to cover a taxi job for somebody whilst I rushed around making sandwiches and paying the weekend’s takings into the Post Office.
Eventually we managed to get ourselves organised and set off.
Maryport is in the north of Cumbria, about an hour and a half’s journey away from our house. It is one of the impoverished old mining towns, and looks bleakly exhausted. It is on the coast, although you can’t actually get to the beach because the railway runs along it, a remnant of the days when iron and steel were shipped down to Barrow to be turned into ships.
Steel seems to come from China these days, it is inexplicably cheaper. Maryport council are hoping to encourage tourism as a way of revitalising the town, although they will probably have to revitalise the weather a bit first.
The sun was shining when we got to the MOT station, rather unexpectedly, and even more unexpectedly, everybody was very friendly.
Even the MOT inspector was friendly, at least by the standards of MOT inspectors. That is to say, he did not swoop down from the roof wearing a black cloak and hat, shouting Ha Ha Ha, Perish All You Mortals. Instead he was quiet and civilised and just said things like Please Press The Brake, which Mark did whilst I cowered anxiously in the front seat, and then eventually, Right, All Good Then, and that was it.
We held our breath all the way out of the gate and around the corner before yelling so jubilantly that we scared the dogs, who had been soundly asleep on their cushion between us.
We had not realised how anxious we had been until it was over, and suddenly the world seemed a brighter place, even though it was raining by then.
We thought that we would quite like to pretend we were on holiday, having been inspired by our friends’ stories on the previous evening, and stopped in a lay-by to drink tea and feel pleased with the world.
We could not sit still drinking tea for very long, and instead got up to pace around the back, marking the most recent Final And Definitive Design measurements on to the floor with a bit of chalk. Obviously we wanted to try them for size, and squeezed down the pretend narrow corridor and sat down upon the pretend loo, until we were satisfied that we had dreamed up the best and most workably perfect design possible, and could trundle off, feeling pleased with our cleverness.
We did not want to go home then, because of being still on holiday, so on our way past we went to visit Castlerigg Stone Circle, which is near Keswick, and where I have never actually visited, because local people do not bother about tourist attractions, they are always full of visitors.
Nobody was there today.
The dogs charged about and barked, and we marvelled at the stunning location, and decided that it could only have been built by people who were really concerned that the Gods approved of them.
In the end, of course we had to go home because of work, and reluctantly chugged back to Windermere.
We are at work now.
I do not mind in the least. We have had a holiday in our new camper van and it has got a real live MOT all of its own.
It has been a trucking good day.
