51 WE’RE OFF, WE’RE OFF, WE’RE OFF IN A MOTORCAR…

We set our alarms for silly o'clock, packed our overnight bags and headed to Poole in the darkness.  The plan was to leave around 6 to get past Birmingham before the full impact of rush hour could be felt.  

Even in the very early morning, the M6 is so busy.  The Winwick Interchange was its usual rammed self, and Stafford and Stoke were lively.  We ended up stationary on the M6 just before the M5 cutoff, even though we got there at 7:30.  The wait was thankfully short, though.  Before you knew it, we were doing a whopping 50mph heading towards the West Country.

We stopped at Gloucester Services for a terrible breakfast barm. Lisa's bacon barm wasn't any better. The coffee was okay, but nothing special, either - all that for close to £20. I would not recommend it in the slightest.

We headed back onto the motorway and to the second leg of the journey from the M5 to Poole on mile after mile of A roads.  Twisty country lanes that skipped from 30 mph in towns to 60 mph in between, with a generous smattering of speed cameras to keep me on my toes.  It is tiring driving these roads for any length of time; unfortunately, we had to do it for two and a half hours.

Finally, we made it to the dealership (after nearly going up some guy's drive), and we got to see Ed, who was selling the car.  He is a lovely guy and greeted us warmly. 

He showed us the car, put the trade plates in the window, and then threw me the key to take it for a test drive. Santa Maria!  The little car can't half shift when needed, even before pressing the SPORT button. 

Put a little lead in your right boot, and you are rewarded with a surge of torque and a whoosh, and then the horizon is much closer than it was a few seconds earlier!  Hit the SPORT button, and the same thing happens…only a lot quicker!!!

We returned to Ed and did the paperwork, and I was the proud owner of Abbie the Abarth!  I explained the rally we were doing, and I couldn't work out if he thought we were brave or stupid!  

We had driven 245 miles without a hitch and went wrong twice in the 6-mile drive to the hotel.  After a loop of Poole, we got into the hotel car park, parked, and headed to Reception to pick up our key and have an hour's kip.  

We then put our bags back into the boot.  We could only check in at 3 pm, so we headed into the town for some medicinal Guinnesses and grabbed some food.  We had a delicious Italian in Poole Quay, looking out at the harbour over to the uber-posh strip of land that is Sandbanks.

We finally checked in around 7 pm and crashed hard.  It had been a long day and an epic drive. We had picked the car up; it was as described, and the handover was straightforward.  All we had to do now was the same trip in reverse, with a stop in Stroud for some alloys…