The splashy two-step

Well I've been around a bit today. I started with an early appointment at the surgery for another blood test. The phlebotomist had twisted her ankle seeing out the previous patient so was hobbling painfully. Then round the corner to wait for the pharmacy to open to collect my latest batch of drugs and, while waiting, I decided that I needed to see the sea. Because Stack is back it wasn't as simple as jumping onto the M20 and I knew that the A20 would also be stuffed so I went down towards Hastings and then across from Tenterden to New Romney. 

It's a glorious drive and a wonderful way to listen to Radio 4. E. O. Wilson was being interviewed on "A life scientific" and I was enthralled by his description of going to university and how he studied ants; he's given to be one of the leading experts on them and their behaviour and the field of sociobiology.

A brief visit to RSPB Dungeness but it was very windy and all the interesting birds were taking a day off. One of the staff described it as "a few ducks bobbing around in the distance"; it was but it's still lovely spending time there, incredibly relaxing. 

Round to The Station Café but too windy to get out of the car and go far so I headed along the coast to Hythe where I stopped to watch the sea and grab this shot. I'm not very tall but there's a fair bit of me and the gusts of wind were knocking me back so I hope these guys were enjoying their fishing but they were the only fishermen on a long stretch of beach.

Then up through Shornecliffe - I will park and take photos there sometime - and onto the M20. 

We've seen the news reports about Operation Stack but today I saw it properly and it is impressive. Because it only started this morning the first stretch of eastbound motorway from Cheriton was simply empty bar the police vehicles. This meant that I could see the portaloos spaced along the side of the motorway; single units every half mile or so. There were also fire brigade vehicles and an ambulance; it stands to sense that these need to be stationed on the motorway as they cannot use it when blocked and might need to attend incidents in amongst the parked lorries. At Ashford I saw the beginning of the lorry park and then it was two lines of trucks parked nose-to-tail for mile after mile. In total 25 miles of eastbound motorway is shut just now and many of the drivers are out of their cabs wandering around or chatting. However large a company might be having part of their fleet sitting on a motorway going nowhere has to hurt and many of the men and women who should be going somewhere won't be earning just now.

When I came off the motorway I saw the traffic trundling away down the eastbound A20 and it was already sticky - it'll have got much worse further down and that's before businesses shut for the day and people try to get home.