We’re on the road again.

For how long, we’re not entirely sure. The vague plan is to make our way up to Scotland, have a look around, and see how we feel. So, about as organised as usual.

For some reason, our first day on the road turned into a tour of British supermarkets.
First stop was Lidl to stock up on supplies. From there, we went to visit Mich, who is currently off work with sciatica, before hitting the road.

Quite why we thought setting off in the middle of the school holidays was a good idea, I’m not sure.
The roads were packed. Roadworks seemed to be everywhere, sections of motorway were closed, and we had no choice but to take the back roads.

Normally, we love the back roads. In Spain and Portugal they’d taken us through tiny villages, over mountains and along roads where we could drive for miles without seeing another car.

England is slightly different.

Here, there are other cars on them.

Eventually we made it to supermarket number two: Tesco, for a sandwich and snack deal. Proper road-trip cuisine.

Then we sat in some more traffic.

As we drove through Bradford on Avon, the air suddenly became thick with smoke. There had been wildfires breaking out around the UK, and driving through the haze was a little unnerving. I was starting to wonder whether this was really the best time to be setting off on a road trip.

The plan for the night was Ludlow, but somewhere just south of Gloucester we hit yet another traffic jam. As I stared at the map, I suddenly realised we were going to be passing quite close to Matt and Sonia’s place.
Mike gave Matt a call.

And just like that, Ludlow was abandoned and we were heading to see them instead.

Via Aldi, obviously, to get beer.

Three supermarkets in one day. We know how to travel.

It turned out to be a really nice change of plan. Instead of spending the evening looking for somewhere to stop for the night, we got to catch up with Matt and Sonia, and even had a proper bed to sleep in.

Scotland will just have to wait.