Normal services resumed
After a grim year, the annual motorway stop on the way to holiday fun is a tradition I can’t wait to observe
THE great bank holiday getaway is under way – as far as it can in these confused times for travel – and large sections of the population are on the move from one bit of the UK to another.
This year, perhaps like no other, it will bring road gridlock and family rows, vomiting kids in the back, breakdowns – not always of the car variety – wrong turns and righteous indignation at the driver who cuts in front of you in the queue on the motorway.
It will see crack-of-dawn departures, late night arrivals, 4x4’s stuck down country lanes, smug caravanners – no extortionate hotel prices for them! – and an up-tick in the share price of Werther’s Originals.
But amid all the stress and strife of packing the car with the suitcases, the dog, the wellies, the picnic and the kids – must not forget the kids – there is one up-side to the annual UK getaway.
The arrival at the first service station.
For me the holiday really begins not at the campsite or Airbnb or even at the first glimpse of the sea but when you pull off the motorway and into the familiar uniformity of the service station.
Whether it’s the array of fast food outlets which give you immediate permission to eat a burger and chips at 10am or the shops selling random merchandise (why not buy a lilo? We’re only 200 miles from the nearest beach) I can’t help but feel a frisson of excitement as me and thousands of others negotiate that soulless acreage of car park.
Then it’s through the doors, past the Spa and the slot machine area to peruse the books you’ll never buy in WH Smith. A quick stop in the mobile phone accessory shop and then you’re filling up on a KFC/ coffee/ butty from the little M&S because, rather like casinos, time has no relevance in service stations so eating any or all of these at any hour of the day is acceptable. Perhaps it’s the egalitarian aspect of it all. Posh folk, businessmen and women, families, couples, kids, grannies, lads on stag dos – this year I even saw a bloke with a cat on his shoulder meandering to Maccies –everyone’s in this together.
A bit like life itself, we’re all travellers on a journey heading north, south, east and west to all kinds of places for all sorts of reasons with a variety of different people – some of whom we even want to be with.
I get the same feeling at airports as I watch the to-ing and fro-ing to Boots and departure gates but somehow it’s more pronounced at service stations. Plus, getting on a ‘plane involves an endless round of strictures and formality. In the services the only rule is the one that says don’t jump the queue in Costa.
I’m not alone in my passion. Channel 4 ran a mini series on Tebay Services while a recent survey on the best and worst service stations provoked acres of print coverage and hot online debate.
You see? Whether you’re an Abington aficionado or you’re in wonder at Woolley Edge we’re a simple nation at heart.
I can’t help but feel a frisson of excitement as me and thousands of others negotiate that soulless acreage of car park.