9:19 pm, October 28, 2008
As days go, today was filled with highs and lows of equal measure. I’m on the road this week visiting the winners of the Car Dealer Ewards in association with Motors.co.uk. It’s great to get out and about and meet you guys at the coalface, but that means a series of road trips which is never pleasant in the UK.
When you’re clocking up as many miles as I am this week there’s a high chance they’ll be some unpleasant experiences. And the first came at about 10am. It was a big bright yellow thing with flashy lights – the curse of the roads; the evil eye of the establishment… yes, a blasted speed camera.
I was snapped travelling up the A1 to meet the winner of the Independent Car Dealer Website of the Year. Thing is, I wasn’t really concentrating (never a good idea) and with thoughts on other things my mind was wondering and it was then when I was get caught out.
Just after a section of motorway I pulled off a roundabout and accelerated away, failed to notice the fact the speed limit had changed to 60mph and bish, bosh I’m caught on film.
What a fool. I haven’t had points on my licence since I was caught on my motorbike in 2003. Now the wait begins to see if the fine comes through. I’m sure it will.
But the really, really annoying thing about it? Well, that was the fact I was testing a new TomTom 730 sat nav with built in speed camera alerts! At least that’s what the maker says it’s got – why the stupid thing didn’t tell me there was a camera coming up is beyond me. I nearly launched it out of the window…
Still, it was great to meet the first winner of this year’s Ewards. I’m seeing another tomorrow, one Thursday and the last on Monday. They were chuffed to bits to pick up the gong and were yet another firm I’ve spoken to recently that is well prepared for the downturn in the economy and places their website as key to boosting business.
Oh, and one other low today? Visiting the petrol pumps! I booked in a Volvo XC90 for the week, as I knew it would cope admirably with the many miles I’d be doing. Plus I wanted to take a look at the R-Design model anyway. But only I could book in a 3.2-litre petrol model that’s currently returning just 20mpg!
At least petrol’s coming down – if I’d been doing these trips in the summer I’d need to remortgage the house!
Winners of our Ewards will be revealed in the next issue of Car Dealer which is set to hit desks from November 13 onwards.
James
