MEDIA CENTRE - Off The Wall

Phil’s Travels – Nottingham, England (09.24)

Phil’s Travel – Nottingham, England (09.24)

Shortly after a hot and humid sejours in Dominican Republic (DR), my Vesuvian mosquito bite and I were on the road again, literally this time. I hired an SUV from nearby Paddington. My last SUV was a very feminine, white paint job, Nissan Qashqai that was very Sheikha-like. This time, I was given a much larger, all black, mean looking Mazda. I would have passed as FBI in USA. The coolest thing about the car though was the speedometer and speed limit displayed on the windscreen itself – which only I, as driver, could see. The family thought I was hallucinating as they could not see such display. All very Top Gun (and not due to any residual mosquito venom).

Such a big car meant that all the stuff my darling daughter wanted to take to university was comfortably accommodated (although we did need to use part of back seat to do it). I don’t recall my super son requiring an entire apartment-full of stuff when he went to Nottingham. Anyway, big car, big thanks.

We left an hour later than planned, which meant slow going on the motorway and we had to lunch at a service station. In Nottingham, after a number of wrong turns (thanks to the Google Maps lady and her awful drawings on my iPhone) we made it to the right part of the extensive campus and checked in. We unloaded the masses of stuff, cleaned her room, unpacked and checked everything was in working order. Surprisingly, the room absorbed all her stuff – way more storage than my son’s broom cupboard in his first year. Ladies are so lucky.

Her room was en-suite, had its own built-in heater, a fridge, large desk, ample shelving and a super comfortable bed. Apart from the Winter Wonderland-style mirror on the back of the door, it was the height of luxury. Some way better than my super son’s first year room and light years better than ‘when I were a lad’. My first digs had three of us in one room, with one sink. Full stop. No fridge, not heaters, shoe box sized storage and the bed was so bad, I slept on the floor for nine months.

We had decided to spend the night in Nottingham, rather than do a day trip, so as to celebrate a birthday together. At our hotel, I secured the last parking space and we inspected our rooms. My wonderful wife and I had a boutique (ie very small) room with an incredible view over the city (through a huge floor to ceiling window) and to the UK’s last remaining coal-fired power station on the horizon (huge great big thing that looked massive even 12km away). Our bijoux room was made all the smaller by being furnished with the world’s largest desk light, a fan that would do a windfarm proud and an alarm clock the size of a 1950’s super-computer (and just as complicated).

Our kids had a huge room and none of the supersized equipment. They could have played a match of tennis in there and still not hit the sides. The view was of the car park and our black Beast occupying the last space. On balance I preferred our Alice in Wonderful quirky room.

After hotel check-in, we took a taxi back to uni to drop off our darling daughter, for her to mix and mingle with her fellow freshers, and we taxied back into town for dinner. We did not use the Beast as I did not want to lose the last space. Dinner was at Red Dog BBQ. Food was pretty good but atmosphere tense. My wonderful wife was in full Greek Mother meltdown mode and was fretting throughout the meal over the loss of our darling daughter and her hesitant efforts to blend into university life.

In the end, darling daughter taxied into town and spent the night with us in the hotel. We had a lovely family breakfast in the hotel’s cute restaurant and hung out until checkout time. I would highly recommend the hotel, Hart’s Hotel & Kitchen. A shame we could not sit out in the garden or courtyard and enjoy fare from the owner’s bakery (Hambleton Bakery). Maybe something for us to do in the summer when we collect darling daughter and her modest belongings at year end.

The reason for no outside sitting? The remnants of Storm Boris (that devastated large parts of Europe and killed at least 24 people) were visiting the Midlands. The rain was so heavy that it sounded like 50-cal bullets hitting the taxi’s roof. The skies were filled with thunder and very impressive lightning most of the night. The streets and air were just full of water everywhere.

The ruddy awful weather spilled over into Sunday, although not so biblical as on Saturday evening. The wind and rain were so heavy that we averaged less than 40mph back to London and it took nearly four hours to reach the sanctuary of home. I swear I barely hit 50mph all trip. It was dangerous even at 40mph, what with the abysmal weather and atrocious visibility through constant sheets of rain – more rain on that day than in an entire month of an average September. Truly biblical!