Another wee winter tyre tale.
Had a day off today to do the Christmas shopping. Incredibly cold weather, so cold that salt is having no effect. Absolute brass monkeys. Siberia territory. Decided to get as much as I could in the village rather than drive to a larger shopping centre.
Village roads that had been ploughed and gritted were hard-packed ice. Parking was dodgy because of piled snow at the sides of the roads. No trouble at all. While I was parked in the main street I saw another car coming towards me, down a fairly slight incline, going sideways with its wheels locked. Nearly hit the Co-op delivery lorry which was parked outside the shop. Temperature then (midday) was -13C. My car behaved perfectly, including letting me park it on what were basically piles of packed snow, and pull off again in good order. I tried a sharpish braking manoeuvre at a low speed, and the stability was very encouraging.
By four o'clock I was fed up with it all and besides I'd just made the bookshop owner's day. I stopped looking at kiddies' toys in the Post Office and decided to go home. As I was opening the car door, a lad passing by approached me and asked for a lift home if I was going his way, naming a group of houses about a mile outside the village. He'd been stuck in Glasgow last night due to the weather and was only then getting home, walking from the bus stop. He asked me just to drop him at his road-end, because the road up to the houses was a bit dodgy, but I said "winter tyres rule" and turned into his road. It was hard-packed snow with soft snow on top. Drove like tarmac in summer. After I dropped him off I had another of those awkward 7-point turns into piled snow. No problem. Going back down the side road the car was slithering and the tracking warning was coming on, because I think the tyres were basically coated balls of snow. Soon stopped. I glanced at the temperature read-out. -18.5C.
Car is now safely tucked up in the garage, and God alone knows what the outside temperature is by now. The sheer peace of mind, knowing that I can get out and about, park, turn in snowy roads, and get up the hill to the main road without sliding backwards, is just amazing. When I compare this with the farce that was going on last year, which was making me wonder if the GTi had been a rash choice for a village 800 feet up in the Scottish hills, it seems like a different world.
Rolfe.
