Lucky for us, this rental car was available at Gatwick.
At the end of this nice, luxurious flight, we did arrive at Gatwick International Airport in London. Original plans
were to fly into Birmingham and rent a car from there, but due to last-minute flight loads, it was thought safer to
fly into London. Initial plans were to take a train straight to Birmingham to pick up the car, but after being in-
formed by a very helpful airport employee (in a wonderful British accent that would take us almost the whole week to
get used to) that the train route "no longer ran". After considering and then dismissing taking a bus because the
bus schedule wasn't flexible enough to allow our getting back in time the next week, it was was decided we would have
to rent the car from Gatwick and have the adventure of crash-course England driving for practically a cross country
drive. The Avis agent said "not a problem" to transfering the reservation and after saying our goodbyes, we took off
from the airport and headed for the M40.
Driving on the left side of the road was not a problem - I was prepared for that. What I wasn't prepared for was the
road layout and road signs. The first thing we learned was that when exit signs are put above certain lanes, it does
not mean you have to get in those lanes. There may be SOME order to how they are placed, but it does not have the
same meaning as here. In fact, I don't think I saw anything but left hand exits (no exits going off to the right and
then over a bridge). Also, another curiosity was the road signs for Birmingham itself. The first we encountered
stated "Birmingham 100". I assumed (and still have to) that this meant miles, so thought, an hour and a half, not
too bad. It was around 11:00 by this time. But, it was not until after 12:00 of constant driving 70 MPH that we saw
the next sign "Birmingham 80". Okay, something was definitely off, and after the 1 1/2 hour estimated time had
ellapsed, we were still 50 miles from Birmingham according to the sign. But, then something amazing happened.
Within a minute or so, we saw the exit for the M42 beltway around Birmingham. I did not stop to question whether the
signs were wrong, or using a strange measurement I'm not familiar with, or if I was hallucinating because of lack of
sleep. I just started to keep my eyes open for the M6 north, which would take us near the Alton area. So far in our
journey everything was going more or less as expected. But, it was at this point that we seemed to take a slight
detour into The Twilight Zone territory. Already at this point, Subgirl had given in to being awake for nearly 30
hours (seemingly so with the time difference) and had crawled into the back seat to sleep. And I could have almost
gotten us onto the M6 and away from Birmingham if I had learned to read the junction signs just a bit sooner. But,
upon missing the M6, we went half way around the other side of the loop before we hit upon a reasonable turnaround
point. In the long run it would have been best to have just gone around again. I cannot recall much of what
happened in those dazed 2 hours we spent trying to get out of that city. Mainly we stopped at several of the "Welcome
Breaks" (probably some of them twice) to ask for directions and to get something to drink. I do remember finally
figuring out which exit to go to, but then somehow getting on the south-bound M40 and heading back to London before
getting turned around. We finally managed to find the M6 exit, but not before it had gotten late enough that the
traffic had just started to get heavy. At least this is what I assumed at first. Eventually we would find out there
had been a traffic accident, which brough the M6 down to a crawl. We drove 10 miles going inch by inch, while I grew
progressively sleepier. Several times I nodded off to be awaken by Subgirl, alarmed out of her sleep, grabbing the
wheel to keep us from hitting the car parked beside us. It was after the 4th or 5th time that I decided Subgirl
had better drive for a while. So, with one quick stop at the next Welcome Break, we "filled" up the tank (more on
this later), rested for just a minute, then started back out. I didn't actually sleep once I was free from the mono-
tonous task of inching the car along at 1 MPH, but instead tried my best to make sense of the Avis map and our own
maps printed from the net. Things started to look better as we found the next few road changes and made it all the
way to the Alton village. And this brings us to another issue in getting around England: the local roads are like
codes. I'm sure it is very efficient, but makes it difficult in finding the next road if you're not used to looking
for a road like B5323. We were, in fact, concentrating so hard in finding this road, that we happily took a right
at our last turnoff because we saw that road name pointing off to the right without realizing the road went left and
right. Later in the week we realized we went around the whole village and was a street away from our B&B when we
turned around to retrace our steps. And after a frightening learning experience with a closed off construction lane
being controlled by an easily-missed red light and some final helpful instructions by a man walking down the street,
we made that final correct turn and was headed straight toward The Warren. But, of course, to complete this madcap
journey, we missed the actual road because of the angle and not being able to see what road it was until after it was
passed. One final turnaround and we were there.
We followed the sign to the side entrance to let our host know we were indeed there, albeit 5 hours late. She could
see we were very tired and stated we should just get into the room and that the introductions could wait until break-
fast the next morning, which we scheduled for a late 9:00 time. I managed to get all the luggage out of the car and
onto the nearest space on the floor we could find closest to the entry-way, while Subgirl snapped the above picture
of The Warren. After these necessary chores were done, I decided to test out the firmness of the bed. Evidently
Subgirl thought this was a good idea as well, because we awoke at 2:30 a.m. to find we had fallen asleep on top of
the bed covers and in our clothes. I got a quick drink and then we got properly under the bed covers and that was
the last we knew until 5 hours later.