18th June 25. A Long and Troublesome Day.

When you meticulously plan a day around 3 different jobs from Aylesbury to Great Yarmouth. Then back to Maidstone. Into London collect a third car to get back to Aylesbury. Nothing can go wrong. It did. My greed for jobs and thinking about the saving on the train when there was a job from London to Aylesbury to get me home. It didn't.

However it was another in a long line of sunny hot days. It's mid June and we have had beautiful weather really since March. With only a few days off from glorious sunshine. Today, It was blisteringly hot. I love it. Added to that it was light until well after nine tonight, which gave me a false hope I had plenty of time to get these three jobs done.

Having collected the Motability return from Ironically my customer in Aylesbury, last night.

I was able to have an early start to get to the Buying Vauxhall dealer in Great Yarmouth at 9.00am . They took and checked the car quickly and I then headed out to the station which was a short walk and on a day like today it was a pleasure. On the way I came across a real back street car dealer. Who had a selection of cars , I'm sure nobody actually buys.

Proper car sales 😂

There was one car sitting there with grass growing up around it and I was tempted to go and ask about it but I thought better of it.

An Audi TT original shape.

Audi TT

You can see why I declined to find out more. Shame.

From Great Yarmouth station I was going to Norwich. Which is a direct service taking a little over half an hour.

From The station I clicked an Uber to take me to a Group 1 assured site to collect a 2022 Kia Sportage going to my customer in Maidstone.

I was there in about 10 minutes and the car was ready to go. All going well so far today.

The journey from Norwich to Maidstone. Takes around two and a half hours. There are two ways you can go. You can go via Cambridge or Ipswich. I'd heard of problems on the A1 South so I decided to take the Ipswich route which is a little longer, but I'm sure would have saved me time in the long run as going round Cambridge can be congested.

Norwich to Maidstone

Arrived safely at Maidstone Kia. It took me around three hours with a stop. My time today was going well. For now.

After getting my appraisal signed. I even got a lift to the station from one of the sales guys. Which was kind of them. Walking that mile to the station, I enjoy. But the sun today was very strong and I still have a lot to do.

The nearest station to the dealership is Barming. A very small station tucked away about half an hour from anywhere on foot.

But from there I can get to Victoria station. Then the get the district line and go east to Upney underground station where it's a short walk from there to collect the car going back to Aylesbury.

Looking for the "dealer" this car was being collected from. It was in a huge yard with many small industrial buildings all doing something with cars. I'm guessing they weren't all 100% good honest taxpayer's.

Interesting place

But some had some very interesting vehicles parked outside as you can see.

I however, was here to collect a 2016 Vauxhall Corsa going back to the very independent used car site I have mentioned before. When I delivered a horrible Audi Q3 to a friend of the dealer. !!

I eventually found the guilty seller

I had to wait for the owner. Who came out and checked my credentials. Funny...

He also advised me that there was something I needed to be careful about as they had just changed the engine and gearbox so go easy.

The car appraised and started ok . Not really sure what gearbox they changed it for. The buyer paid his money and I kind of rowed the row out as the gearstick didn't seem to be connected to the same gearbox that was in the car. Perhaps it was missing the original one.

I eventually left around 16.45 and joined the traffic to get from Barking to the M25. The Corsas difficult gearbox giving me a challenge in heavy traffic. The challenge hadn't started.

M25 Rush Hour. 82 degrees

Someone overtook me on the M25 pulling alongside he pointed behind.

I stopped in the next emergency area. And the stopping simply showed me the smoke that I hadn't seen due to it flowing out behind.

Once stopped the car was enveloped in thick smoke.

I got out grabbing everything of mine and got over the barrier to safety in case it just went up in flames.

Sadly, it didn't.

The smoke settled and it smelled of burning oil.

I lifted the bonnet to let all the smoke clear and called the AA.

Being on the M25 in a safe area means you are a priority.

But standing in the sun , which I normally love. Was starting to drain my stamina for the day. There was no shelter and I wasn't going to sit in the car and wait to be rear ended by someone on their phone.

So standing in the sun was the only option. I jumped down the banking and waited for the AA.

He arrived and immediately called the police to close the lane using the signal system placing a red X over the inside lane.

He looked at the car and started it to see where the oil was coming from and it turned out that someone had fitted something the wrong way round and the oil was squirting out not in. He said it was lucky not to have gone up in flames. I questioned his judgement.

He refitted it but said to try and get off the motorway and after two hours in the baking sun. We gingerly filtered back onto the M25 and crawled round to the A1 service area. Where he set about trying to fix it. A hour spent there and a temporary fix was done.

Lots of very interesting cars started appearing at the service area. Obviously a local club or just a bunch of guys who love their cars getting together. It was nearly 7pm now.

The AA man decided he would follow me to the destination rather than set up the towing equipment. I had called the buyer a few times and told him I was getting the car to him and leaving the keys in the post box

I wasn't, as he suggested, taking the car back to the seller and being stranded there. He wanted me to go back and do the complaining. Cheeky sod.

The very helpful and kind AA man said he would take me back into Aylesbury from this dealership miles from nowhere. The last time I will be talking on a job for this company.

The car made it to The place, just. And we left it and headed through the countryside roads to Aylesbury. The sun was just setting by now as it was now well after 9pm

It was quite spectacular over the fields and hills on the way and the AA guy, who lived in central London, hadn't actually seen the horizon for months. He was really pleased to have offered me the lift to see this. His face made the day bearable.

I arrived home. Around 9.30pm and thanked him for his help and left him an amazing review.

A troublesome day. But actually quite rewarding in the end.

I'll do it again tomorrow.