It’s mile after mile of empty tinder dry blonde grass, occasional clouds of sheep seem to float on the horizon, fence posts flash by either side hypnotically. I wind down the window to let the breeze buffet me, to keep me awake the last 3/4 hours of the journey. Not much happening at all just the horizon and the radio, the constant tone of the motor trapped in fifth, the rumble of the tyres along the reasonably kept highway. It’s coming up to the horror stretch from Cressy to Foxhow – single lane road. I hate having to go off the shoulder at one hundred. Imaginings of the car fish-tailing and skidding into an oncoming car or tree bite at my consciousness.

There’s a surprise after the place where the road dips down to a bridge and becomes a single lane -a road crew and signs slowing me down , 80 .60. 40 – SLOW. The stretch ahead is laid out in wonderful two lane magnificence – but it’s so new it’s not yet sealed, the roller is pounding the stones two kilomteres ahead. A big red STOP lollipop confronts me and an orange jacket talks into the leach of his two way radio. I wait, a tinge of dust in the air and the distant sweet smell of bitumen. Waiting, I turn up the radio for amusement, after the last hundred and fifty clicks I’m glad for the break in concentration. I hate driving. The lollipop flips to a yellow SLOW, there’s an acknowledgement and a nod and I’m skating over loose stones at sixty, they click and bash at the underbody and make the sound of rain on a tin roof. I pass the roller breathing and pulsing like a dormant dragon……