WC NOV 19.
Drove up to Glastonbury on Monday to interview a real classy singer, Clare Teal, who is coming to Shanklin Theatre on Saturday December 1. She has a great new album and will be appearing on John Hannam Meets on Sunday November 25. Fell in love with her amazing house. Clare made us so very welcome. She was off to see Van Morrison later that day in Bath.
Wednesday was likely to be another exciting day with a visit to Ludlow to meet Boycie, John Challis, who has a great new book out called Boycie and Beyond. With such bad weather around I, wrongly as it happened, decided to go by train. All was well and I left Southampton at 9-10am and the Cardiff train was dead on time. I had to travel to Newport, Gwent, and then catch another train to Ludlow. The train was halted at just outside the Bristol Temple Meads station – and that was the end of the line. The heavy rain had flooded stations and the Severn rail tunnel and you could not get into Wales. Coaches were on their way but had been held up by motorway crashes and traffic jams. I was advised not to to try and travel to Ludlow. I tried to get a train back to Southampton but these had been cancelled. In the end I tried to get to Reading and pick up a train to Southampton. The Bristol to Reading train took 3 hours, due to flood water. I did meet one or two lovely ladies which helped to make the journey pass quicker – and they were getting information via their phones. I eventually arrived back in Southampton at 4pm – having made the over 7 hour round trip to Bristol Temple Meads. I did manage to contact John Challis to make him aware I could not make it. It will happen – but not until early 2013.