Well that was unpleasant.
After sitting fully leathered up watching the met office website for 2 hours, I left while it was snowing and 0C, but that only lasted 7 or 8 miles bar the odd flurry. Steady Eddie at 40 to 50 avoiding the slush. By Birmingham it was sleet/rain and 2C. It stopped raining by Worcester and the temperature struggled to 5C by Bristol. I'd had the heated grips on 2 dots and was beginning to wonder if what feeling I had left was cold or wet hands. In 5 miles somewhere between Weston and Bridgwater the temperature soared from 5C to 14C so I pulled in at Bridgwater (the original Shell station in town, not the one I described above) for a warm, tea and fuel. Turned out my BMW Enduroguard gloves had wet out, I suspect because the heated grips reversed the temperature gradient in the glove thus pushing moisture the other way. Plus I had RSI in my left arm from using the visor wipe on my left hand as a windscreen wiper for most of the 156 miles so the glove was very wet. The right glove was dry but you can see the salt stain here
The old Alpinestars oversuit performed faultlessly, not a drop shall pass. Apart from my feet I wasn't particularly cold given I was wearing underwear, 3 layers of EDZ, and Hein Gericke leather with liners in the trousers under the Alpinestars. Ambient high temperature sent the radiator into relapse after it had been loving the deep freeze, so I had to reduce cruising speed, but the temperature steadily dropped back to 7 or 8C as I got into Cornwall. By Okehampton the wind was against me but apart from a couple of showers I managed to get home just as the next weather front arrived. I saw 6 bikes the whole day, nothing North of Worcester and the first one was a police RT going the other way. 627 miles for the week.
Just punched the numbers into the spreadsheet and found that my fill up on Tuesday was the 500th tankful. And VPower is 5 or 6 pence cheaper in the Midlands than Cornwall. Again.
As far as motorway service stations go, I think its better to go into the filling station than the services. In Michael Wood there are a couple of tables where you can have your tea and a munch and a warm. Foods not great but its more convenient than the services.
