The hire car and the tree: A lamentable (true) story

This time last year we were driving around the UK in the vehicle you see here, pictured with my wife Faith. We hired it in Falmouth, Cornwall and were making our way north to eventually hand it back at Oxford after almost 4 weeks of zig-zagging from the east to west coast and in between. It was a pretty sweet trip and we did loads of things, saw amazingness at every turn and hit a fucking tree. Yeah. A fucking tree.

It's ok, we were unhurt and were able to drive the car away however it was a close thing. Here's the story.

We'd set out from Wells in the county of Somerset heading to Dunster Castle, also in Somerset, which is now a country house (a huge one) but was formerly a motte and bailey castle, fortified since the Anglo-Saxon period. It is beautiful, brutal and rumoured to be haunted. It was a great day that started with a drive through Exmoor National Park and wandering the streets of Dunster, the village that sprung up around the original castle around 1090, just after the Norman conquest of 1066. A quaint little village of around only 800 people.

We headed up the Tor to the castle and enjoyed a day there then got back into the car for the drive back to Wells and our B&B accommodation.

I can't recall the name of the town however it was around 4pm when we accelerated out of a very small fly-speck village and hit the speed limit of 50mph (about 80kph) quite quickly. Now, I'm a great driver, attentive and all, and usually stay on the speed limit so there I was, doing the right thing, watching the road, doing the speed limit and discussing the day with Faith like normal.

The road curved slightly to the left ahead and was covered by a thick canopy of overhanging trees, close by the road, which caused a fairly deep shadow on the roadway. A typical scene in this part of the world.

First error
I did not remove my Oakley's which left my vision impaired in the reduced-light situation.

Coming the other way was two vehicles. A horse float truck (lorry they would say I guess) with a passenger vehicle behind. I would pass the truck right on the apex of the sweeping bend, so half way through.

Second error
I decided, due to the reasonably narrow section of road (one lane in either direction), that I would drift left slightly to give the truck a little more room to pass.

There was a white painted line to the extreme edge of the road so I knew I was still safely on the road.

I was in the middle of saying something to Faith, not expecting anything out of the ordinary considering I had the scenario covered, it being a pretty straightforward driving scenario and all...When I head an almighty BANG and the car leapt up on the left side. That's when things went into slow motion.

I recall looking at the truck and wondering if the car would come down, hit the road and skew right into its path, then I looked at the car behind it to determine the same thing. At the same time my left arm shot out instinctively to cover Faith and I turned to look at her, upwards due to the acute angle of the vehicle, then back to the road as the car landed.

It came down hard, but straight, and I pressed the brake, not hard as I didn't want to unsettle the vehicle if it had broken suspension components, and my left hand returned to the wheel for additional control for the same reason. We rolled to a stop in a farmer's driveway entrance and took stock. The car was running so I shut it off to avoid pumping its liquids all over the place in the advent of ruptures. Ok, what the actual fuck just happened, I thought.

Turning to Faith I asked if she was ok. She said, "what the fuck!". She doesn't swear much so I knew she was shaken up. At that stage I didn't know what had really happened, only that I had just hit something.

We exited the car quickly, taking wallets and important things in case it caught fire, and I walked around the front to survey what I fully expected was going to be a fucking mangled front end and left side. The further I got around the car, (I was walking very slowly), the more surprised I became. Nothing. I made it to the left side and...Nothing.

I looked at Faith and simply said "what the fuck." We had not damaged the car at all. When I say we I mean me.

I checked under the hood and there were no leaks...Restarted the car, no noises. Ok, now I was puzzled. I had expected to see a destroyed corner, a shattered wheel at the very least. The last thing to check was the tyre...Visually it looked ok but on closer inspection, there it was. The damage. It was bulged out in one location, about the size of an egg, and for a low-profile tyre it was a problem. It would be a problem on any tyre. It was fucked. I was expecting it to deflate but it held fortunately.

We took a short hike back a few hundred meters to the tree on the apex of that sweeper to try and work out what had happened and then it all made sense.

The tree, which sat right on the edge of the road, literally on the edge, had a root system, a root-bole, at the base that was sticking out into the road. It was on the road, so much so that the road was laid around the root bole. Even the white line was painted around it in almost a perfect semi-circle...Straight, semi-circle around the tree then straight again. WTF.

That's what I had hit. Despite placing my left side wheels just inside the white line to give the truck room the tree was still in my path. We hit it at 80kph and it threw the left side of the car into the air, so much so that the rear wheels cleared it altogether. Dukes of Hazard style.

So, my errors culminated in what could have been a terrible accident. We would most certainly have been seriously injured or killed if we landed and skewed into the path of the oncoming traffic or had hit the tree more square on. I should have taken my glasses off in the dim conditions which might have given me the chance to see the obstacle. Was it a mistake leaving a little more room for the truck? In that case not doing so would have meant avoiding the tree but maybe it could have brought different issues if I didn't.

I took some air out of the tyre to alleviate the pressure on the weak spot, got back in the car and drove it carefully back to Wells. The next day I called the hire company and told them. They referred me to a small town only 12 miles away and I called the repairer there with an approval number. They had the tyre I needed but only the premium (expensive) one so they needed another approval which they obtained. We drove there, dropped it off, went for coffee and two hours later were on our way back to Wells to continue our holiday, not a cent out of pocket. Phew.

To this day I marvel at how a vehicle can take that sort of punishment and only receive a fatal dent to the tyre. The wheel alignment wasn't even out! The car drove like brand new, (it only had 2000 miles on the clock.) We hit motorways doing 70mph (112kph) with not even a vibration, small country roads and everything in between...It drove like new.

We were lucky that day, very lucky. Looking back at it I think how close we came to a massive wreck. A few more inches and we might have wrapped it around that tree. A different landing and a 30 tonne truck might have ploughed through us. Instead we did a little stunt driving, learned some valuable lessons and found one more reason to be thankful, grateful and respectful of each other and the lives we have...We never know what's around the corner and when life could be torn away.

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Design and create your ideal life, don't live it by default
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This image taken in Dartmoor National Park. (Prior to the tree incident.) This car was a great way to travel the UK. It had every feature we could want, was fast, comfortable and enjoyable to drive. They use these cars for cop cars here in Adelaide and until I drove one I wouldn't have bought one...I would now though...If I wasn't into four wheel drives.