It's snowing

I've got a spare set of alloys for my car (£27 off ebay ), so if it continues to snow a lot around here, I might get a set of winter tyres fitted to them for next winter, especially as my P6000s will be getting a little more worn by then (done about 20k so far).

 

Certainly banned in Swizzieland, except on certain roads where marked. They indeed do wonders for the road surface.

Most folk in Swizzieland have winter tyres, for the simple reason that if you have an accident in winter and you're found to be on summer tyres, it may void your insurance. A pretty strong incentive - but not strong enough for a friend with a BMW X5 (basically a tank, minus the turret). He's relying on his 4WD to save him, and being in an apartment with no garage, he has nowhere to store the (enormous) wheels and tyres. Not a risk I'd take, even with a company car.

 

Up here the roads are cleared very quickly. I've had snowplough down my little road twice already today. Gritting is done as soon as the temperature falls below 5 C and snow doesn't lie at road level for long. So, no, I can't say I've seen anyone with anything special for snow. I would guess some of the farmers in the higher & remoter glens have chains on their 4x4s. Once I got a lift in a Transit van. We were going down a snowfilled Estate track in the Cairngorms and we drove that for several miles before getting stuck, we were rescued by the local gamekeeper who then drove us on to the end of the journey in his Landrover (Defender?) through everything and I can't say I noticed chains on his wheels. Exciting ride though.

 

Extraordinairy sunset. The clouds stayed grey/purple but the snow covered moor went burnished copper and then through various shades of blue. Cool

 

Tom, you need a digital camera
Michael.

 

The shortest day has been and gone, clocks change back at the end of March and then we cancel our Aircraft 'Snow and De-Icing' standby duties at the end of April for another 6 months.
Oh, how I hate, detetest and despise winter.