The Adventures of a Honda Civic

I have a 1994 Honda Civic Automatic. It's ok for a 12 year old car to be honest.

Yesterday a friend, my cat and I set forth in said car on a long trip south. Just over halfway, cruising along I slowed down and flashed a car to come in off the hard shoulder.

As I did so I lost all drive; it was very strange. So I coasted onto the hard shoulder wondering what on earth had gone wrong. I tried restarting the engine and had no joy. The engine was turning over but there was no one home. It sounded a little different to usual too. As we had coasted to a halt the automatic transmission cogged down through the gears but the throttle had no effect.

I got my friend out the car and over the barrier and lifted the bonnet. I couldn't see anything obviously wrong so I looked underneath to see if any oil or water was escaping. Nothing there either.

I called the RAC for the second time this year. With the help of the Highways Traffic Agency, I managed to persuade the receptionist of our location and we got help within 20 minutes.

We were towed off the motorway and into Toddington Services. I discussed the options with the RAC rescue man. We could turn round and go back to Sheffield or put the car into a local garage and continue on. I had paid for the full monty on the RAC package but didn't have my driving license with me. It being a Bank Holiday Sunday, DVLA wouldn't be open until Tuesday so no chance of a car until then. We had been heading to a friend's in London to drop the cat off while we went on to the Kingston Green Fair for the stewards' briefing.

Once we had been towed to the garage, I rang that friend and he came out to pick us up. We managed to get everything from my car to his car and set off again.

The motorway was now clogged with traffic so we took a scenic route to an A road; experienced two hold ups due to accidents but otherwise reasonably plain sailing for London on a Bank Holiday Sunday.

Eight and half hours after we had set off we arrived at our destination.

The cat behaved impeccably throughout. I let her out the cage for a little while inside the car but she began to overheat so I put her back in her cage, brought her outside the car, poured some water on her and she stayed outside the car from then on. Other than that, she was a little fed up with being in her cage all the time but never significantly distressed. I am amazed she travels so well.

I won't know til Tuesday how much the car will cost to repair.