Noye's Fludde and Port Eliot

I'd allowed plenty of time to get to the Friday dovegreyreader event at Port Eliot for 5pm.
From here a mere eighteen miles so even given leisurely-scenic I'd be early. But in true Daphne style, as I was about to set off, the thunder crashed around the brimming pewter skies, the lightning forked and we had a veritable Noye's Fludde as the heavens opened.
If the Kayaker hadn't just set off for four months white water river guiding duties in Canada he could have paddled along the lane with ease (that's actually the Zambezi not Devon).
This is predictable.
The minute he leaves the country in search of snow we have a blizzard, hunting white water and we can expect a flood.
Undaunted I crossed the moat that had appeared around the house to get to my car, set off in my trusty Fiesta chariot and quickly realised I'd soon be needing armbands. Funny how it doesn't look that deep until you are in the middle of it.
The lane was flooded, water slopping up the wheel arches and I'd only driven a hundred yards.
Reversing back to the house I decided to float to the other end of the lane where actually the water was even deeper but I just kept going and ignored the strange whining noises coming from somewhere near the front of the car.
Is that where the engine is?
Does it matter if water gets in?
Call me irresponsible but on principle I refuse to learn about cars, that's what the RAC are for and when they arrive I can get the instruction book out to find out how to open the bonnet.
Things aren't that bad yet but in a minute they could be because I then made a completely irrational and stupid decision based on my eagerness to get to where I was going and turned left. As I headed downhill towards the Tamar in order to cross it and climb the other side of the valley, thus cutting twenty miles off my journey, it quickly became apparent that the Tamar was not waiting for me but seemed to be coming to greet me.
Suddenly I also notice in stark relief the combination of ancient trees that tower over the lane and the lightning. I'm safe in my Ford 'Faraday Cage' I think but not so good if a tree topples.
Do not ask me how I didn't splutter to a halt as the water got deeper and deeper and the underneath of the car's had a real good wash, but eventually seeing sense I turned round and headed uphill again for the main road. By this time the flood descending downhill to meet the ascending Tamar was like nothing I had ever seen before and I'm still only five minutes from home and I've been swimming around in circles for half an hour and now I'm driving against the tide and the wipers are swiping fit to take off and I still can't see a thing.
The dovegreyreader event will be starting without me at this rate, but actually I'm beginning to feel slightly nervous at the sheer quantity of water outside.
Check the brakes, that's what you're supposed to do.
No don't check the brakes, if they don't work I won't be able to go to Port Eliot, I'll find out soon enough. Where's the Land Rover when you need it? The Land Rover's on its way back from delivering the Kayaker to Canada via Heathrow that's where.
I'm going to have to go the long way round and suddenly I'm not sure of the way so I ring the Gamekeeper, who thinks I've arrived, to tell him I'm back at the end of the lane and he swims along to me in his van with a map and then heads on his way to help someone whose house is flooding.
I don't ask about ours.
If it's flooded I won't be able to go to Port Eliot, I'll find out when I get back.
Eventually I summit at the main road and crack on, finally screeching up to the front of this incredible house that is Port Eliot at one minute to five where thankfully the brakes do work and I don't drive on in through the front door.
So what's waiting inside?
Well everyone else for a start, and Justine Picardie attired in dovegrey and clutching a copy of Daphne and Catherine St Germans with a dovegrey dog and all those fabulous Joshua Reynolds paintings, so then we...
Well that's enough excitement for one post, more soon, but special, astonishing, amazing doesn't even begin to describe it all.