Half a mile up the road back towards the 13th milestone is Erinville. This is a lovely georgean, sorry no G thanks to Yank spellchecker twats, country house owned by De Beers the diamond merchants. It is occupied for some 4 weeks a year and is now for sale at £1.5m. It is also the location for the first flag position leading to Douglas Road Corner. So today I bust my solo marshal cherry as armed with radio I trekked up the road to find the house and the flags tucked behind the wall. Boy was it cold there in the morning as the sun could not get through the panoply of mature trees casting shade. This plus an onshore breeze had me wearing two woolly hats and stamping up and down. And then, in the Manx way, tee shirted Ian appeared out of his door on the sunny side of the road opposite me. Here, he said, have this nice big flask of hot tea ! I love these people. Thankfully the Newcomers, Past Masters parade and Junior races all passed off without incident, other than being called up to black flag 63. I could not see why but later learned that he was stopped for being too slow! That's a new one for me. I don't get it. He had qualified and was having a steady ride round in the lower order and was not dead last. I understand he went berserk at the unfortunate official who broke the news to him when he did stop. Can't say I wouldn't have done the same thing myself.
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