Strange events on a small country road..

Back in the dark misty days of 1988 I was a 33yr.old mature student. I had been married for 14 years and was the father of three children. We could be considered a normal family in every sense of the word, with no particular problems or cares. Although I had many keen interests, including the arcane and the paranormal, little did I think I was about to confront the subject head on. Due to the fact that I was training to become a registered nurse and that the college was situated in a remote area, my wife and myself decided to purchase a small family car. This was the first vehicle that we had owned and as such the children loved to be taken on jaunts into the near-by Bathgate Hills.

It was on one of those unplanned night excursions, prompted by the children, that I turned the car Northward and headed into the hills. The night was dark and stars twinkled in the clear sky. We were driving on a familiar road, running parallel with Raven Craig Wood, popularly known as the Knock Forest, (O.S. Pathfinder map 405 ref: 9977) situated less then a mile from our home. The children were chattering in the back seat while my wife and I discussed the days events. At this point nothing uneventful had occurred nor was it expected.

Past Experiences.

I have said that this road was familiar to me. Apart from living in the area all my life, I had up to that point had two unexplained experiences on that particular spot on the road. In my teens I had a passion for motorcycles and owned a vintage Sunbeam S7. As a sixteen year old I delighted in careering along the local country lanes. One day, as I approached a particular spot on the forest road, the Sunbeam's engine stopped and the giant machine glided silently to a halt. The rotor arm in the distributor had disintegrated. Despite many replacements and many hours of work the motorcycle never ran again. This, I believe, was the beginning of a strange and mystifying trilogy.

Missing Time.

My second experience happened sometime in the summer of 1973. At around 10pm myself and a female friend, Ann (pseudonym) who had her own motorcycle, were driving on the same stretch of road alongside the forest. It was a dark but clear night. I was a short distance in front on my brand new Honda. The last recollection I have before the crash is checking the speedometer and noting that I was approaching 60mph. I have a recollection of opening my eyes and there in the full beam of the headlight was a telegraph pole looming ominously in front of me. I then remember slowly closing my eyes, as if accepting the inevitable impact with complete indifference. The whole scene had a fluid dream-like quality and I felt as if I was simply closing my eyes and returning to sleep. I do not remember having any sensation of feeling fatiqued or of my eye lids becoming heavy. I do remember the silence during the episode, as if I had been watching a playback on T.V. with the sound turned off. I quickly snapped out of this trance like state when a searing pain struck me on the left side of my neck. My eyes opened as I crashed against the wire of the roadside fence. I saw, almost in slow motion, the cart wheeling effect of the Honda, red light over white light, flying over the fence to land with sickening crash in the adjoining field.

As I lay there crumpled on the narrow verge, I heard Ann roar past. I listened silently as she wheeled her motorcycle around and remember thinking aloud, "Ann where the *******! are you going" as I heard her drive off at speed back toward Bathgate, two miles distant. I determinedly staggered to my feet and somehow managed to clamber across the fence to reach the prostrate cycle, the lights still glaring in the darkness. I reached down in a futile attempt to pick the bike up from the ground and was severely burned by the exhaust. The shock of this threw me violently backwards towards the ground as I lay there, cursing my luck and feeling extremely sorry for myself, my friends arrived with a van and some people. The implications of this did not occur to me until a few days later when the shock of the crash had receded.

I later asked Ann just how long she had taken to gather the people together. She replied that she had been gone approximately thirty minutes! I was aware of only a few minutes elapsing between her leaving the scene of the accident and returning. Enough time only for me to get to my feet, climb the fence, get burned and be thrown to the ground. I was never at any time aware of being unconscious or coming around from the unconscious state. It appeared I had lost a period of time. I had never heard of missing time, abduction and other possibilities of that nature. Despite having numerous motorcycle accidents, none of them have left me with such a surreal recollection as events of that night.

A Different Viewpoint.

A strange postscript to this event is that my friend states that she saw me reduce speed, and signal with my left indicator, making her believe at the time that I had "spotted something." She continued, "That was strange as there was nowhere for you to go...only a grass verge and a fence.....You simply vanished from my sight, as if you had entered another dimension or something." When I asked why she gave me no immediate assistance before seeking help, she replied. "I had driven a good distance before realising that you were nowhere to be seen, I thought you had driven further out of sight. I was so frightened because you had literally vanished and I could not find you or the Honda!"

Indeed I had no reason to indicate, turn left, slow down or stop. I had no earthly reason to do so. To date this matter remains unexplained to me and throws up more questions than answers. The mental and physical scars will remain with me always. The memories of the incident also remain with Ann even after a period of 23yrs.

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