OK, so I have a half wave coax dipole rigged up on an old 7M telescopic fishing pole, attached to a short scaffold tube dropped into some spare car wheels I have in a stack outside. Sadly, the other UK CBs users around here are not impressive

Lots of swearing, in-jokes with music clips and some old lady who's trying to date anybody she can catch by the ear. Still no truckers, and the farmers must be on holiday.
I'll flick to Euro channels and see what I can get, but it's the wrong time of year for any distance.
Time to try PMR I think. I'll need a decent bit of coax for that though. 27MHz will work on wet string, 446MHz is getting more like wifi and 20M of cable to get it outside and up the pole will need something better than cheap RG58. I could climb up on the roof with the mobile, and diy antenna on a stick. But its cold, wet and windy!
I might look at a Ham license.