Highway or byway? I did it my way.

“You didn’t take the motorway?" Dave, our genial keyholder, asked. "Should have taken the motorway, you would have been here in an hour. Hour and a quarter at the outside.”
I apologized again for our late arrival. Frances smiled, said nothing. To her credit, she did not gloat, at least not openly, at our navigational error. Our journey had taken almost three hours.
Dave couldn’t resist reminding me of the errors of my ways though. “You mean you were on the A12, then came off it? That’s a shame. I hate those little roads, all those twists and turns! Takes you an hour to go ten miles. Like I said—”
“The motorway.” I knew. I sighed.
He went on cheerfully, “Oh, well. Never mind, you’re all here now, so that’s alright.”