Delegate touring vale, heading north in a completely different direction (2,1,7)
I believe the answer is:
at a tangent
'a completely different direction' is the definition.
I don't know anything about this answer so I can't tell whether it can be defined by this definition.
'delegate touring vale heading north in' is the wordplay.
'delegate' becomes 'agent' (I've seen this before).
'touring' means one lot of letters goes inside another (touring can mean going round).
'vale' becomes 'ta-ta' (ta-ta can mean bye - 'vale' is farewell in Latin).
'heading north' becomes 'n' (abbreviation).
'in' is an insertion indicator.
'agent' enclosing 'tata' is 'atatagent'.
'atatagent' going around 'n' is 'AT A TANGENT'.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Another definition for at a tangent that I've seen is " In a divergent train of thought or action".)