Things are looking up ...

I say things are looking up because the weather has changed... for the best. I say 'for the best' because it's no longer cold, that all stopped last week. I was in Bruges last week (well, last Thursday and Friday) and it was bitterly cold, even when wearing a fairly heavy suit. I had to wrap up warm on the Friday when I spent most of the day walking around, popping into shops, diving into cafes and so forth, but generally I was just mooching, me and a pal from work. It happens yearly at this time: the company takes the entire workforce abroad for what is billed as the Christmas Party, a kind of belated event, but is really the company conference. The conference bit lasts all of 30 minutes and then, after a quiz (if there's time, there wasn't last week) we head out for dinner and then have the whole of the following day to explore and do as we please until it's time to go home. We went to and from Bruges in a coach and via Le Shuttle, which was fairly painless. We all stayed in the Novotel Brugge Centrum (I was in room 353) and on Friday morning I enjoyed an amazing breakfast before heading out to find a small teashop in which to sit and read for half an hour or so. We left Bruges around 1530hrs and I reached home around 2030hrs. All was good.

In Bruges...lovely place!

On Saturday morning the plan had always been to ride to either Oxted or Limpsfield. I left later than expected (around 0930hrs) and headed for Coffee at Kiwi House in Limpsfield Village. It's my new place. I reckon the cappuccino is to die for and the almond croissants aren't bad either. However, the last time I was in there it was earlier than it was on Saturday and now I found reserved tables and the need to ask people if I could join the end of their table. Still, no harm done. Like the last time I was here I parked the bike outside and padlocked it to a wooden fence. In all honesty, if anybody had fancied nicking the bike all they would have needed was a small wood saw, but this is snooty Limpsfield, I probably could have left the bike unpadlocked.

Like last week I rode along the 269 to Botley Hill and then down Titsey Hill, which sometimes can be nauseous as the bike shakes its way downwards until the road smooths out a little bit prior to rolling into Limpsfield. Normally I turn right and follow Granville Road into Oxted (about another mile on the journey) or, as on Saturday and the week before, I simply turned left, past the church and the pub and into Coffee at Kiwi House.

Tea in Bruges on Friday morning

The problem with making oneself at home in a coffee shop when you're riding a bike is that nagging thought that, at some stage, you're going to have to ride back; and my ride back is up Titsey Hill. It's not a problem for me, but the thought of it remains awful even if there is a fair ride before I reach the bottom and prepare for the ascent. Once, as I rode up Titsey Hill, I turned right as the ascent began and followed White Lane (an even steeper hill) to where it joins Clarks Lane. Now that's an ordeal, but again, I take it in my stride if I'm honest and then the remaining ride is a bit like the ride back from Westerham. I suppose the good thing about White Lane is that it's a short, sharp, shock whereas Titsey Hill is long and drawn out and seemingly endless. On Saturday I rode the length of Titsey Hill, got myself into a groove and all was well, all that remained was the 269, which is fine if you keep your wits about you.

On Sunday I rode to Westerham to see Andy who was waiting for me in Costa Coffee. These days Costa is a little bit hit and miss (is it or is it not open?) but on Sunday morning (yesterday morning – today's Monday) it was open and Andy was sitting in the window finishing off a cup of coffee. I ordered a tea and joined him. I thought that his Kona was looking pretty good and he told me he'd changed the bars and had recently purchased new tyres. He'd also cleaned it, putting me to shame.

Prior to last week's ice ride to Oxted

I've been pretty crap these past few weeks, not really writing much on my blog (the last post to this one was on 10 January) and I had to admit to Andy that I'd not been reading his blogs either, which is a shame because he's got some big cycling plans on the boil. He's looking in to riding a coast-to-coast route from Lowestoft in Suffolk to Land's End in Cornwall, or possibly Weston-super-Mare, quite a trip and not your traditional coast-to-coast cycle ride (like Liverpool to Scarborough, say). I talked briefly about the up and coming Dunwich Dynamo, something Andy and I have talked about in the past. It's roughly 125 miles through the night from Hackney Wick to Dunwich on the Suffolk Coast. Now don't get me wrong, I'd like to do it – at least I think I do – but I might just like the idea of it, the riding through the night, although I've heard bad things about it too. I'm wondering if I could do a straight 125 miles, at night, without engaging in proper training and I think Andy's of the opinion, quite rightly, that I'd need to train. In fact, he's kind of thrown down a gauntlet, which I'm contemplating as I write this: should I commit to it or not? Andy says the only way you'll do anything is to commit to it and again, he's right. He's said that if I commit, he'll do it with me next year, but on the condition that I train for it; I've yet to get back to him as I'm thinking (and I stress the word 'thinking') about changing the commitment from the Dynamo to a day time coast-to-coast ride, something like the Liverpool to Scarborough jaunt, which used to be the Whitbread Coast-to-Coast. That said, I'm not ruling out the Dynamo, just giving myself time to think about it. I think I could do it, my only worry is having a puncture at 0300hrs in the middle of nowhere. We've decided that we'd spend the day and night in Dunwich and then possibly ride back (so I'd better consider training for a greater distance than just 125 miles) but in all honesty we'd probably opt for the train. So, I've got some thinking to do.

Saturday's cappuccino and almond croissant at Kiwi House

There's a train strike on Wednesday and Friday and I'm thinking about riding it; the evenings have started to brighten up and I reckon that if I left the office around 1600hrs I'd almost get home while it's still light, so that's something else I need to consider. The only other option is the bus or the car, but I think it's a good excuse to get back on the bike for those two magical mid-week extra rides.  

Limpsfield Village via the Titsey Estate...and then up Titsey Hill

The tunnel under the M25, but would you sleep rough here?

Another 7am meeting on Warlingham Green and this time the gloves were off, literally! I know. I hate using that word 'literally' too. But they were off. I didn't need them. It wasn't cold. The weather was pleasant, the blossoms were on the trees – as they have been for a few days now – and, of course, we're in May. It seems like yesterday when it was snowing and the weather was cold and frosty, but now, we're through the turbulent airspace of poor weather and we're looking down from up high on past misery.

Should we even be here?

Andy suggested the Titsey ride and it was good to be doing it again. The last time was February 2012. I'll always remember it because there were deep puddles and mud and, like today, we sat in the churchyard sipping tea. The last time we were here was when I injured my foot – through walking too far in the wrong kind of shoes. I remember being convinced (wrongly) that I'd been wearing wrong-sized shoes. I hadn't been, but back then I thought so and it just so happened that a size eight shoe, a wide-fitting pair of shoes, fit me perfectly. I'm not a size eight. I'm a size ten. Size 44. I'm wearing a pair now, as I write this post. In fact, the shoes I'm wearing now are the shoes I was wearing a year ago when I was walking around Crawley in West Sussex. It wasn't the shoe size. It was the fact that I was wearing 'office style' shoes on long walks. I should have been wearing trainers or walking boots.

Another day, another churchyard – this one in Limpsfield.

Anyway, that was over a year ago. The ride towards Botley Hill was fantastic; I love it when the steepish incline is over and done with and the view opens up a little as we head towards the pub, fields on either side of us and, at such an early hour, little in the way of traffic – just the odd airliner in the distance landing at Gatwick Airport. Just past Botley, we headed towards the Titsey Estate gate, which was open, and headed on downhill, and off-road. We stopped halfway to take a photo of my bike next to a 'no cycling' sign, but, as Andy pointed out, the sign was for the routes to our left and right, not the rocky trail we were already riding on. 

We cycled all the way down and there were woods on either side of us; and then, through a farm gate and on towards a short tunnel under the M25 where we stopped again to take more photographs. For some reason, I always have this strange desire to camp, to sleep rough, and I was looking at the tunnel and thinking: no, not a good place to camp the night (if we had to). Andy said it wouldn't be good if there was a wind howling through it. I said it was too exposed and by that I meant that it was a route others might take and, therefore, not safe. Far better, to camp in the undergrowth, out of sight. Why do I think up all this rubbish? There's no way that I'm going to camp in the woods, no situation that might arise where I might find myself in a position where the decision to sleep rough would have to be made and, of course, no reason in hell why I would ever set off with a tent on my back.

The Kona in the Limpsfield churchyard. Pic by Andy.

We carried on to the end of the track, emerging on the road and crossing it to where another track would lead us towards Limpsfield, past some rather grandioise houses and out into a quiet and deserted 'high street', if you can call it that. It consisted of a Post Office and a few other shops, including a fancy dress outfitter, all of which were closed. There's a nice restaurant, a pub and a bookshop, but it was too early for any of them to be open and besides, it was Sunday.

We rode towards the A25 and then turned back and headed for the churchyard where we found a bench and sat drinking tea and munching cereal bars. It's amazing how things change in life. When I was a kid I was frightened of graveyards, but today I find them peaceful places where nothing but birdsong disturbs the tranquility. We sat there contemplating nothing in particular. And then I started again – thinking to myself this time – about sleeping rough and whether I'd be happy sleeping in a graveyard without spooking myself. The answer was yes, of course. Remember, the living are scarier than the dead – as somebody once said.

I used to know someone who slept in a churchyard in Sutton, Surrey, and the only reason he slept there, with a few others – down-and-outs like churchyards – was because a friend of his (and mine) had died in the flat they shared and the whole thing had spooked him a bit. But why, I remember thinking at the time when I heard he was sleeping rough in a graveyard, why sleep surrounded by dead people? Surely that would be even spookier for somebody who had witnessed the death of his flatmate. Graveyards are, by definition, full of dead people and choc-a-bloc with reminders of death – headstones, epitaphs, wreaths and flowers.

For me, though, the churchyard in Limpsfield – and the Tatsfield Churchyard – are nothing but havens of peace, places of contemplation and somewhere to recharge the battery before riding home. Alright, perhaps a reminder of one's own mortality, but that's not necessarily a bad thing.

We headed home and faced Titsey Hill, a 16% incline leading to the top of the Titsey Estate and that dreary old car park with muddy puddles near Botley Hill that I mentioned a few posts back. It took about 15 minutes of hard graft in a low gear to reach the top. The key was not to look ahead but to 'knuckle down' and keep pedalling until we reached the top. Eventually we got there.

One thing I love about meeting at 7am is that it's still relatively early when we hit the home straight. Andy and I parted company half way along the 269 and vowed to meet again tomorrow – Bank Holiday Monday. I carried on along the road, feeling quite energised as I reached Warlingham Green and headed towards Hamsey and then Sanderstead High Street. It was only 9.45am when I looked up at the church clock and headed down Church Way. I sailed down the hill, with no hands on the bars, and then put them on smartly as the T-junction with Morley Road approached. I hung a left into Morley, a right into Elmfield, a left into Southcote and a right into Ellenbridge. 

One of many sculptures to be found in Pashley Gardens, Ticehurst.

A hearty breakfast followed: porridge, bread and marmalade, a boiled egg and fingers plus a cup of tea. Lovely. Then we headed out in the car with the mother-in-law, to a very pleasant place called Pashley Gardens in Ticehurst in Sussex. 

I loved the gift shop and the gardens and, of course, the sculptures that were dotted around the grounds. 

We had a picnic of sandwiches and samosas, prepared by the mother-in-law. All in all, a perfect day.