Non-stop rides and other stories...

Over the last few weeks I've started doing non-stop rides, meaning rides where I don't stop for a cup of tea or a bun (or both). Why I've started these 'new' rides, I don't know, probably out of a sense of not having much in the way of time on my hands, but still wanting to get out there and 'do a ride'.

Don't get me wrong. As the weather starts to improve - and it is starting to get more pleasant out there - I will be getting back to my usual routine; that of riding to, say, Oxted, and then sitting there nursing a green tea and an apricot croissant whilst sitting in the sunshine people watching and enjoying the pleasant summery mornings that tend to come our way when the clocks go forward.

I expect we'll be here tomorrow morning. Hopefully no rain!

There are, of course, many other signs that mean the same thing. One such marker is blossom on the trees. Long before the leaves appear on more conventional trees (is there such a thing as a conventional tree?) there are blossoms that bring out the Japanese in the locality who like to stand in front of my house (and others) and simply marvel and admire the blossom tree in my front garden. It isn't in bloom yet, but give it a few weeks and it will be, it's a bit of a late starter compared to other blossom trees in the area.

Seeing a tree in full blossom is a joyful experience. As I walk down West Hill towards the alleyway on my journey to Purley station (two miles) I always pass a white blossom tree in full bloom. I'm aware, by the way, that I'm using the word 'tree' and 'blossom' quite a lot and I will go through this post later to see how many I can delete.

From a cycling perspective, seeing all these signs, these precursors of summer time fills me with happiness as I'm not somebody who particularly likes the winter months. That said, when I awoke this morning, fully aware that later in the day I'd be outside mowing the lawn, I did start to feel a little down. Why? Because I don't want to mow the lawn. I hate mowing the lawn, getting the mower out of the garage, faffing around with the power lead and the circuit breaker and finally pressing the button and moving back and forth across my rather large lawn. In fact, it's not so much 'lawn' but 'lawns' - I've got three of them if you count the front garden. And let's not forget that the first cut of the year is the most challenging. I normally start at the highest setting and then step down to around setting three before I can genuinely say the lawn is done. But no, not today. Rain stopped play. Hailstones rained down upon me and I was forced to scamper around getting everything I'd taken out of the garage back in it.Secretly, I'm rather pleased that my lawn mowing was cut short, I just don't feel ready to mow lawns and the fact that it started raining proved me right. 

What I do like about winter - apart from fireplaces and watching movies and eating chocolates and all the cosy things I've been used to doing for years - is not having to do any gardening. Because I haven't had to mow the lawn since October 2023 I've spent my time visiting genteel places like Tunbridge Wells and sitting in cafes eating cake and drinking cappuccino. Bakewell tart, coffee & walnut cake, millionaires shortbread, you name it, I've enjoyed it at my leisure over most weekends since the mower was put back in the garage three months before Christmas. Well, now it's been woken up and it won't be hibernating for another seven months - not that I want to wish my life away. I've just got to get used to the fact that over the next seven months or 28 weeks, I'll be mowing the lawn at least every fortnight.

While lawn mowing is not my favourite pastime, it is good for me. My dad always told me that my garden was my gym and that I should get out there and keep fit in the process. Personally, I prefer to ride a bike into the sticks and find a coffee shop where I can sit and read a book for half an hour and then ride home again. Admittedly, it takes time and when I get back mid-morning the last thing I want to do is mow the lawn. However, that said, after a ride I always feel particularly energised and after a cup of tea I might well head on out there and get it done. Remember, it's only the first cut that takes an age, after that it's no more than an hour if I'm just doing the back garden. I prefer the back to the front lawn because out front there's talking to be done. Neighbours to pass the time of day with, passers-by always ready with an encouraging word or two and I don't like it. At least out back there's nobody to disturb me, I just get on with it and when the true summer arrives I can enjoy sitting on the patio with a huge mug of tea and possibly a cake from the supermarket while I admire my handy work.

When the rain did stop play the lawn was three quarters done and that means it'll be nagging at me for the next seven days unless I get out there tomorrow and finish it off. That's the plan, but first a ride, most likely to be Tatsfield Village and Sheree's Tearooms and then I guess I'll have to get down to it, although secretly I'll be praying for rain. Tomorrow's ride (if it happens) is around 16 miles. Today's ride was just over 14 miles. I had been considering riding into Oxted (a 20-mile ride) but somehow I couldn't face that uphill ride up Titsey Hill. I rode to Botley Hill, turned at the roundabout and was immediately hit by a cold northerly wind. It went right through me as I pedalled north and never let up until I turned right on to Beech Farm Road. I quite enjoy non-stop rides as they make me realise that, where cycling is concerned - and bearing in mind that I've been riding the bike virtually every weekend since 2006 - I'm fairly fit and could do something silly like cycle around the coast of the UK, like Mike Carter or Anna Hughes. They've both written excellent books about their respective adventures and both are good reads for different reasons. But I figure that if I can ride non-stop for, say, 20 miles, that means I could easily double up and do 40 miles a day (at first) and then, as I get fitter and fitter day-by-day I could hit the 70-mile/day rate. I often think about it: on the road before 0800hrs, 20 miles under my belt in around 60-90 minutes, a rest somewhere with a cup of tea and then onwards until lunch time and then perhaps another 20. I could probably ride 60 miles a day without too much grief. I don't know how long it would take me to circumnavigate the UK coastline (or whether I'd ever have the inclination or the time to do it) but it's one of those things I think about at night, in the dark, in the middle of the morning when all is quiet. I imagine myself wild camping somewhere and waking up as the sun comes out, making breakfast on a stove and then jumping on the bike.

Something else I find myself thinking about in the dead of night when all around me are fast asleep is camping, sleeping under the stars, stealth camping in a wood. I often try to identify places where I could hunker down without detection in a small tent; there are loads of places. Even today, while out on my non-stop ride, I kept passing places that would fit the bill nicely. I think that if I was homeless I wouldn't be sitting in a sleeping bag in a shop doorway, I'd be out in the fields. I'd try to keep fit by walking a lot and I'd probably walk into the town during the day but sleep at night in the woods, away from the nutters who hate the homeless.

It's 2037hrs, that's just gone 8.30pm if you don't understand the 24-hour clock. There's one of those royal documentaries on the box. I've just eaten breaded cod with stir-fry vegetables and a dash of sweet Thai chilli and I'll probably hit the sack later, armed with a digital radio and BBC Radio 3, Night Tracks, a programme that comes on around 2200hrs and ends at 2330hrs. It's great.

Saturday afternoon...

Well, I've tested negative, twice, and that's positive. All I have to do now is get out on the bike in the morning. I've checked it out, the puncture I fixed is holding firm, the bike's fairly clean and, weather permitting, I'll be heading for Westerham in the morning for a 22-miler. I've had a couple of walks around the block, I've eaten a bit of coffee and walnut cake from Waitrose, I've even bought a lottery ticket - who knows, I still might be able to buy that remote cottage in the Outer Hebrides, there still might be time to stare at the sea after all). Listening to music, all sorts. Rocks by Primal Scream, Temptation by New Order, Land of Confusion by Genesis, Who by Numbers, all the good stuff in other words. It's the first time I've felt like listening to music in a while and now that I'm testing negative, well, I feel good about it. School by Supertramp, that whining mouth organ, it's on now, it's dark outside, gone 5pm, wailing saxophone, piano, what's not to like? There's something weirdly pleasant about wintry Saturdays, like wandering around malls or IKEA, muddy footprints on terrazzo flooring, or visiting fireplace shops or sitting in a cosy coffee shop with a mug of tea and a slice of cake as it starts to get dark and you can see into people's houses as you pace the streets wishing you were home, in the warmth, chilling, safe behind that double-glazed, triple-locked door. 

It's different in the summer, lighter for a start, and the grass is green, the shadows long as evening approaches, but it has it's own charm. There's no need for coats and scarves, hats or gloves for a start and there's often the distant sound of Greensleeves playing from an invisible ice cream van. Or there used to be when I was a kid. I always remember the bell ringers in the local convent school, now that was a magical sound coming from the other side of the railway track, not far from where I lay in bed as a child listening to the day calming down, evening setting in, dad yet to come home from work, rapping his familiar rhythmic rap on the front door as we lay in bed staring at the ceiling tiles, longing for morning, which was a long way off, far over the horizons of time, it wasn't even dark and the daylight still seeped through the curtains. I haven't heard those bells for a long time and I often wonder whether I'll ever hear them again. I wonder if they're still there or whether they are long gone, cast adrift forever from those who listened to them back in the day. Where are they now, I wonder? 

Slow way there and back – to the Tatsfield Bus Stop

It's Tuesday morning. The day after the bank holiday Monday and last night some strange dreams. One involved watching somebody arrive by car at a shopfront that was shuttered up and covered in graffitti. There was a small door and the driver of the car jumped out, mistaking the place for a hotel. I wasn't the driver. I was a spectator wondering why somebody would mistake a shuttered shopfront covered in graffiti for a hotel. But then I became the driver, stepping through the small door into the dark and squalid surroundings inside. Drug users were in there and I was definitely not in the UK, but somewhere in the USA. Later the shop front changed. The shutters and graffiti were gone and instead there was a different, older building with two upright, rectangular windows and a wooden door between them. The name of Ortiz was over the door. I asked one of the occupants why he'd let himself fall into such a state of depravity, he mumbled an answer. I was certainly being held there against my will, as some form of punishment, but I wasn't always there. At one stage I wrote a note to the police, long hand, but never finished it. Then I found myself closer to home, in Westmead Road in the London suburbs where I used to live. I was driving and noticed that cars were reversing at speed towards me. There was some kind of commotion and it turned out to be a gunman in the back of a car shooting people at random. Later I encountered the gunman, who was now out of the car and on foot. I ran into suburban streets, turning left and right and left in order to lose him and then I woke up, it was light outside and the time was 0543.

Our bikes parked on Beddlestead Lane...

Poppies, thousands of them, in a field on Beddlestead Lane

That name Ortiz bugged me as I made my way downstairs to make tea and porridge, but all I could find online was a reference to boxing and a reference to horse racing. It had been a great weekend of cycling. We managed two out of three days and on both occasions rode the slow way to and from the Tatsfield Bus Stop where we chilled out in the early morning summer sun. On Saturday, as we drank our tea, a fog rolled in and that's why we rode back the slow way, which meant we'd have to tackle Hesiers Hill, not a problem. In fact, Andy's in training to ride up a few hills in the Caterham area so it was a good move in his books. I paced myself and rode slowly to the top where Andy was waiting and we continued the ride home.

Early morning summer sunshine on Beddlestead Lane

We didn't ride on Sunday and while I was going to ride to mum's early that morning, mum was in tizzy about visitors so I didn't bother. Monday we headed for the bus stop again and the poppies in a field on a sloping hill stopped us in our tracks. We were on Beddlestead Lane, close to the memorial to 'Skelly', a cyclist. A blanket of red covered the hill and I suggested that Andy should take a photograph. On Saturday we'd spotted the poppies but were put off the idea of trampsing into the field to take a closer look by the brambles and thistles that stood in our way as Andy was wearing shorts. Monday morning the poppies had intensified so we took a closer look but discovered a wide ditch, like a moat, stopping us from going any further. Well, we could have jumped, but then we'd have to jump back so we stayed put on the bank and took a few snaps, me on the iphone, Andy using something a little more professional.

A rural idyll...

Further along Beddlestead Lane a most unwelcomed sight: fly tippers had been at work. A pile of rubbish on the roadside: an old wooden chest of draws, a rusty old barbecue and many other bits of rubbish somebody had just dumped.

We continued on our way, chatting about this and that – bikes, photography, work – and it wasn't long before we reached our destination. Normally Beddlestead Lane is long and strenuous, but on both Saturday and Monday it was a little more chilled, which had a lot to do with the pleasant weather.