27 March. Cycling through the plague
When we studied the Great Fire (1665) and the Great Plague (1666) at school, there was no mention of people finding it hard to amuse themselves whilst the pestilence raged through the razed ruins of London. No Netflix, no internet, no bikes and I am not at all sure that many people had dogs. We seem to be more complicated in 2020.
But there it is. Bikes now exist and because of that there is a duty to exercise them - bit like dogs. I can hear my bike whining in its shed if it hasn't been out for a while. The moral question I am stuck on is not whether I should ride but for for how long and how far - and how fast? Generally 'fast' is not something that bothers me. Actually lack of 'fast' bothers me a great deal but I have reluctant lungs. I have taken to going down hill faster than I used to though because I worry about wearing my disc pads when all the local bike shops (apart from
Halfords which doesn't count) are closed because of the plague. Either cycle faster downhill or be forced to mend my own bike. Tough choices. Both frighten me.
Today Madame Crow said she would like to come with me on my proposed ride but it would need to be "shorter and less hilly" and ended up not being my proposed ride at all. The new aim was to get to Perranporth, look at the sea and then go home a different way. I had planned to go....well it doesn't matter. Another day.
Madame has an e-bike. A very nice one, better wheels, frame and chainset than mine. In theory she should be ahead of me but I still end up waiting at junctions because of my new desire to save my disc pads. She overtakes me on hills which is quite irritating, but has no qualms about smoking her pads all the way down. Cycling with someone else, even a special someone, is at times quite hard. The internal conversation I normally have with myself, just stops. We converse at junctions and intermittently on hills. I stop noticing things like flowers in the hedgerows or the opening views across spring green fields, the new catkins on willows and birches, the budding oaks because I am either chasing the retreating figure of my wife, just a red dot in the distance or just terrifying myself going downhill. Not especially fast if what I read about others descending speeds is true - but enough to make me stop daydreaming.
The lanes are dry. The hedges are thickening with green. The cows have been allowed out onto the spring grass. The sky is a cold blue and the air is fresh enough to nip at exposed flesh. I have found a way to Perranporth that involves twelve miles of continuous either up or down but misses any major roads, or minor roads, and passes isolated farms, granite walled houses in solitary splendour and the odd short terrace of three whitewashed cottages stuck in a hollow and half hidden with trees.
Perranporth is deserted. The beach car park empty. There is a surfer walking home, board tucked under his arm. Surfing has been stopped unless you can walk to the beach. It hasn't gone down well with surfers and there have been some ugly confrontations. But not here today - all is calm, shops and cafes closed, pubs shuttered. There are more people walking than I have ever seen before and I have greeted a number of cyclists but as so many have noticed, hardly any traffic.
Even the seagulls are avoiding humans at the moment.
We carry on up through Perrancombe, a gradually rising lane between woods and large detached houses, that should take us to St Agnes but before we reach the village, it is time to turn off and head for home. I need to be careful, still just three weeks from major surgery and my legs are already complaining. It turns out that the left turn was the wrong left turn. We descend steeply down to the old mining village of Mithian and then steeply uphill, the Wahoo says 22% at one point, until I reach the top and a simultaneous realisation that this is not the right way. Madame says we should just go back down the hill, back up the other side and carry on to the right turning but she has electrons and no concerns about disc brake pad thickness. A lifetime of obedience - I do as suggested.
The right route is familiar, well worn into the the neural pathways of my mind. I stop watching the scenery. I focus on the end. The road falls and rises and we exchange positions depending on the direction of the slope.
Truro is almost empty. Madame wants to buy aloe vera (for home made hand gel) in Superdrug and I hang around outside, holding my breath when people pass, hands dug deeply into my pockets, head pushed down as far into my shoulders as I can get it because this feels like I may avoid the clouds of active virus around me.
I am tired when we get home.More tired than I expected. The news about the plague has not improved since we went out and I stop reading it. We don't have a TV. Well we do, but no aerial or satellite dish, so effectively no TV. This gives us in our isolated house stuck a mile outside town and surrounded by fresh planted barley fields, an air of unreality. Madame is reading from the internet and gives me snippets of bad news but I ignore her. Spring is proceeding. The birds still fill the afternoon air with vibrant songs, the magpies and crows watch me sadly, the pheasants scurry under hedgerows as we pass them.
I wonder what future children will learn about the Great Plague of 2020.
Seen here crossing the bridge over the former Harrogate-Ripon railway line which today looked like a muddy canal.
