22 December. The (Solar) New Year's Day Ride
Living in a pagan part of Britain where Celtic beliefs lie just beneath the surface, today is the real first day of the year as the earth tilts back on its six month journey back to mid summer. Jan 1st is just a date.
It was a horrible day. Fog on the hills, heavy rain showers, flooded lanes, quite a lot of mud and a boisterous wind. I was not at all sure I wanted to go outside this morning...especially as this is the season when Morrigan, the Celtic goddess of fate and sometimes foreteller of death, tends to wander about. Often disguised as a crow.
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She may look like this...
But it's not real is it? Just a very old story. Although today, on some high and lonely lanes where there are no houses or passing cars, just heathery moors and winter rough fields with only the road edges visible in the swirling mists, it is easy to feel a sense of foreboding.
My plan was to sneak around all the quietest lanes between Truro and Penzance, avoiding the madness of Christmas traffic. Life in Tier 1 carries on as normal and we will see the impact soon in rocketing rates of Covid 19. They have already tripled since the beginning of the month. So out of Truro on the steep Chapel Hill and a brief view of Cornwall's metropolis laid out below me , then immediately plunging down into a deep valley, over a small bridge and then up again steeply to regain all the height lost. Passing Merlin's Wood, a tangled oak woodland that is much newer than any pre-Christian magician, the rain falling hard on the road and pricking my eyes.
The villages roll past, each accompanied by its own hill, always steep, the rain sometimes stops but the water is always flowing down the road, washing gravel under the tyres. Cusgarne, Frogpool, Trethella Water, Stithians, St Day. I thought St Day was the highest point of the ride. The fog was certainly thicker here as I rose up into the clouds. Cars emerged from the whiteness suddenly so I put a second front and back light on, one flashing, one steady and hoped they could see me. The hills continued after St Day but fortunately not for long and downhill soon beckoned to where the mist was much lighter and I felt safe enough to take a photo.
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Through Praze-an Beeble, just a blur of granite grey houses, dripping trees and onto Relubbus and Leedstown, St Hilary and Goldsithney. The villages mark the route, give me short targets to go for. I like to know the next thing is only three or four miles. It breaks it up.
Descending steeply through Marazion I finally see St Michael's Mount. The village is busy with tourists, the pasty shops and ice cream sellers doing well despite the gloom and rain. The Mount is only half visible, the top hidden in cloud and a grey, restless sea and raw wind are not enough to deter one couple swimming. No wetsuits. But who is more mad...me for cycling in this gloomy rain and mist where all I can see is a stretch of dirty road or those two for getting an endorphin high playing in the bitter waves?
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The cycle route along the top of the beach has been closed for upgrading so to avoid the A30 which is busy with impatient shoppers going too fast, I take a roundabout route behind the town, up and down though Gulval, which looks as if it would be a lovely place on a summer's day, but I am hungry, wet and cold and just want to get to Penzance harbour and turn round.
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The way home is up to the north coast to Hayle, blessedly rolling at first rather than crocodile toothed hill and valley, hill and valley. I have switched to my spare gloves now and eaten quickly, stuffing a sandwich down on the harbour slipway. There are cafes and pubs and a tantalising scent of fresh pasty hereabouts but I am both quarantining before meeting elderly relatives at Christmas and shielding with my own vulnerabilities. So week old bread with jam it is, damp at the edges where the rain wets it.
I always find this north coast route after Hayle to be hard work. The hills are longer and by now my legs are tired with forty miles and 3000 feet in them already. I went through Hayle slowly, snarled in traffic, a grey sky and grey buildings and a grey road. Everything is shades of grey but cold and wet rather than erotic. Now it is up and then down (inevitably) to pass the surf beach at Gwithian, VW vans parked all along the road, skinny surfers, hair plastered down by waves and salt, changing out of wetsuits, tugging at the reluctant neoprene, trying to force frozen hands to work. The waves look good today, clean and not too big.
Another long hill with traffic queueing behind me which I hate, so it is off on the first lane on the right. An error of judgement. It is flooded and I cycle through long, brown puddles where the water is streaming off the land. My feet were already wet but I worry about the bottom bracket. I could go back but don't. I keep thinking it will get better in a bit.
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It doesn't. I don't photograph the worst bits, just plough through them hoping for the best, hitting unseen potholes. I wonder how long it would be before anyone drove along here and found my drowned body. Can you drown in six inches?
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It is a relief to race down the hair pinned drop into Portreath and an opportunity to grab some more food although all I find in my saddle bag is a gel. It will have to do. Hunger gnaws at me. Three hills left. I watch the waves for a while and the squall that misses me as it proceeds along the coast. The sun is breaking through and the temperature has risen.
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Three hills, then two and finally one. The roads are getting busier and no one seems to want to give me space. I need to concentrate, making eye contact with oncoming vehicles and cycling defensively. The last hill is the worst and for the first time ever I take a break part way.
Home is a welcome sight. I am wet, dirty, tired and hungry and I am not convinced I have had a great time.
But I didn't encounter Morrigan, either as she is depicted here or in the shape of a crow. I barely saw anyone not in a vehicle in fact. If she was looking for me, she would have struggled today in the mist and rain.
A rest day tomorrow. There is a list of jobs for me on the kitchen worktop I notice......
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I never used to keep track of stuff like that, just got on and rode. Only with the advent of stuff like Garmin, which makes things easy, have I kept any kind of record.
