footloose crow
Veteran
- Location
- Cornwall. UK
11May. Sunlight and storm
I cycle on my own for about 99% of the time. Not because I am anti social, although I probably am, but because my very recently started cycling career has fitted in largely between the bookends of the pandemic (so no clubs running) and in any case I hate getting up early for a ride. Ah excuses: just anti social then.
But nevertheless when my phone dings with an invitation to ride with my only cycling friend, my heart does respond positively and forces my mouth into an almost smile. We should cycle together more often, you would think. We are both retired. We have also reached that point in retirement when you no longer feel you are just pulling a sickie each day and take the emptiness of the diary for granted. Small things occupy great space. 'Fancy a ride tomorrow?' 'Ah but I have a blood test at 11.30 so we can't fit it in today, maybe tomorrow'. And so it goes on, two former professionals who used to juggle diaries, work 12-14 hour days, achieved great things and now panic at the idea of two things happening on the same day. This is why I hardly ever surf despite living twenty minutes from a great surf beach. Always waiting for a better day, a more perfect wave, mañana.
Thus my excitement this morning. A ride in company. New conversations. I haven't been in a shop nor met anyone nor talked to anyone except the cat or my wife for weeks, months. Apart from Zoom of course and I am not convinced that counts. I start to disbelieve anyone else is real, but maybe just characters playing their parts on my screen.
At 8am a text pings in.
I used to be a geography teacher. I look at weather forecasts. 'Its going to rain heavily around 11am....and it is 8 degrees'.
But you don't want all this preamble. You want photos and anecdotes about close passes and funny things that happened and descriptions of the road travelled. I will try......
We meet in Tregony, a small village that describes itself as the Gateway to The Roseland, a lost land of steep hills, deep valleys and innumerable small peninsulas dividing tidal creeks. Tregony has two (tiny) schools, one shop and the largest retirement home in Cornwall. We leave quickly.
I have chosen the route. Stephen is impressed. As we drop down to sea level for the fourteenth time, skirt the fan of gravel and dead leaves that sits at the sump of all of these lanes and begin the steep ascent that will take us to yet another drop, he says "I didn't know you liked hills so much'. I didn't know either. Actually I don't. I wish Stephen had chosen the route. Mine is rubbish.
From St Just the road is merely hilly and now on the right we can see across the Carrick Roads and across to the Falmouth Docks a watery mile away There is a super yacht anchored in the Roads, its white paint flashing in the sun. The local paper said it was 75,000 Euros a week to charter. Who has that much money?
The whole horizon to the south is taken up with an ominous black cloud that is increasing in height every minute. The light contrast between this threatening sky and the sunlit, cobalt waters of the Roads is startling. Light and dark. Sunshine and storm. The cloud is moving towards us and there are grey skeins of rain between it and the rapidly darkening sea. The wind has increased and there are no yachts out today 'enjoying' the wind whipped lines of cerulean and azure waves that are still catching the light.
There is just time for a tea and a cake in St Mawes as the first drops of rain arrive on the wind and we dig into our packs for waterproofs.
Don't know why I am smiling.....its behind you! Stephen told me he was trying to photograph the bike, not me.
Its getting closer, eat that cake quickly....
Stephen is trying to remember if he did bring a waterproof.
The wind is behind us on the way back and Stephen chooses the route home. He is still talking, as he has throughout the morning, although his words are snatched by the wind. I just nod. This is a much flatter way back, although 'flat' is just a relative term meaning the use of the larger chain ring is sometimes possible. The rain has arrived, wind blown and stinging my face.. My gloves darken as they soak up the water running down the sleeve of the waterproof. I can feel the rain through my clothing. My shoes have acquired a dampness that becomes a squelch. Stephens tail light is a red fractal in the rain, a long reflective stripe in the water washed road. There is a small steam of water running off the helmet and down my neck. The wind catches the bike and shoves it bodily int the verge.
The traffic has picked up as the rain arrived and the close passes begin. Charitably I put it down to ignorance rather than malice until a tricked out and lowered red VW Golf slows as it passes, changes gear (to create an even louder exhaust?) and the driver nudges the car towards us, looking for a reaction. Stephen is cool and makes the appropriate hand gestures. I hold my handlebars tight and stop pedalling. The Golf steams off, water spraying from a deep puddle, leaving just a jet roar of engine noise and a faint smell of petrol quickly torn away by the wind. That's what happens when you think charitable thoughts. A lorry passes so close I am almost sucked into it. I really don't like this road.
We arrive back in Tregony and part ways, promising to do this again when the diaries align. I choose the quietest lanes and obscurest routes to get home, avoiding traffic. The windows of cars and vans are steamed up and everyone wants to be somewhere else urgently. I am soaked now, but the rain is easing. Those in cars have no idea what they are missing. This is an elemental experience, fighting the wind now I have changed direction, rainwater between my toes, aching thighs.
A message from my wife pops up on the Wahoo "Do you want me to pick you up?". No , I reply, I am having way too much fun.
I cycle on my own for about 99% of the time. Not because I am anti social, although I probably am, but because my very recently started cycling career has fitted in largely between the bookends of the pandemic (so no clubs running) and in any case I hate getting up early for a ride. Ah excuses: just anti social then.
But nevertheless when my phone dings with an invitation to ride with my only cycling friend, my heart does respond positively and forces my mouth into an almost smile. We should cycle together more often, you would think. We are both retired. We have also reached that point in retirement when you no longer feel you are just pulling a sickie each day and take the emptiness of the diary for granted. Small things occupy great space. 'Fancy a ride tomorrow?' 'Ah but I have a blood test at 11.30 so we can't fit it in today, maybe tomorrow'. And so it goes on, two former professionals who used to juggle diaries, work 12-14 hour days, achieved great things and now panic at the idea of two things happening on the same day. This is why I hardly ever surf despite living twenty minutes from a great surf beach. Always waiting for a better day, a more perfect wave, mañana.
Thus my excitement this morning. A ride in company. New conversations. I haven't been in a shop nor met anyone nor talked to anyone except the cat or my wife for weeks, months. Apart from Zoom of course and I am not convinced that counts. I start to disbelieve anyone else is real, but maybe just characters playing their parts on my screen.
At 8am a text pings in.
| The sun is out, shorts? |
I used to be a geography teacher. I look at weather forecasts. 'Its going to rain heavily around 11am....and it is 8 degrees'.
| Pessimist.......I will bring a waterproof. |
But you don't want all this preamble. You want photos and anecdotes about close passes and funny things that happened and descriptions of the road travelled. I will try......
We meet in Tregony, a small village that describes itself as the Gateway to The Roseland, a lost land of steep hills, deep valleys and innumerable small peninsulas dividing tidal creeks. Tregony has two (tiny) schools, one shop and the largest retirement home in Cornwall. We leave quickly.
I have chosen the route. Stephen is impressed. As we drop down to sea level for the fourteenth time, skirt the fan of gravel and dead leaves that sits at the sump of all of these lanes and begin the steep ascent that will take us to yet another drop, he says "I didn't know you liked hills so much'. I didn't know either. Actually I don't. I wish Stephen had chosen the route. Mine is rubbish.
From St Just the road is merely hilly and now on the right we can see across the Carrick Roads and across to the Falmouth Docks a watery mile away There is a super yacht anchored in the Roads, its white paint flashing in the sun. The local paper said it was 75,000 Euros a week to charter. Who has that much money?
The whole horizon to the south is taken up with an ominous black cloud that is increasing in height every minute. The light contrast between this threatening sky and the sunlit, cobalt waters of the Roads is startling. Light and dark. Sunshine and storm. The cloud is moving towards us and there are grey skeins of rain between it and the rapidly darkening sea. The wind has increased and there are no yachts out today 'enjoying' the wind whipped lines of cerulean and azure waves that are still catching the light.
There is just time for a tea and a cake in St Mawes as the first drops of rain arrive on the wind and we dig into our packs for waterproofs.
Don't know why I am smiling.....its behind you! Stephen told me he was trying to photograph the bike, not me.
Its getting closer, eat that cake quickly....
Stephen is trying to remember if he did bring a waterproof.
The wind is behind us on the way back and Stephen chooses the route home. He is still talking, as he has throughout the morning, although his words are snatched by the wind. I just nod. This is a much flatter way back, although 'flat' is just a relative term meaning the use of the larger chain ring is sometimes possible. The rain has arrived, wind blown and stinging my face.. My gloves darken as they soak up the water running down the sleeve of the waterproof. I can feel the rain through my clothing. My shoes have acquired a dampness that becomes a squelch. Stephens tail light is a red fractal in the rain, a long reflective stripe in the water washed road. There is a small steam of water running off the helmet and down my neck. The wind catches the bike and shoves it bodily int the verge.
The traffic has picked up as the rain arrived and the close passes begin. Charitably I put it down to ignorance rather than malice until a tricked out and lowered red VW Golf slows as it passes, changes gear (to create an even louder exhaust?) and the driver nudges the car towards us, looking for a reaction. Stephen is cool and makes the appropriate hand gestures. I hold my handlebars tight and stop pedalling. The Golf steams off, water spraying from a deep puddle, leaving just a jet roar of engine noise and a faint smell of petrol quickly torn away by the wind. That's what happens when you think charitable thoughts. A lorry passes so close I am almost sucked into it. I really don't like this road.
We arrive back in Tregony and part ways, promising to do this again when the diaries align. I choose the quietest lanes and obscurest routes to get home, avoiding traffic. The windows of cars and vans are steamed up and everyone wants to be somewhere else urgently. I am soaked now, but the rain is easing. Those in cars have no idea what they are missing. This is an elemental experience, fighting the wind now I have changed direction, rainwater between my toes, aching thighs.
A message from my wife pops up on the Wahoo "Do you want me to pick you up?". No , I reply, I am having way too much fun.
A little bit warmer again, just down to 2 layers this time……..still not where May needs to be though. I headed over to dads, as he’s had another setback on the health front today.
I stopped and found that the new tube had a small slit on the inside face but not in the same place as earlier. I tried patching it but failed twice so had to pop in my last tube and hope that it would get me home.
