Travels: Downhill All The Way...

Cycling was one way to get to school every morning during term time. The alternative was by bus, which Mum insisted that I take whenever it was raining. Except for a few years in the seventies, when I had a small Honda 50 motorcycle, my kind of local transport had always been by pedal cycle. The use of the pushbike resumed in the 1980s, after a stint in a local hospital as a result of a motorcycle accident. 

A Racing bike like this one was my pride and joy...

I'm one of those "oddities" who had never owned or driven a car. But that doesn't mean that my way of living lacked fulfilment. Perhaps the reverse.

In this series of blogs centred on personal travel experiences, so far, I have focused on backpacking overseas. But today I like to emphasise travel on two wheels, including here in the UK, as well as across Europe. Both include sharing the adventure with other people.

During the late eighties, several of us went on cycling holidays together as a small group of five unmarried Christian men - Tim, Gareth, Keith, Paul and me. The key issue was the camaraderie that we shared between us. We all had bikes, we all had passports - although one of us thought that passports weren't needed to cross the North Sea from Harwich to reach the Hook of Holland. When he was asked if he had his passport with him, he ended up rushing home to collect it, thus averting a last-minute disaster!

We were as mixed-class as we can get - quite unusual, in my opinion, within the English church culture, which tends to be predominantly middle-class. There were three of us holding white-collar professions - a banker, an accountant, and an architect assistant. The other two included a kitchen porter and a window cleaner. Yes, I was the window cleaner, self-employed, as was the accountant.

This was in the days when I was also competing in Triathlons, therefore, I was quite used to fast, long-distance riding. But as one of a group, we all had to ensure that we all paced to the slowest rider, who could have been any one of us, and on one occasion, whilst we were in Belgium, I was asked to slow down - as I was leading the group during that particular stretch of the journey.

Teasing between us was quite frequent. On one occasion in 1986, we were at the Kukenoff Flower Centre in Holland, when I thought I lost my keys. Had I lost them, then I wouldn't have been able to release my bicycle from the strong and secure, D-lock. Nor return to my apartment back home. So I began to search frantically for my keys, feeling panic rising as I emptied the rucksack and searched through the scattered contents.

Then Tim asked, What is that bump on the outside of your trouser pocket?

I plunged my hand into my pocket, and lo and behold, there were my keys. The rush of relief I felt was worth the remorseless teasing - to whom I became the principal target - since I always keep my keys in that pocket. And here's the secret: Never take teasing to heart. Instead, I laughed with them, and I when an opportunity arose, I was able to throw one back at him. We all laughed, adding lightheartedness to what was otherwise a few days of serious pedalling.

A more serious incident took place whilst we were staying at Cologne jugendherberge. We were having breakfast at the hostel restaurant when my wallet was chosen to be emptied of all cash by a dishonest thief posing as a guest - or even as a dormitory cleaner. Fortunately, my credit and debit cards were still there, intact. But the loss of the Deutschemark from my wallet presented problems. And anger. Why, oh, why did I leave the wallet in the dormitory? Why did I automatically assume that everyone was just as honest as we were? A fight very nearly broke out between me and the kitchen porter in our group after ordering me not to swear. Instead, another member intervened, and the potential fight was averted.

All four paid for my keeps - such as overnight accommodation, restaurants, snacks, and even the return train journey from Harwich. This goes to show how valuable friendship is, despite the near fight I might have had with one of them. But these are lessons I learned the hard way - never to leave valuables lying around unattended. This lesson was to prove beneficial for my yet future solo trips to Israel, Singapore, Australia, and the USA.

However, I would like to focus on the End-to-End cycle ride from John O'Groats, at the northern tip of Scotland, to Land's End, on the west tip of Cornwall, which we completed in 1990. The traditional road route covering the entire length of Great Britain is 874 miles 1,407 km. This is over the geographical distance of 603 miles 907 km - if the route was a straight line. But we diverted from the traditional route at various places, such as through the Lake District National Park, and also into Blackpool, which made the route we completed in 1990 somewhere between 890-900 miles 1432-1448 km - all within 12 days.

There were just two of us, Gareth and myself. When planning the trip, Gareth took care of the train journeys, first, an overnighter from London Euston to Inverness, followed by another train from Inverness to Thurso terminus station, which is near John O'Groats. He also booked two tickets from Penzance to Bracknell via Reading.

I took care of overnight accommodation, which was in YHA hostels, except at Blackpool, where we spent the night at a Bed-and-Breakfast hotel. Here, advanced bookings were far better than the off-the-street approaches, as knowing exactly where we would spend the coming night as a means in keeping each day's ride under a regular schedule, and therefore avoiding each subsequent day's leg of the journey getting shorter and shorter.

Narrow inlet, or Fjord, at Duncansby Head.

It was an experience of a lifetime. There was only one flat - on Gareth's rear wheel. However, as was the custom, I always carried a puncture repair kit with me, and this proved vital on our journey, as his tyre began to deflate on the remote and almost deserted Aviemore-Perth stretch of the A9. Therefore, I emphasise the importance of carrying vital tools needed for any on-route repair - especially on a long journey.

When it comes to breakdowns, it was my turn to experience a more serious situation when my chain was ready to give way as we approached Wigan. Fortunately for once, this particular day not falling on a Sunday, we came across a bicycle shop in town, open and trading. Here, I bought a new chain, and having a chain-breaker among my tools, I was able to replace the old chain with a new one myself, thus saving labour costs if the repair was done in the shop. After fitting the chain, I went for a quick ride around the block to ensure that the new chain was fully compatible with the rear gear cassette and there was no jumping. Fortunately, the new chain took to the gear teeth well, or else it was back to the shop to buy a new cassette also - and to pay them to have it fitted.

We were intrigued by the natural beauty of Great Britain, especially by such coastline contrasts. For example, the dramatic limestone cliffs with their narrow inlets and the waves of the sea dashing against the natural vertical walls and echoing with a strange, haunting sound, accompanied by the wails of the Puffin birds flocking within the inlet as they nest on its walls. And the nearby sandstone stacks resembling the buttes found within the Grand Canyon, all confined within the region of Duncansby Head, just east of John O'Groats, and a short ride away from the hostel where we were staying. Hardly any buildings, no road, but just a footpath edging open fields inland. On the other hand, the wide, flat sandy beach at Blackpool during low tide gives the impression of a mini-desert strip, backed by the busy street of the resort and dominated by the famed Tower.

 

And then the hills, "those funny bits pointing skywards and draining our energy." But we were told that, because we are riding from north to south, it's "downhill all the way."

Am I kidding? Er, no. During the weeks before we started on our journey to Scotland, the same architect assistant who came with us to the Continent in the late eighties approached me, and with all seriousness, said that by going from north to south, we will be going downhill all the way. His message passed around other church members, and I was beginning to wonder whether they were serious or merely teasing. Eventually, even Gareth himself felt confused.

This happened while we were sitting in a coffee bar near Exeter one morning before setting off on the next leg of the journey, and after spending the previous day struggling uphill and against the wind on a spirit-crushing 90-mile stretch between Bristol and Exeter, that following morning my banker friend expressed his concern. I felt exasperated, but I made sure that I explained the situation as gentle and courteous as I could be.

It easy to imagine a sphere, and for example, if water was splashed on the smooth object, such as on top of a golf ball, or even better, a squash ball or a football, then any droplet large enough will roll to the bottom of the ball and even drip off. Therefore, it comes as no real surprise that this "downhill all the way" theory is likened to the bead of water on a smooth ball. It rolls to the bottom and drips off. Therefore, on a much larger scale and with the UK on a curving slope some 50-60 degrees north of the Equator, or 30-40 degrees latitude south of the North Pole, why shouldn't the same happen with us - just roll south towards the Equator, if not to the South Pole itself?

And this was coming from someone who wore a business suit to get to work and wore a shirt-and-tie in the office whilst concentrating on the drawing board, hence a middle-class man of respectability. This really bothered me! I always thought that I was meant to be the uneducated, working-class ignoramus! Instead, I've known about the properties of our planet since childhood, or at least from adolescence. 

I explained to my friend that gravity is centred within the core of the Earth, and not at the equator, nor, for that matter, at the South Pole. Since the Earth's gravity is much, much greater than that of the ball, the droplet will roll down the ball to fall towards the Earth. But there is no greater source of gravity under our planet, therefore, unless resting on something solid, everything will fall towards the centre of the Earth. Hence why we tire quickly as we struggle on our bikes riding uphill. By contrast, riding downhill means riding extra fast with ease.

The Earth from Space.

Ah, travel! I guess I will meet people of all kinds, thus making travel such a fascinating experience. And going on a holiday break with Christian friends was quite different from travelling alone. Although by nature, I prefer to travel alone, nevertheless, I can learn much about travelling with a group of Christian men, all very close to my own age. Disagreements over a misfortune, such as the one at Cologne, can and does, arise. But after I was wiped clean of all my money, the moral and financial support I received was impressive. I could have been left to deal with the problem on my own. Instead, I was carried along the way until I'd reached my front door. 

With lockdown in place for the past year, maybe we may see the end of the tunnel once again and, who knows, maybe God will open the door for us to travel together as a couple.