Later on Saturday

This afternoon I went for a short ride. It is just an 18 km loop east of Stevenage.

I am really not in the mood for cycling locally. I want to go to more interesting places. However, I have the lurgy, I'm sick of riding in the rain and I only had a couple of hours; so Aston it had to be!

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River Beane at White Hall. It is from boreholes near here that water for Stevenage is drawn.

Ford at White Hall, with Ellen.

The mysterious Frogmore Hall seen from across the Beane.

Three views of what remains of Aston House. During WWII it was Station XII, where unusual weapons were invented and developed. Now the grounds are a small exclusive housing development and a golf course. The only remaining building being the stables. 

Mosses and lichens on a gravestone in St Marys churchyard.

Ellen replaced Hardy on 8th December. I had been riding Hardy since about February. I found the dumped frame on my way to work day, took it home and built a tough expedition bike.
Recently the bottom bracket kept coming loose, and I kept tightening it. Eventually it failed; the fixed cup breaking off completely. 
I had been tightening the adjustable one while the fixed one had been fracturing!
So I rebuilt Ellen (The Elswick Hopper) who had lain dormant in the loft. She is light and fast, but much less rugged than Hardy. I shall replace her soon with something similar, but ten years younger.

Happy New Year

Happy New Year to anyone reading this now, or in the future. Of course, if you are reading it you won't be in the future but in your now, which is not my now now.


My commitment to this blog has been as bimbling as my riding. This year, however, things are going to be very different. Writing is going to be part of my daily routine, and these pages will rapidly expand.


I have so much to do this year. I am planning three big cycling / walking holidays, and I am going to do many day trips. there are so many places that I have got to visit. I am getting old and fat(ter) and the sooner I do something about it the better.


 I also plan to:  do more drawing / calligraphy
                        expand my knowledge of both geology and astronomy
                        learn a foreign language
                        learn a musical instrument
                        see 100 new species of plant and 10 new species of bird
                        walk up a mountain (or preferably lots of mountains)
                        swim in a river (as above)
                        wild camp
                        cycle 7500km


This may sound silly and ambitious, but I have carefully thought it all out and it is all feasible. these are not just the usual doomed, new year wishes.

Pigeonswick Loop.

I had planned a little ride for today, my day off. However, the weather had other ideas.
So I rode up to Cartwright Road, locked my bicycle to a lamp-post and walked my local loop, past the Pigeonswick sawmill.

It was extremely muddy, aided by a posse of Landrovers that, as part of a shooting party, had passed through earlier.

I saw very few birds as it was quite late in the day. I did manage to see goldcrest, treecreeper and three marsh tits in larger, mixed groups of tits.
I also managed some nice photos:

Cambridge and Around.

Yesterday I took a train to Cambridge and had a little ride around the villages south of the city.
I then rode into the centre to change my library books.

Library books?  Cambridge?

Yes, I am a member of Cambridgeshire library service because it has a much larger stock list than Hertfordshire (at least the books in which I am interested).

Anyway I had a pleasant ride except for one encounter with a mad bitch in a Peugeot who, as well as being completely psychotic,  honestly believed that, because she was signalling, had a perfect right to turn left over me.

Motorists are ignorant, arrogant scum.

Actually, that's (probably) just a minority. But I am not going to waste my time trying to classify each one I meet. Nor am I going to put my health or life at risk by giving any of them the benefit of the doubt.

'DNA Path'

Wandlebury

Wandlebury

Coe Fen - What other city has such an attractive site right in the centre?

Enterprising busker; and talented

Are these bicycles abandoned? Can I take one?