Blog – Page 44 – Where is Phil now?

Back to the coast!

Sunday 21 December 2014 – Dartmouth, Devon.

The past few weeks have been rather busy, with work taking over far too much of my life again, not quite to the levels it did before I left New Zealand in 2011, but far more than I want it to – the price that is paid for delivering systems projects, and being a bit too hands on. In a sustained effort to meet the deadline date for the project I have worked quite a few evenings lately as well as the past five Saturdays, effort worth putting in, but I ended up delaying the project for a couple of weeks anyway. It was close but not quite.

The good news is that I am now banging away on my laptop keyboard while sitting on a train heading down to Dartmouth on the Devon coast. I have been looking forward to getting away by myself for a while, taking some time to do some photography and some walking and enjoying a bit of solitude. I surprised myself by really badly wanting to get out of London for a few days, something I did not think was possible. I, of course, miss the sea and the hills a lot, but have found places in London that have allowed some relief from the madness of living in a city of eight million, and while I have always taken the opportunity to escape the clutches of the city – I have never before felt an urgent NEED to.

I have taken a week off work – it was going to be two, but there is too much to do so I return to the office next week with the expectation of being able to knock off a load of stuff while the school is effectively closed. With a week off under my belt, the start of the new year will be a little more relaxed then the end of this one.

Dartmouth was chosen for a number of reasons, mainly through lack of choice as to places to go, but it does have a castle and is on the South West Coast Path, so fulfils my most basic holidaying needs. I was hoping to go somewhere wilder, but rental car prices quadruple this time of year so I have been limited to place I can access by public transport – and with it being a Sunday in winter in rural England there is a surprising lack of that as well. Even Dartmouth – which is fairly well known, albeit small place is not accessible by public transport on Sundays. There is no train service at all and the bus from the closest train station in Totnes does not run on winter Sundays. I will be forced to take a cab.

The journey has been a pretty good one, starting at Paddington.

The train was a little late out of Swindon but made up time before Taunton and hit the coast at Dawlish Warren to schedule. Dawlish Warren holds a special place in my memories – and not for a good reason !

When I was supporting my friend Mal on his epic run of the South West Coast Path back in June 2012 I was on walking/running duties when we arrived in Dawlish Warren late one evening, we misplaced the path and ended up doing an hour long and pointless loop of the golf course that juts out into River Exe. We were tired and hungry and it was dark by the time we got back to where we supposed to be. I think some bad words were said…. I briefly cover the run here. I should mention that Mal is about to embark on an even bigger venture next year – running 50 marathons on 50 days, each with a classic New Zealand peak. Massively epic and you should read about and support it here…

We saw way too much of this place…

The train line through Dawlish is right on the coast and was washed out this time last year in the winter storms, it must have been a great relief to the people of Devon and Cornwall that the line was repaired after some major work. It is a short, but lovely piece of railway and I managed to get my camera briefly out one of the windows in the doors. Unlike Sri Lanka, there is no standing in an open doorway in the UK! There is something magical about looking at the view and the side of a train as it winds its way around a bend on the track.

I arrived in Totnes to discover the taxi was almost twice as much as I was told, a slight uplift on the week day rate, but still I was definitely mis-informed on the taxi price, I hope the price increase is not the same everywhere else in Dartmouth or this could be a very expensive holiday.

After checking into the B and B, I dumped my suit case (I cannot believe I am travelling with a case and not a backpack!) grabbed the camera bag and headed off into the drizzle to check out Dartmouth Castle. To avoid the disappointment of finding it closed I had looked it up on the internet and knew it was open until 4:00 today, but closed during the week – so I had to visit it today. I made it there with plenty of time for a change.

The all too familiar sign, some good – mostly good memories.

As a castle, it was not overly interesting, though it has been well preserved as it was used by the military up to the end of the second world war. The castle was started in 1388 to defend the small town of Dartmouth just up stream from the mouth of the River Dart. The tower was an addition in the fifteenth century and was the first coastal castle built to take big cannons, covering the width of the river. When the tower was built to house cannon a similar tower was built in Kingswear on the other side of the river – and I hope to visit that soon as well…

It was a rather damp exploration of the castle, drizzling for virtually the whole time I was there. Looking back towards the town.

And across the river to Kingswear Castle.

I was surprised to find this wee robin sitting on a sign just outside, I shot this photo on my wide angle lens. I was that close to it.

I was quite keen to get back into town to find a pub to watch the Liverpool v Arsenal football match at 4:00, being a keen Arsenal supporter I was desperately hoping to not see a repeat of the 5-1 thrashing we received at Anfield last season… I took a few photos on the way back into Dartmouth.

Hopefully more on Dartmouth later in my visit as the old town, where I am staying is quite quaint and worth a good explore.

The small town of Kingswear is on the opposing bank of the River Dart and I will visit there either tomorrow or Tuesday.

Oh yeah, the football was a two all draw, not what I wanted, but better than last time!

A couple of days on the Kent coast.

Thursday 13 November 2014 – various bits of Kent.

After our weekend away on the Isle of Wight in September I have been pondering the possibility of buying a small flat somewhere on the coast within a couple of hours of London by train. I have spent many hours in front of the computer since, and some of that time was even spent researching potential locations. I had drawn up a bit of a short list of possibilities and El and decided to take a couple of days off of work, hire and car and go and explore some of the Kent coast and have a look for ourselves. Naturally something else has come up since so buying may be off the cards for now, but it was still a good excuse to rent a car and hit the countryside.

We waited until the worst of the rush hour before picking up the car from a car rental place that is conveniently just down the road and then hitting the road. Our first stop was at a delightful truck stop just outside of Folkestone, we had planned on stopping for coffee and a delicious motorway service centre lunch at Maccas on the way, but the first services area we came across was closed so we ended up here. It was pretty sad with half the shops closed. We won’t go back…

The first planned visit for the day was the historic town of Dover, not to look for property – this isn’t my sort of town, but I really wanted to see the castle and was also really looking forward to seeing the famous ‘white cliffs’. Getting through Dover was a bit of a challenge, it is a small town with a small but extremely busy ferry port and the truck queue was massive, once we passed the port turn off the town seemed deserted.

I could clearly the see the castle as we drove down into town and sitting in the traffic looking up at it on the far cliffs overlooking the port was quite exciting, it is a huge complex, with loads of buildings and I was really looking forward to seeing it. However…..

As seems to be norm with me visiting English Heritage managed sights, it was closed, and only open at the weekends over autumn. Needless to say I said some bad words as we drove around trying to find a decent vantage point to get a photo. Disappointed again, and unlike Camber Castle that was closed when we visited it on our Rye weekend, Dover Castle is fenced off so I could not even take a walk around the perimeter.

I snapped a couple of photos by illegally stopping on roads and leaping out of the car, and that was my Dover Castle experience. I must come back some time.

Just along the way from the castle is the viewing point at Langdon Cliffs, which looks out over the port of Dover and the northwards up some of the famous chalk white cliffs. The cliffs make up a large part of the Kent coast line, being made of a soft chalk rock they erode quickly and in some places are disappearing at half a metre a year. They are of course spectacular!

Even on a cloudy day you see the French coast from here, maybe not in my wide angle lens photo. But I assure you, it was there…

We went for a brief walk along the top before a slightly unexpected rain storm blew in, it had been cloudy all morning without rain, so we did not linger up there.

We jumped back in the car and headed down to the beach at St Margaret’s at UnderCliff. I wasn’t sure what we would see from there so it was a bit of a random guess that there may be some nice cliff viewing, but wow. It was a pretty special little spot. So special that some bloke was even having a swim. Madness!

I really enjoyed the interplay between the sun and the clouds, the sort of dramatic sky and light that I like the best. I took a few photos…

We reluctantly pulled ourselves away from this lovely little beach side spot and drove a few miles up the road to Deal. Deal is one of the main towns I had been seriously looking at as a possible place to buy a flat. It is cheap, on the coast with easy access to hills and grass and not too far from London on the train. OK, the beach isn’t soft white sand, but it is a nice beach considering and we both really liked the old part of town and there are flats for sale in the white building right at the end of this photo.

Deal seamed fairly quiet – it was early afternoon on an autumn Wednesday mind, but it didn’t have the narrow hillside streets of Broadstairs that would be a nightmare in summer time. We stopped for coffee and cake in a little traditional tea shop that seemed to be quite popular with the locals before heading out for a walk along the front and to have a walk around the building that had flats for sale.

I wanted to see the castle, but knew that it would be closed (English bloody Heritage again) – and it was, but at least we could see around the outside of it.

Our next objective was the “isle” of Thanet, which has not been an island for a few hundred years. The Roman fort at Reculver, which we visit tomorrow, was built to watch over the Wantsum channel that cut Thanet off from the mainland. The isle has the beach towns of Ramsgate, Broadstairs and Margate, amongst others in it. It was an area I have thought about looking in as well, but had been put off until we spoke to one of El’s colleagues who visits regularly. The drive through the outer suburbs of Ramsgate hardly inspired and with traffic a bit mad we decided to carry on going and look for our B and B in Broadstairs before it got dark.

We had decided to stay in Bleak House, a B and B/Hotel on the cliff tops above the town, and a summer home to Charles Dickens, who wrote a novel of the same name. The B and B had been decked out like it would have been in Dickens’ time and it was quite nice. There had been a couple of cancellations so we were the only people there. It had the most comfortable bed I have ever slept on in a hotel… It was a struggle to get out!

In the morning we took a rather fresh walk before breakfast, the morning was lovely, with the only clear skies we saw while we were away.

I had not realised that the white cliffs extended so far up the coast, I had always thought it was a phenomenon local to Dover, so I was pleasantly surprised to find them all the way up here, nice spot I really liked Broadstairs.

It has a nice mix of old town and new, nice beaches and cafes – but I am sure it is utter madness in summer time. And Bleak House is positioned really nicely above one side of the town.

Like most of the south east coast of England, Margate has had some rough times and has become a bit run down, and this was really obvious as we drove in through the coastal road from the much more upmarket Broadstairs. In 2011 a big and brash new art gallery was opened on the waterfront – the Turner Contemporary. This has brought a slightly more upmarket clientele to the area and started a cycle of regeneration. We parked up above the old town and walked down through its narrow streets to the waterfront and out along the wharf to look back over the town.

I loved the sign in Jane Jone s shop, sort of summed up the area – almost but not quite.

The Turner opened at 10.00 and we were there right on opening, I was hoping to see a good collection of Turners paintings, especially from the period when he lived here, but there was only a couple on display. I am not a fan of Turner at all, but was hoping to have my mind changed in a gallery named after him.

The gallery had the big ‘English Magic’ exhibition by Jeremy Deller – English Magic which was first shown at the Venice Biennial in 2013, including this piece “We sit starving amongst our gold” that we saw in the William Morris Gallery near home a few months ago – though this version is much much bigger.

I also really liked this piece entitled “A good day for cyclists” With its endangered bird carrying away one of my hated Range Rovers.

I liked the gallery, it is airy and light and I would definitely come back again for the right exhibition.

After the gallery we started on a slow journey back towards home, I wanted to see the abbey at Reculver on the way so we drove along the coast as much as possible to Whitstable with the aim to stop for lunch there. Though after Reculver we just ended up driving all the way home. I had read that Reculver Abbey was also an English Heritage building so I was dreading driving there to find that we could not even walk around the outside, but was pleasantly surprised to find that it was access all areas all the time – Yay…

The 12th century abbey was built on the ruins of an old Roman fort, which was converted into a Saxon abbey in the 7th century before being abandoned again, falling into ruin and finally being revived and rebuilt as the parish church in the 12th century. When it was built the abbey was quite a way inland, but over time and tide the coast moved closer to the abbey and sections of it fell into the sea. The ruins are lovely – as were the clouds.

We arrived back in London in the early afternoon, deciding to shoot straight through as there was no easy parking in Whitstable and missing school traffic was worth the early arrival home. Plus we went for lunch at our local cafe Bygga Bo, which is always a treat!

It was a great couple of days out the city, I won’t be looking at buying a house at the moment as I am probably going to help my son in NZ buy one instead. But if I do I have some ideas of where to look more seriously.

A weekend away in Manc and Macc.

Sunday 2 November 2014 – Manchester and Macclesfield.

It seems like an age since El and I went away for a weekend, but checking back through the blog it appears it has only been four weeks, though it has been quite a while since we booked this trip up to Manchester and Macclesfield. One of EL’s oldest friends moved to Macc many years ago and has recently moved house again. We have been invited up for the house warming party and a side trip to Manchester seemed like a good thing to do.

Even though I have lived in England for at least four years over my two visits here I have never been to Manchester, or anywhere else much north of London, something I really need to remedy. In fact I have barely seen much of the UK outside of London, and the more I think I have seen the more I realise there is so much more of this lovely country to explore, so I need to remedy that too.

We booked the train early enough that it was only a little bit more to travel first class than normal, so we took the first class option and on the way up it was really worth it. We had both taken the afternoon off work so met early at Euston and had free lemonade and some crisps in the first class lounge at the station.

The train ride was pleasant enough, it was a high speed train and only stopped twice on the way to Manchester so it was quite a quick trip. Travelling first class on an early commuter train meant we got free coffee, sandwiches, biscuits, crisps and, as I found out far too late, wine. Well worth the extra fiver it cost. Sadly the return trip on Sunday was as not well catered for, but it was not terrible 🙂

We arrived in Manchester late in the afternoon, I had booked a room in a hotel quite near the station, and we checked straight in once we hit town. Unfortunately I was feeling the affects of a horrid little chest cold and was not 100%, so I needed a wee rest before we went and started exploring central Manchester in the early evening. We did not really have much of a plan, just a map from hotel reception and a desire to explore.

I will have to caveat this by saying I was sick and a little grumpy after a busy week at work and I was not really in the mood, but I was not overly impressed with downtown Manchester, it just didn’t inspire me as a city centre . Maybe we just didn’t see the best bits, I know we did not go to the new Quays area, or maybe I am over cities ? I cannot explain it, but I found it all a bit uninspiring.

There was an eye, but so many cities have those these days and the Wheel of Manchester is hardly in an inspiring location, maybe the views from the top were fab ? I don’t know.

We walked down through the main shopping area to the cathedral and the football museum, before turning round and heading back the way we came arriving at the hotel in time for our dinner reservation. This is not our hotel by the way…

It was Halloween, a festival I despise for its American commercialness, and the hotel had a DJ in the bar and it was really loud, un-surprisingly the restaurant was fairly empty, and those that were there, like us, did not linger, though they did turn the music down a bit so we converse over our meal. I took a whisky, purely for medicinal purposes, back to the room as soon as we had finished eating and we had a quite night in, apart from me coughing all night. The room was really nice and we could not hear the bar, which was a real bonus!

Saturday morning we were up relatively early and down for breakfast soon after they started serving, breakfast was pretty good and I did the usual and over-ate a hotel breakfast…

We wanted to see a bit more of downtown Manchester before heading out to Macclesfield in the afternoon. It was a glorious start to the day, lovely clear skies above and not too many people out and about on the streets.

I was keen to get some photos of the trams, something to like about Manchester, and of course with a bright low sun I was also keen to get some lovely flareage in at least one photo.

We were passing Manchester art gallery just on opening time so we decided to pay it a visit. It is partly in a lovely old sandstone building and partly in an ultra modern glass and concrete building behind. I really like this new thing of mixing up old and new buildings in galleries, it provides such a variety of hanging space, and they have done it really well here.

The gallery was interestingish – bearing in mind I was not feeling 100%, there were a couple of good exhibitions on, one based on war related imagery, and one on the 1950s cotton fashion industry. Manchester was the centre of the UK cotton industry and there was a big push by the marketing board in the ’50s to promote cotton into high fashion with a number of big-name English and European designers contributing to the push, I am not sure if it was successful or not, but some of the clothes were quite cool.

I found this Banksy painting rather bizarrely positioned in the 19th Century British artist section…

Manchester’s (Salford) finest contribution to the art world has to be L.S. Lowry, I really like his work and there was a classic Lowry cityscape hanging in the gallery. A painting of nearby Piccadilly Gardens from 1954. The Wheel of Manchester is now in the gardens, I liked it better in the Lowry’s version.

A number of the buildings in Lowry’s painting still stand, though one of the things that I hated about Manchester was the mix and match of architecture and style – there just did not seem to be a theme to the planning and design, making it, in my opinion, quite ugly. Though of course there are some lovely parts to all cities and the section around the town hall was quite nice, almost European in style.

Though the front of the townhall was closed off while some building work was being carried out, presumably for Christmas festivities.

I was hoping to walk on a tow-path up the canal to the cathedral area, but there did not appear to be one to walk on, so we ended up walking up another busy road.

I know times are tight for local councils, but there were a few signs like this around this part of town.

We stopped for a smoothie and coffee and a sit down in a lovely tea house next to the cathedral before heading over for a look. The cathedral was nice, it was heavily refurnished in the 19th century, so it does not look particularly old from the outside, but parts of it date back to Saxon times and it has been modified and expanded ever since.

The coolest thing about the cathedral is that they host gigs inside, stage and lighting was being set up for a gig that night, and one of my favourite bands 65 Days of static, had played there on Wednesday – that was a gig I should have gone to, I bet the sound under that massive ceiling was amazing.

Our main goal for the day was the Football Museum, a new addition to Manchester, and though I have just criticised the mix of new and old buildings, I think the design of this building fits in with its location – just.

Actually, I really liked the building 🙂 which was more than could be said for the museum, I was disappointed by it to be honest, I love the idea and I think it could be really interesting, it was just a bit too disjointed for me. It did seem to have a really good interactive component though and I think kids with an interest in the game would love it..

It was time to head back to the hotel and on to the station so we walked back via the northern quarter, which is the new old up and coming, hip, cool bit of Manchester. It is a bit Shoreditch, and I think will be pretty good given a bit more time and some more shops moving in.

There are some great record shops and cafes there, so next time I am in Manc – and hopefully feeling less sick, I will check it out more. I did go and buy a record though. Muzai, one of my favourite small NZ labels has just moved to the UK’s north west and a couple of albums are available from Piccadilly Records. I bought the All seeing Hand LP. If Piccadilly was in London, I would be broke. Wow, such an awesome selection of post rock, psych, shoegaze and noise. I left in a hurry.

We caught the train out to Macclesfield in the early afternoon and it was good to slump for a while, walking around had really taken it out of me. Macclesfield is about thirty minutes by train from Manchester and Jen met us at the station and we walked for ten minutes to her new house. When we got there, after some polite chat time I snuck away for a snooze before the party started – and then fell asleep in a chair in another room at about 9:30. At that point I felt it was time to go to bed… everyone enjoyed the party apparently.

After another night of coughing and little sleep I surprised myself by feeling a little perkier on Sunday morning and with a couple of coffees and a massive breakfast at a nearby cafe inside me I was ready to go. Jen’s brother and his wife had also stayed the night so the five us went for a drive in his car to the nearby Tegg’s Nose Country Park for a brief walk before El and I had to jump on the train back to London.

It was a lovely walk and I really enjoyed being in the countryside; breathing some fresh air, getting the shoes slightly muddy and pondering what the running and riding would be like.

There are some great old English long horn cattle here, I do not know the particular breed, but the horns are amazing, and this fellow was quite friendly.

The views from the hill were lovely, typical English country side. Green and lush and some autumn colours just starting to show.

It is hard to see in this picture, but this was looking out over the Jodrell Bank space observatory.

In far too short a time we had to turn round and head back to the car.

And onwards to Macclesfield station and the return trip to London.

I surprised myself, by really liking Macc. It is a nice feeling town, especially where Jen lives and I look forward to going back one day and exploring the town itself.

It was a good weekend away, I am really pleased to have finally made it to Manchester, I didn’t enjoy it particularly, but then I wasn’t feeling the best, so I will blame me and not the small part of the city I visited.

I ended up taking the following day off of work as I was feeling pretty rubbish, finally stopping coughing enough to get a decent sleep on Thursday, when El I passed the baton on to El. Sorry…

Meet my new friend.

Saturday 18 October 2014 – Epping Forest.

Ok, last post from Epping Forest for a while I promise (fingers crossed behind back), but I have been enjoying myself up there and this week was different. This week I was riding my brand spanking new bike and it was a real joy.

After the last couple of rides on the old and too small Kona I had decided that I was enjoying my riding enough to spend a decent slice of cash and get a new bike. After a bit of time looking around the internet and some discussion with Tony from Walthamstow Cycles I decided on a Genesis Latitude 20, a steel framed UK designed bike – I also decided on a bike with lots of gears.

I haven’t bought a bought a new bike for years, the last one was the Kona Dawg full suspended bike I bought what must be twelve or so years ago. The DMR I ride in NZ was assembled from a frame I bought second hand in 2005 and bits from other bikes I had owned. I can definitely say that technology has moved on since I bought or built. The new bike has 27.5 inch wheels, a size I had not even heard of on a mountain bike a month ago – apparently they are the new thing, and it has twenty gears, which is also new to me. It seems I did get very out of touch.

I had a very busy weekend booked but managed to sneak out on Saturday morning for a couple of hours in the forest to give the new beast a bit of a run.

This is the one and only time it will be truly clean…

It was a good ride, I am pretty sure I did not ride any of the same trails I rode last week, I definitely got misplaced twice this time, once in a small section of forest before the main park – I did an unexpected loop, but it was a nice trail. The second time was on a really good section of flowing single track, though sadly I rode up the gentle gradient – twice, before popping out on a road and having to use Google maps to work out where I was. Which was not where I expected to be! It didn’t take long to get back on track though. There are so many trails in the forest, and unlike home there is no trail marking and the trails are two way. Not that there were many other riders out on Saturday morning to meet coming the other way.

The bike rode beautifully. With a large 19 inch frame and the big wheels the centre of balance was significantly higher than I was used to, but it is such a stable platform I barely noticed the difference. It also felt a lot lighter than I expected and even with those massive handlebars it was surprisingly quick to manoeuvre.

The fork is an X-Fusion Velvet RL2, I have not heard of the brand before, but they seem to have a good reputation and the fork was very smooth and even better I could lock it out for the road section to and from the forest. I have never had a lock out fork before, luxury!

I did come off at once stage, the rear wheel just flew out from underneath me in this really greasy section of track on the way back home, luckily I managed to get off the pedals before I hit the ground and came out unscathed – and “clean”.

Actually I was filthy when I finally arrived home, the tracks were either very greasy, very wet or very boggy in so many places. One of the reason I really enjoy winter riding…

Fabulous bike and another great ride.

an Epping Forest mud fest.

Saturday 11 October 2014 – Epping Forest.

Wow, three posts from consecutive weekends from the same place, I must say it has been a lot of fun visiting the forest – who would have known !

As I mentioned in my last post, autumn arrived last weekend with a sudden drop in temperature and the onset of the first rain in what seemed like weeks. Fortunately it only rained while I was at work or at home and I managed to squeeze a couple of runs in on the way home from work. Not that I am running very far at the moment, just barely squeezing out five miles. The good news is that I am getting fitter again, not that I could get a lot less fit. I signed up with a doctors a couple of weeks ago and found I am 7kilos heavier than I was when I did my 50km run two years ago – ouch! I have not been 85kgs for a very very long time.

I had been following the forecast all week and had decided if it was not pouring with rain on Saturday morning I would head out for a ride and see how muddy and greasy it would be when it had been wet. It was a pretty damn glorious morning. No excuses needed.

I am really lucky living in Walthamstow in NE London, I am twenty minutes from work in Covent Garden by tube (plus a short walk) and I am five minutes by bike to the bottom fringes of Epping Forest. If you look at the area on a map it is hard to see that all these small patches of green all hook up and eventually join with the lower reaches of the forest itself.

I wore my Garmin watch so I could map the ride, and maybe come up with a vague idea of where to go next time.

As I was riding on my own this time I was hoping to be able to find some of the single track we rode a couple of weeks ago, but there is so much track in the forest and it is impossible to get really lost, so I was not too bothered. I would guess that well over fifty percent of the ride today was on proper single track with the rest on wider trails, and apart from the first and last five minutes of it none of it was on road – though I did cross a few

The forecast had been for a cloudy morning with some showers, but it was pretty damn nice out there, I love the fact that unlike most of the riding I did in New Zealand, I was not riding in pine forest, so I loved the trees and the way the sun filtered through them. I had to stop and take a few photos on my phone on the way; this was just five minutes in to the forest section of the ride – bike is still clean !

The light reflecting off the water at Highams Lake was lovely so I stopped for a wee look and just maybe, to stop sucking air for a second.

The trails had taken on a lot of water in the last week and it was pretty slippery in some places, traction was minimal at times and I will have to make sure I get some decent tyres on my new bike, it was a hell of a lot of fun and I surprised myself by how quickly riding greasy trails came back to me, though I am slow as all heck…

I did stop for half a cup of coffee at one of the forest tea huts. I was trying to work out where I was on the map on my phone, but without glasses on it was hopeless. I think I will take the paper map next time.

Two rides and I have already bent a seat post, it used to take me at least four or five rides.

The forest has lots of wooded area which is riddled with single track, some old and faint and some new and freshly ridden, I really enjoyed the mix of fast trail and tight twisty faded trails with low hanging branches and a vagueness of direction. The stinging nettles are a pain though! Epping itself is not all forest, there are a few open sections and I made use of these to gain some distance. My plan was to ride as far north as I felt like and then duck into the trees and meander my way back.

I pretty much managed to ride a mix of single track all the way back down to the bottom end of the forest, surprisingly I managed to head in generally the right direction the whole way back towards the small interlinked sections that got me back home. At one point I found myself riding along the side of the River Ching, along some trails that EL and I walked a while back.

I got a bit uncertain about my direction in the next section of mini-forest and ended up riding back up a trail that I rode down a couple of weeks ago before realising I was heading in the wrong direction, and that was really the only time – something I was utterly surprised about as my sense of direction has been truly awful since I have been in the northern hemisphere. Maybe I have just not been testing it enough.

I wanted to get a couple of hours of riding and was pleased to do that, we had some furniture to move after the carpet man had been in while I was out, so had vowed to come home in a reasonable time and less knackered than I was two weeks ago. I did get laughed at when I turned up all muddy though!!

It was a great ride, I am now very keen to get myself a new and properly sized bike, my left hip really did not appreciate me riding so low today and was quite painful by the time I got home. But bloody hell it was fun out there. My love for the sport has certainly been rekindled.

an Epping Forest sleepout.

Saturday 04 October 2014 – Epping Forest.

After an awesome ride in the forest last weekend I was really pleased to get a message from microadventure organiser extraordinaire Anna, talking about an early autumn, last day of summers warmth microadventure on Friday night. Even better, it is in my hood – back in Epping Forest.

I managed to sneak home quickly after work to get changed and pick up pack before deciding to take the bus all the way up to the meeting place in Loughton rather than bussing to Leyton and catching the tube. Frustratingly the bus took ages to get out of the bus depot and more than a kilometre up the road as the traffic was really bad, I ended up being over half an hour late to the station, but it seemed I was not the only one. It was dark when I arrived at the station and rather than hang about waiting to see if there were any other stragglers I started walking up through Loughton and out into the forest towards our meeting point at the Robin Hood pub. I didn’t realise the road would have no footpath as well as no street lighting.

Strangely I was the first to arrive at the pub, but I was not alone for long as others started arriving soon after me, some having taken rather a long walk from Loughton station. There were ten of us who turned out for the night, which started with a couple of beers, some quite nice Thai food and a little whisky tasting.

After the whisky tasting we headed off from the pub, crossed the road and went straight into Epping Forest. We took a twenty or so minute walk down one of the paths until we found what looked to be a comfortable clearing to set up camp for the night. The great thing about this microadventuring malarky is that it should be nice and easy, no great packing of tents and camping equipment. Tossing a sleeping bag, mat and a bivvy in a small pack is all that you need. this makes for a quick transition from finding a place to camp to being settled. Sweet !

Then sleeping type things happened, for most people, not so much for me, but some happy snoring sounds rumbling around the forest suggested some had a good sleep.

Fortunately it was a pretty mild night, I was expecting it to be colder than it was, and was glad I really didn’t have to test the boundaries of my summer sleeping bag. It was a pretty comfy night and reasonably quiet in our section of the forest.

It was a slow start in the morning, I lazed about for a while waiting for signs of life from the others.

Eventually I got up and went for a stroll to find a clear photo of the sunrise I could see through the trees.

I also found we had some neighbours as well.

Most people were up soon after I got back, with not a lot to do it was pretty much a case of pack up and go. A couple of people had these awesome jet boilers, small gas filled stoves that put out intense heat and boil a container of water in just over a minute – no good for cooking, but brilliant for coffee, which was generously shared around.

Once packed we walked the thirty or so minutes down through the forest to Chingford station and caught the train home. For me it was three stops and I was home by 8:30.

I am really pleased I went, it was a fun night out, with a great bunch of people.

As forecasted the temperature plummeted on Saturday, dropping about eight degrees over the weekend. And there ended summer!

An Epping Forest Epic

Sunday 28 September 2014 – Epping Forest.

Growing up in New Zealand in the 1970s meant my friends and I were riding bikes in the dirt years before the term mountain biking came along, but then teenage laziness arrived and I did not really get back on to a bike until I bought an old mountain bike off of my friend David in 1998. After a couple of rides in Woodhill and Riverhead forests near Auckland I was hooked. Over the next dozen or so years I rode most weekends, in many places in New Zealand and made opportunities to ride when I was on work trips to Sydney and Boston. To say I was keen would be an understatement, it was the first time I found a sport, or any form of exercise I truly loved. The frequency of rides waned significantly in my last year in New Zealand as I discovered trail running and the trail running community. I rarely had the time or the fitness to do both in any one weekend. And then I left the country !

Apart from the facial expression I love this photo of me taken at the 2007 Moonride 12 hour event. It is the only event photo I have ever bought – and it is the first time it has been seen in public… That little pop took me completely by surprise!

Back to today. I had bought my Kona Lanai’i before I started working and had ridden it a couple of times on the road, basically using it as a cheap form of transport. I had it booked in for a service with Walthamstow Cycles the week I was offered my job and have not had the time to ride it since, though Tony from Walthamstow Cycles had offered a couple of times to show me around the nearby Epping Forest.

El and I have made a couple of visits to the fringes of the forest and each time I go I think about what the forest would be like for mountain bike riding. Well today I had the opportunity to find out as I took Tony up on his most recent offer.

I was up early for a Sunday and soon into my old regular pre-ride breakfast of coffee and banana and peanut butter on toast.

Tony, Tom and I had arranged to meet about five minutes ride away from home, on what turned out to be the edge of the forest.

I was really surprised to find we actually ducked into some trail so close our meeting place and it was a nice thirty minute ride through Walthamstow Forest, Highams Park, the edges of Woodfood Golf course and Hatch Forest before we hit Epping Forest proper. I was stunned at how much off-road riding was to be found so close to home, and though I am sure I will never find it on my own, there was one section of single track that had the heart soaring and a monster grin appearing on my face – lovely, swoopy and fast. So unexpected.

We were to meet a forth rider at Butlers Retreat, but due to alarm issues he didn’t show. Mountain biking in New Zealand never offers you the sight of buildings built as far back as 1543, which is when the building in the background, Queen Elizabeth’s Hunting Lodge was built. Love it !!

The view down over London is apparently amazing on a clear day, I guess I will have to come back !

It was a great ride, I took a load of photos – well I thought I did, some were still on my phone when I finished and some were not… We rode a broad mix of single track and forest trail and I was pleasantly surprised at how many forest users were out making use of this wonderful resource. Horse riders, runners and mountain bikes were everywhere.

We had a few stops, one for a broken chain, which were really appreciated by me, I have not ridden a mountain bike since February and my lack of fitness really showed. It was also apparent that my bike is too small for me and I will need to buy a larger frame. Yay 🙂 The frame is the same size as my beloved DMR back in NZ, but the geometry is not the same and it was just uncomfortable and I had really sore hips and back by the end of the ride.

There is a great mix of single track in the forest, grin inducing fast sections and twisty, turny root filled lovely bits mixed with loads of link-up trails and grassy sections.

Though it is largely flat I was still pretty worn when, after a couple of hours of riding, we finally stopped for tea and a bun at the High Beaches tea-shed. A well known, and very popular stop for all sorts of forest and forest road users.

Tom had to get more water so we headed over to the Epping Forest Centre car park which has a tap, and found a couple of blokes washing off their bikes. This contraption using a sealant gun to hold down the tap was just inspiring !

It was a shorter ride back to the streets where we started and I was definitely feeling it at the end. It was a most awesome ride and I cannot understand why I have not been riding up there for weeks. I will be back, but I am sure I will never find half those trails again. I really appreciated being shown around by Tony and Tom and couldn’t believe the stats that they produced after the ride. 23.4 miles in the forest for a first ride was not too bad at all !

I am pretty sure I earned the half a cold pizza I had for lunch!

I haven’t had a dirt tan for ages 🙂

Maybe not an epic in real terms, but it was an epicly fun ride.

Thanks Tony and Tom. I am looking forward to my next outing, and buying some proper riding shorts !

Rye Nature Reserve and Camber Castle.

Sunday 21 September 2014 – Rye, East Sussex – Part two.

Our Saturday in the lovely East Sussex village of Rye turned into a big day with too many things to see and do to fit it all onto one post, so in a very rare event I decided to split the day sort of in half and do two posts. Yesterday’s post had us looking around the village and the very old inn we were staying in and finished as we found a small cafe on the edge of town to stop in for lunch.

We had initially planned on walking out of town, along the edge of the River Rother down to the sea and then northwards across Camber Sands towards Dungeness and its charming power plant. However after visiting the information centre and seeing a map I wanted to visit Camber Castle which is on the south side of the river and in the middle of the Rye Nature Reserve. This also meant a walk down the river to the sea, with the bonus of a castle and a double bonus of no power station – so that is what we decided to do.

After crossing the river on the edge of town we found a narrow and twisting track through about a million nettle bushes that slightly more scenically took us down to the river, the second option was to walk by the roadside, so while this was a little stingy in parts, at least we were away from the traffic.

It did not last for long and we soon walking on the edge of the nature reserve and some farm land – and I could see the castle off in the distance, which kept me nice and excited.

Just past the village of Rye Harbour we found the first of a string of Martello Towers, these were built to protect the harbour during the Napoleonic Wars in 1809. This one was built on the edge of the sea, which is now, only 200 or so years later, almost a kilometre away… I liked the tower but was disappointed we were not allowed to go near it.

The walk from the village down by the river was really nice, if very bleak. I loved the clouds and the absence of trees or any life apart from birds.

This is real birder country and there was a hide on the edge of the marsh land that had half a dozen birders perched over their binoculars, looking out over the water.

On the edge of the beach are a couple of pillboxes left over from the war, a modern rendition of the Napoleonic Martello Towers.

There is also a long sea wall built that is constantly being extended to prevent the pebbly beach washing across the rover mouth – sealing off the river and the harbour forever.

I really enjoyed the walk down the beach towards Winchelsea and Hastings, and I took way more photos than the load that I have posted here. I really would have liked to have had my big camera with its wide angle to really capture the immensity of the scene, but then it would have taken all day and I wouldn’t have made it that far.

There is an old Royal Navy Lifeboat Institution shed on the beach and just before we reached it we followed one of the lovely old and slowly disintegrating groynes to the small path at the top. Which was a bit of a relief as walking on those pebbles for a couple of kilometres was hard work.

The lifeboat shed on the beach is used as a memorial to the seventeen members of a Rye lifeboat crew who all tragically perished in a storm as they went to rescue the crew of a stranded Latvian ship back in 1928. It was later discovered that the Latvian crew had already been rescued.

On that cheery note we soon turned inland and followed the path around the far edges of the ponds to find Camber Castle. I was really looking forward to seeing the castle as it is a really unusual design.

The castle was started in 1512 as a circular tower built to defend the harbour at Rye, it was extended in 1544 with four smaller circular towers built around the outside and linked by walls. It was the first of a series of castles built under King Henry VIII to defend the harbours in Rye Bay. Like the Martello Towers and Ypres Tower in Rye itself, the building of the castle was rendered pointless as it was abandoned in less than hundred years later as the shoreline moved too far away.

I took a few photos as we walked around the outside and was looking forward to going in for a look at this quite different style of castle. I was rudely shocked to find the castle is only open to tours at 2:00pm on the first Saturday of the month in the summer. What bullshit. I was a bit aggravated to say the least and may have said some bad words that reflected poorly on English Heritage….

I was so disappointed, as it is lovely. I really liked the wind and sea air damage to the stone walls, and I can see that the site is potentially unsafe, but nanny state rules gone mad again.

There were some more lovely squally rain clouds as we walked back towards Rye, and I could not help myself but take some more photos.

I think El got tired of waiting !

We crossed over a very tidal side river and were soon back in town, up the short steep road to the Mermaid Inn and sitting in the side outside with a well earned gin and tonic.

As we had had a very light lunch we decided to eat early and headed out just after six. We had seen a nice looking restaurant as we walked town earlier in the day and this was one was quite reasonably priced compared to most – still ‘west end’ prices though. Rye is very expensive ! We were lucky to get a seat as long as we were finished before 8:00 as it was fully booked out. We did have a great meal and a nice bottle of rose to go with it. Much better than last night!

We had a bit of a lie in on Sunday morning, followed by breakfast in the hotel – I didn’t eat as much as yesterday though ! After breakfast we packed up and checked out before heading back to the station. We had read earlier that the train had been replaced by a bus service to Ashford, we were not sure on how many buses were running and how many people were likely to be there so we took the cautious route and went early. Luckily.

The bus service was a cluster-disaster, buses didnt arrive, the station attendant had no idea what was going on. After almost an hour of waiting and people coming the other way arriving by taxi the station attendant came out to tell us the bus was half an hour away. It arrived as she walked back into the station…

From there it was an uneventful journey to Ashford, where we managed to catch the fast train into London and home.

It was another pretty awesome weekend away. We both loved Rye.

The old town of Rye.

Saturday 20 September 2014 – Rye, East Sussex – Part one…

September has turned into a bit of a busy month, something I am really pleased about as I had suspected that with work now in full swing I would get a bit tired and lazy and end up not doing too much at the weekends. However, this was a weekend away that El and I booked a few weeks ago, my birthday was on Wednesday and we decided we would celebrate it by going somewhere new, and for no reason other than it looked nice we picked the village of Rye, under two hours away by train on the south east coast.

I would like to say that we picked Rye as it was a coastal town worth investigating for a property, and factually speaking Rye was a coastal town – about 2000 years ago. Since then the shoreline has slowly moved away as the shallows around the entrance to the River Rother have silted up after bad storms in the 1200s and the town is now about two miles from the sea. Isn’t the earth amazing?

We met after work on Friday at St Pancras Station with the intention to get the fast train to Ashford where we would pick up another train that would take us to Rye. We had an hour to wait until the train we planned on getting left, but saw on the board that an earlier train was about to leave so we dashed down to the platform and jumped on the train – only to find it was the slowest of the slow Ashford trains, and it ran slowly as well. One of us was not happy. The train arrived late into Ashford, but with luck on our side the train to Rye was still in the station and we managed to jump just before it left, saving us another half an hour delay.

We arrived in Rye, slightly late, but in time to unpack and settle before the 8:30 reservation we had made in the hotel restaurant. It was dark when we arrived and there was a light fog settling in as well. The hotel was five minutes from the station and it was a little eerie walking up through the narrow streets surrounded by some quite old houses. One of the reasons we chose to stay in Rye is because it had a cool looking hotel – The Mermaid Inn, which we had chosen to stay in. The hotel has a very long – and quite chequered history, originally built in the 1100s it was rebuilt in 1420.

Our room was on the top floor, up some narrow and creaky stairs, in an attic space under a gabled roof. It was pretty lovely, the first thing I did was take a look out the window, then grabbed my freshly fixed camera and took a time exposure out of the window of the Tudor houses in the street. I was so excited about getting out and about tomorrow morning !

We had dinner in the hotel restaurant and while the food was good, it was extremely expensive, and sadly in our opinion not particularly good value. If I was paying that much in London I would have expected a lot more for the money. Service, ambiance and food.

The first thing I did when I woke up was to check out the window again to see if last night’s fog was still hanging around, and I was really pleased to see that it was. We decided we would take a brief walk around the village before breakfast to see what it looked like before too many people got up and before all the fog had lifted.

It was pretty magic outside, though the worst of the fog had gone before got out the door. The old part of the town of Rye sits on a hill overlooking the old harbour. There have been people living here since before Roman times, though most of the buildings are from the 1400’s onwards as the French destroyed the town in the late 1300s.

I knew there was an old fort – Ypres Tower, in the town and it didn’t take too long to find it, and of course we planned on visiting again later in the day – during opening hours. The fort was originally built in 1259 to defend against the constantly marauding French, in fact the name Rye comes from the French word, Rie – meaning sand bank.

The view from the canon ramparts was not that spectacular in the fog…

There was also some great doors and door signs!

I loved this one…

After a nice pre-feed walk we went back to the hotel for breakfast before starting out on our unplanned adventure for the day. We started with a quick tour around the inside of the Mermaid Inn. It is a glorious building, home for also sorts of people from ancient pirates to more recent actors and politicians (more pirates !).

Room 19 is supposed to be haunted, I just had a peak in the door, didn’t see anything. But I noticed the people who stayed there had left….

We decided to more thoroughly walk the village, we needed some cash and a map of the area, and ended up with both. Along with two pairs of boots for me and a small clock for El – we were not planning on shopping, honest ! We did go into the local, and quite cool second hand record shop -where we didn’t buy anything…

Nor did we buy anything from one of the two old school sweet shops.

At the end of one side of town is the Landgate, the last remaining old town gate from what was a fully walled town. The Landgate and the wall were started in the 1340s after a French invasion. To no avail as there was a further invasion in 1370 and the town was largely destroyed.

The village is really lovely, it is definitely a tourist destination as it has been so well preserved – so many of these buildings are listed and therefore protected by law. Thank goodness.

We headed back for a fascinating tour of Ypres Tower before stopping for lunch in a small cafe, just as the tourist crowds really started to arrive.

Wow, so far so good !! It was a pretty packed day, so I will make this my first two part blog post ever 🙂

A visit to Sarfend.

Sunday 14 September 2014 – Southend-on-Sea.

While El and I were away on the Isle of Wight last weekend we started discussing the possibility of buying a small holiday home somewhere. This conversation carried on during the week and we talked about what we would want from a holiday place. It seems that in a perfect world we would be able to buy somewhere near St Ives in Cornwall, but that is just way to far away to be practical right now, but is definitely a future consideration.

Much as I am very happy living with El in her house I had become fairly used to living alone and occasionally feel the need to escape to my own pad, with my own things and just chill out. When I moved in after I returned from NZ in July it was intended that once I was working I would look for my own flat and move out. Living together has not raised any alerts and we have pretty much agreed that it would be silly for me to spend 1500-1700 pounds a month renting a flat I would only stay in half the time. This basically means I have some money to invest. So a buying a cheap flat or house somewhere on the coast but near enough to London so we could easily and cheaply visit at the weekends, or I could commute to and from on occasion, seems like a sensible thing to do.

We just need to find somewhere we like. Southend-on-Sea is not going to be one of those places, but it is close by and well worth checking out as it will give us some idea of what is out there, and what seaside towns near to London can be like.

After Steve and I did our Leigh-on-Sea to Southend photo walk back in April I had been thinking about doing the final leg of the walk from Southend to Shoeburyness, so, as it was a nice day, El and decided to make the trip in reverse. We caught a train into Liverpool St, walked over to Fenchurch St Station and caught the train out to Shoeburyness. Shoeburyness was interesting, the tide was out, seemingly almost as far as France, and we could see kite surfers way out on the horizon, they were so far out that at first I wondered what they were – and you cannot even see them in this photo taken on my phone. It was a nice enough place, there were some very nice apartments near the sea, but that tide is just too much for me.

There was a short section of coast with the ubiquitous beach huts on it before we hit a long section of much nicer beach that was closed to the public as it was/is an MOD testing site, there were numerous signs warning of unexploded shells and other ordinance possibly lying around. Sadly this section of coast was quite long…

I did love this sign – ‘deep water’ !!! – You can barely see the water.

It took us about thirty minutes to walk to the outskirts of Southend, and as soon as the MOD area was over, the beach huts appeared. Quite a number of them had people gathered inside and out and there was a bit of a part time sea side community going on. Not my thing, but nice to see people getting out and about, even though the view of the estuary to the power station was not the most attractive.

I liked this end of Southend, there are some quite nice houses, and as there is no entertainment at this end of the beach it was all very quiet. You can see Southend Pier in the background, the longest in the world apparently – mainly because the sea goes out so far !

After about an hour and a half of walking we arrived in Southend central, and like before I knew it was just not my place, far too busy for me. We walked through town, heading for the Westcliff area that I wanted to have a look at. We stopped at the famous Rossi’s ice cream shop, a long standing feature of Southend, and one my mum asked me about after she read my blog post from back in April. She used to visit here when she was young and was interested to see if it was still here. The ice cream was very nice too, as I believe it was in my mum’s day.

After Rossi’s it was time to go so wandered up through Westcliff to the station and headed back home.

Did I learn anything about buying property on the coast, not really. But I did learn that buying somewhere near the sea, means I want to hear the waves. So that rules out this section of coast!