Every road sign seems to point to a league town around here – Wigan, St Helens, Huddersfield, Bradford, Leeds, etc. But I’ve managed to avoid them all, although it’s taken some torturous routing. I’ve lost count of the number of times I need to get the map out during the day, to work out which way to go, to avoid the busy roads, but still keep moving in the right direction. Thankfully the signage is usually good, the road grading system works well, and excellent high quality maps are available. Except of course I didn’t want to buy the enormous highly detailed map, and so the one I have is sometimes just a touch lacking in detail. Such a change from most of the other bike touring I’ve done, where I would follow one road for weeks, with few, if any intersections.
From Bath, I headed west to Bristol on the “Bristol and Bath Railway Path”, the first path that started the Sustrans movement, back in 1979. Where I come from there are few railways, but here they are everywhere. But what you don’t at first realise is that there used to be far more, before Beeching’s Axe fell. So even though there are many, many lines, in use by millions of people, there are also huge numbers of disused lines, abandoned stations, etc. Some of this land has been reused, for housing, etc., some of it is just abandoned, but large parts have been turned into walking and cycling tracks. It’s all very pleasant riding.
One strange thing along the way though: The line was ripped up years ago, then later Sustrans came along, and turned it into a cycling track. But now some anorak-wearers want to revive a steam railway, and have been relaying track, alongside the bike path, at a cost of £100,000 per mile. Classic.
I decided not to stop in Bristol, instead pushing on over the the Severn, and very briefly into Wales. But I got out of there quickly, don’t worry. Ended up staying in a little village, where Mine Host was down to his last week running the place, and was about to retire to Portugal. A very British thing to do, to retire to Spain or Portugal. But he was OK, he speaks some Portugese, and has Portugese friends – he’s not looking to join another British enclave.
Finally turning north was a relief, because it meant the winds were behind me, and I’ve made steady progress north, now getting to Preston. I should be past the worst of the industrial sprawl now. It’s amazing how many little villages there are, all so close together, with freshly plowed fields between them. Even with the large industrial towns, I can still find little villages, with pretty much anything rating a dot on the map having at least a pub.
The pubs are in decline though, 40 close per week. I’ve wondered about that in the past, because I haven’t seen a lot of evidence for it, but today especially I noticed large numbers of boarded up places, and many others with signs saying “For Lease.” One was only £200/week, would be a reasonable price to pay to live there. It’s obvious why some are closed though, large carparks, with no surrounding houses – people just don’t drink and drive as much any more.
I’ve been looking at the maps, trying to work out my route north. I think I’ll go through the Lake District, it’s years since I was there. I’ve got a day in hand, so I should be able to get to Dundee (my final cycling destination) with time to spare.
