Category Archives: around home

around home, bikes, family, friends, London, MTB, national park, UK

Walks, Christmas, a ride & New Year’s

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I’m mildly disturbed that all my bags are packed for a month long trip & my bike is firmly in the garden shed. If the small amount of snow that has fallen today, & whatever falls tonight, doesn’t bring London’s public transport to a standstill before noon I’ll be back at Heathrow & then on to Calgary. It seems ages since I’ve been on a train or the tube – so it’s more than two weeks since I did my last bit of walking around London. That particular time I met up with my NZ cousin Chris & we followed the walking tour from Soho down to Trafalgar Square. Unlike in NYC, the origin of the name Soho is an old hunting cry – Soho Square was once part of a royal hunting ground.This walk wound around quite a bit & went down lots of small old alleys that we would have missed otherwise. Of relevance to NZ was a house that the botanist Joseph Banks used to live in & of most interest to me was the site of the Broad Street pump. In 1854, 37 of the 49 occupants of the street died of cholera & Dr John Snow was the one who worked out that the common factor was the water pump that they drunk from. The handle was removed & the death rate fell immediately – this work was perhaps one of the most important in the study of disease. Walking through Chinatown brought on a very interesting discussion with Chris on their family being in, & then evacuated from, Beijing in 1989 amongst the Tienanmen Square chaos. It wasn’t long before we were at NZ House, Pall Mall & then Trafalgar Square, where Chris left me & I went on up to Regent’s Park.

There was still a fair amount of snow & ice lying around on this particular Sunday, so it was a bit of a careful climb to the top of Primrose Hill. But as it was another nice crisp clear day, it was well worth it – good views of the city with London Zoo & Regent’s Park in the foreground – & some clowns playing touch in the snow. Crossing over Regent’s Canal & past the zoo I seemed to walk around most of Regent’s Park. With all the snow & frozen lakes it was quite beautiful & there were a surprisingly large number of people out & about.

I think it was the Tuesday before Christmas that I popped out to Hammersmith to take a quick look at a small photographic exhibition of Kenyan wildlife. The photos were quite good & mostly scenes at Nakuru & the Mara – so it was nice to see them. However, I wasn’t that enamoured with them to shell out nearly three hundred pounds for each small print. Up the Piccadilly line to drop off a couple of presents for Andrew & Shelley’s girls & then I was off to check out the Christmas Fair in Hyde Park. With all the German stalls, great smelling food & amusements it was a very Christmasy experience.

Thankfully it didn’t snow on Christmas Eve, so the drive down to Trish’s sister’s house just north of Dover was very easy. Jan cooked up a storm & it was a great day spent with family. As it was a gorgeous day I couldn’t help but go for an explore – so a short drive later I was at the top of the famous cliffs. It was a little strange seeing eight ferries sitting in the port doing nothing. But much more impressive was the sunset – I stuck around a good half hour to see it go all the way down. Back home very early on Boxing Day; later that day we went around to Trish’s brother’s for another great dinner.

After a couple days relaxing & getting the bike ready, I was off driving to Taunton to stay with John & Anna the night before what promised to be a very wintery ride on Exmoor on Wednesday. Since I last saw them, the Lambert family has doubled in size with the arrival of twin girls three months ago & their house has much more than doubled in size with the move from an apartment to a two-storey house. It was great to see John & Anna again & meet the girls – a little sick, but thankfully they seem to sleep well (one night is hardly a representative sample, but I was impressed). With a leisurely two breakfasts & getting organised, John & I drove an hour through very close fog to Withymoor – where we eventually met up with four others. Well wrapped up against the cold (we would have been lucky if it got to three degrees Celsius), mud & rain we set off through the village trying to follow a route that Dave had plotted on his Garmin GPS. Mr Garmin was to provide us with much amusement in the rain as he sent us all around the National Park on the most unlikely trails (or non-trails). A nice gentle & reasonable climb to start before we got off the road & on to the grass & tracks – with all the rain the day before, we were quickly soaked by all the standing water.

We had some good fun, but thankfully gentle, & slippery downhills.

In all we were out about three or so hours & I had a complete blast – it was at least six weeks since I had been on my bike & therefore six weeks since I did my shoulder, I was very pleased with how it stood up to the ride.

Unfortunately, by the time we got to the pub they had finished serving lunch. Back to John & Anna’s for a much needed bike, clothes & body clean; a quick dinner then it was driving through the night & rain to get back to Andrew & Shelley’s before they all went to bed. I’m always surprised at how well I manage to sleep on the floor of their lounge.

New Year’s Eve – spent a delightful four or five hours babysitting (two year old) Vittoria – reading books, pretend cooking, chasing her around the house & (the best game of all) pretending to be asleep. After Andrew & Shelley returned I was rather worn out – mostly from babysitting, but perhaps a little for the driving & riding the previous two days. A quick escape for another exploratory walk – this time to the rather delightful little centre of Pinner. We were joined for a quiet New Year’s Eve by a friend of the Patricks & we enjoyed a good meal, a strange game of Settlers (never seen so many long roads with four people playing), slight excitement when the new year ticked over, more excitement when Andrew touched the cork on the champagne & it went flying & champagne went all over Shelley & the Settlers set.

New Year’s Day was a gorgeous one, if very chilly – and also Andrew’s birthday. The six of us went out for a walk around a rather frozen in part lake & Vittoria amused us all by skating on the ice in her wellies whilst hanging on to the safety net of Dad’s hand. Lazy afternoon & then I babysat the girls again while Andrew & Shelley escaped for a birthday dinner. A nice cross London drive after they returned & I was back in Sidcup by eleven, ready for a sleep in my own bed & facing another drive – this time north. Trish & I spent the weekend staying with another of cousin of Mum’s – very pleasant weekend it was too. A little bike riding around the village, dropped in on my great-uncle Alan (who for almost ninety, is doing remarkably well living on his own & looking after himself). For dinner we met yet another cousin of Mum’s (three cousins, but no brothers or sisters present) & also my second cousin, Catherine & her boyfriend, Chris. Catherine & Chris have recently been to NZ & Australia, so it was great to hear their stories. That’s about it really for the last few weeks – the last few days have been spent recovering from the week before & mostly preparing for Canada.

around home, family, history, London, UK

Walking around London when there’s agreeable weather

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It’s coming up three weeks since I returned to London & I’ve been plenty busy exploring London & being strangely domesticated. As Trish (a cousin of Mum’s) broke her leg the day after I left for Kenya & is now housebound I’ve been doing a lot of cooking, cleaning, shopping & running of errands. In amongst that I tend to run in to London for a day when it is fine (usually manage three days a week of suitable weather) & continue with the walking tours – I’ve now completed nineteen of the thirty in the book. I’m thoroughly enjoying exploring London & discovering, both obscure & well-known bits of, its history. My London geography is slowly improving & I am often surprised at how close many things are to each other. Heading in to the city for the day is also a great excuse to catch up with friends & family for a drink or a meal or both.

The first day of walking since returning, I strung three walks together from Waterloo. The first around Lambeth & Southbank was around an area I was already familiar with, but new sights for me were Lambeth Palace (the palace of the Archbishops of Canterbury) & Archbishop’s Park.

Since I was last on the Southbank, a German Christmas market had sprung out of somewhere & was selling all sorts of traditional wares & food – a reminder that the festive season was pretty close, something that wasn’t all that apparent in Kenya. I was pretty thrilled to pop in to Somerset House & see that a small ice rink had been made in the courtyard – I have since seen quite a few others, including one in the (former) moat at the Tower of London.

The second walk had me crossing back over the Thames to Bankside & Southwark on Blackfriars Bridge – next to Blackfriars Bridge you can still see the large piers that formed the foundation for the first railway bridge over the Thames. Soon I was in the area that was previously filled with theatres & bear-baiting pits – the rebuilt Globe Theatre being the only one still around. I was surprised to see the HMS Belfast has had a camouflage painting since I last saw it & pleased to see that Tower Bridge (still one of my favourite London sights) is in the process of getting a fresh lick of paint. My last walk that day was around the City of London & was mercifully short – as there is so much to see in quite a small area – but great fun going through all the little alleyways. Highlights for me were: Lloyd’s, the Bank of England, Wren’s St Mary-le-Bow Church (you were considered a true Londoner if you were born within earshot of its bells – that were damaged in WWII), and Wren’s Monument – a monument to the Great Fire.

As Thursday last week turned out to be a stunner, I took the opportunity to venture a little further out of the city towards Highgate & Hampstead. Despite the cold, it was pretty easy to keep warm as this turned out to be one of the hilliest walks I’ve done around London. Starting out, it wasn’t long before I was walking around Highgate Cemetery – I couldn’t believe how sprawling & overgrown it was. The most famous resident here is Karl Marx.

At the top of Highgate Hill, was the first of many great views of the city for the day. Steeply descending from Highgate, I was soon rambling across Hampstead Heath – which is over three hundred hectares of quite-wild-in-parts grass, woods & scrub. I stopped & had my lunch in the sun outside Kenwood House & was quite pleased with the art collection inside.

Getting my shoes & the cuffs of my jeans nice & wet & dirty & making my way out of the heath & I was in Hampstead. Hampstead all of a sudden found itself a popular spa resort in the early 1700s, so there were many watery names around the village. Famous former-residents include Constable, Keats, & Robert Louis Stevenson. Near the end of the walk there was a delightful little local museum, which was also a welcome escape from the frigid late afternoon. I managed to get my weary legs home somehow.

It’s surprising how many times I’ve been asked in the last few weeks if I am working yet or looking for a job. Somewhere in amongst the walking & sightseeing, I’ve started to think about looking for one. That basically means that I got around to starting to update my CV, emailed some referees, made a Job Hunting folder on Firefox & filled it with useful sites & then got distracted. I’m in no rush as going away for four weeks in January/February is a whole block I am going to be unavailable. Having said that, I think those four weeks will be quite a drain on my remaining finances & returning to the UK I will have to begin the hunt in earnest.

Friday the eleventh saw me head in to check out the Covent Garden Christmas market – which was disappointing – & then to continue my intermittent gazing at art at the National Gallery. The gallery is quite manageable if you only try to do a little bit at a time – I think I would go mad if I tried to do it all at once. I’m now half way through the collection, but definitely enjoyed the works I saw on my first visit more. I managed to get out to Rayner’s Lane to see the Patricks before it got dark (i.e. before half past four) – always great to catch up with Andrew, Shelley & the girls – even if I did get thoroughly confused trying to learn how to play Knights & Cities.

Over the last weekend the weather took a little bit of a turn for the colder. I was getting quite comfortable with high in the mid-high single digits; now I’m getting used to highs of zero to low-single digits. Still, so long as it’s not windy or raining & one is well wrapped up the walking has been more than pleasant. On Monday’s Islington & Clerkenwell walks I was particularly interested in the New River. It wasn’t really a river at all, but for almost four hundred years this man made channel brought London’s potable water supply from springs about thirty miles north in Hertfordshire. Now of course, it has been superseded by something a bit more modern &, being the geek that I am, was fascinated by details of the new ring main that is twice as far under London than the most of the Underground & is a little like the M25 – but it’s for drinking water. Walking around Highbury Fields was quite nice too – it was here in 1666 after the Great Fire that one diarist saw “200000 people of all ranks and degrees dispersed and and lying along by their heapes of what they could save from the fire, deploring their losses, and though ready to perish for hunger and destitution, yet not asking one penny for relief”. On a less sobering note, I also stumbled across Arsenal’s rather large Emirates Stadium. Near the end of the Clerkenwell there was a flurry of interesting sights – the Smithfield Meat Market (on this site William Wallace was hung, drawn & quartered after being dragged behind a horse from the city; also more than two hundred were burned alive under Queen Mary’s reign – charm the paint off walls, these guys [sorry, Jason Statham quote]), the oldest church in London – St Bartholomew-the-Great (coincidentally, St Bart’s day is the same as my birthday) & where the St John’s Ambulance was launched in 1877.

Before meeting (NZ) cousin Chris in the City on Tuesday it was another good chance to take advantage of the sun & string a few more walks together. These were a little bit closer to the West End – starting with the Notting Hill walk, I then continued on from Bayswater to Belgravia (through Knightsbridge) & finally Marylebone. There was of course a lot of interesting things for sale on Portobello Rd (even if it was only Tuesday); generally, Notting Hill was a lot of nice houses – although it was interesting to learn that there used to be a racecourse around the top of Notting Hill & the top of the hill was used as a natural grandstand – it didn’t last too long as the jockeys refused to ride on it as the ground was so heavy as to be dangerous. I also found one of those delightful book shops near the Holland Park tube – the one where you want to leave with cases of books. From Bayswater it was through Kensington Park (lunch by the Round Pond was quite cold – I resolved to start wearing my Icebreaker leggings, jeans just weren’t cutting it) to the museum district & Knightsbridge before trooping around the quite fancy area of Belgravia – a lot of embassies & consulates. Marylebone is just north of Oxford Street (I never really enjoy the crowds of shoppers here) & once was one of the closest villages to central London – it of course, has long since been swallowed up. This a very pleasant walk with lots of nice squares; the biggest find on this walk was the Wallace Collection – the art collection of several successive Marquises of Hertford. As I walked past, I resolved to return & see it – as it turns out after popping out from the cute shopping street of St Christopher’s Place (nice lights) on to Oxford St, & scooting around Harley St I had plenty of time to pop in to the collection for an hour or so before heading off to meet Chris.

So Hertford House didn’t look overly big for a grand old house & wandering around the ground floor confirmed this. I particularly enjoyed of pieces on Venice by Canoletto in the Dining Room & then in the Back State Room the nature & hunt paintings by Oudry were particularly cool – there plenty of pheasants in these ones, & for a change they weren’t all dead. As it turns out one of the larger rooms downstairs was closed for refurbishment, so when I went upstairs after admiring many miniatures, paintings & ornaments from the sixteenth century, I was blown away by the size of the place – especially the aptly named Great Gallery. After finishing up & having a cursory glance around the shop, I was surprised to find a huge armoury – mostly European, but a bit from India, Persia, Japan & Arabia. The size of it was staggering & I only had enough time for a quick whizz through – I later found out its one of the, if not the, best armoury in Britain. That ended that very nice hour or so – it’s always cool to stumble upon something like that completely unexpected – I had no idea that I would be seeing works by Rubens, Rembrandt, Titian & Gainsborough – to name a few. That stumbling across such delights is one of the things I love about wandering around & exploring London. Always great to catch up with Chris & share a few drinks & a meal (even if the city was packed due to the holiday season).

Wednesday was a very domestic day with shopping & various errands – but made much more exciting by the first snow of the winter. It snowed for a good few hours, but was never enough to settle in more than a few small places. Consequently, I was well prepared for the possibility of snow on Thursday’s walks – the forecast was favourable for the day. As I had an appointment a little west of the city, I took the opportunity to head out & explore around the Thames & Richmond & then Barnes to Putney & Fulham. The Richmond walk was quite a long one & there was alternating patches of (comparatively) brilliant sunshine & cloudy gloom.

I saw what little was left of Richmond Palace – where Edward III, Henry VII & Elizabeth I all died. Climbing up away from the river towards Richmond Park (which has deer roaming free) it was possible to get some nice views of the surrounding area.

The best was from King Henry VIII’s mound (the highest point in the park & so called because he apparently watched from here for the flare from the Tower of London confirming that Anne Boelyn had got the chop – there is a good Snatch quote that goes with that turn of phrase, but it’s probably not appropriate) & was an unobstructed view of St Paul’s ten miles away. It’s a great view as St Paul’s looks as though it is standing alone in the city – most of the view is framed by an avenue of trees that prevents you seeing much else. My little camera doesn’t give nearly as good as image as the monocular on the mound, but you get the idea (if you squint).

Descending through the park, I was soon back by the river & the sun popped out to give me this picture, for the Oamaru Pheasants, of the Royal Star & Garter (top right, & just like the Oamaru one, I’ve never been inside).

Just as I was getting back in to the centre of Richmond a massive cloud came over & dropped snow on me for ten of fifteen minutes before I caught a bus to Barnes Bridge.

Barnes Bridge is passed during the last stage of the famous University Boat Race & as I made my way down to Putney Bridge (where the race starts) I was to see a lot of boat houses & boats. I was curious to find out what the flashing blue lights were there for as I approached Putney. It turned out that the fire brigade was attempting to winch a VW Golf out of the incoming Thames – some clown had parked a little to close to the edge. So that provided a bit of a distraction for a while – they eventually got it out, but I’m not certain if it was too damaged to be written off. The cabin may be a little wet, but the engine & electrics hardly got flooded (the alarm went off as the tow-rope was connected).

Chatting to another bystander, I found that another car was not so lucky – parked a bit further down the Thames at the top of a boat ramp, that BMW had been carried off to the depths of the river. Crossing the river I quickly checked out Fulham Palace (the traditional summer residence of the Bishops of London that has only in the last thirty-five years been given up by the bishops). Another big old house, but it had a nice walled garden that was far removed from the city & had a few neat moving sculptures. After my appointment in Putney it was off to Earl’s Court to meet a university classmate for another worthwhile catch up. The snow started again on the train from Charing Cross & was not to let up for the rest of the night.

Consequently, when I eventually got up this morning there was a good two inches of snow everywhere – quite exciting for someone who has spent most of their life living in a decidedly temperate climate. When I made it out to get some bread & post more of Trish’s Christmas cards, it was quite pleasant (i.e. above freezing point, just) & these are a few of the photos I snapped around the neighbourhood.

around home, London, UK

Kew to Hammersmith walk & off to Kenya

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A quick note as I while away the time until the trip to Heathrow & then on to three weeks in Kenya. It’s definitely been a bit cooler this week & I’ve spent quite a bit of time working on my bike (bled the front brakes – they weren’t done properly by the shop in Pennsylvania – refitted the serviced fork, cleaned the chain & packed it up for a new continent), reading (of course), helped with a bit of yard work at cousin Ray’s & there have been a couple of farewells for good school friends.

On Wednesday I eventually made it Kew for another walk, this time down to Hammersmith. This walk was quite long & I got rained on for the first time in a long time. As it was far (relatively) removed from the centre of the city, the wasn’t quite as much fascinating history to read about. But most of the walk followed the Thames & that was quite scenic & nice to be away from the traffic.

The walk started off near the famous gardens that George III’s mother, Princess Augusta, founded in 1759. I think I will save my £12 for a warmer day as I could probably have spent a good few hours in the gardens alone. On the other side of the river I found the London Steam museum, which is another to add to the rainy-day list of things to do. Walking down the river, it was curious to note the incoming tide going the wrong way up the river & watch it get higher & higher (it was much better looking than when I walked over in the same place last week at low tide). As always, the houses were really quite old – but more unusually, they had been built right next to a river that often floods. Consequently there were a few quaint little flood protection measures. These ranged from front walls that you had no gates, so you had to go up & down steps to get in to the tiny front yards, to slots in all window & door frames to place barriers and really small little front doors that had there base a fair way off the ground.

After walking past numerous pubs, through some nice gardens, a really odd alley to St Nicolas’s Church (which had a deserted & extensive graveyard – quite sombre on what was a grey day, it started raining shortly after) I made it down to Chiswick Mall. This tiny little part of London is bordered on one side by the Thames and on the other by a large arterial road & it feels pretty secluded. The odd thing was it right next to the river & I must have been there right at high tide, as the road was flooded. This seemed to be a common occurrence as there signs up warning of this invasion of water around the nice little gardens that the houses had on the opposite side of the road. I was quite bemused until I couldn’t walk any further & had to backtrack & go around in a big loop – of course, by the time I got back to near where I had turned around the tide had gone out enough to make the footpath passable. Never mind, as I discovered the Fuller’s (London Pride) brewery & that wonder fermenting smell chased me down the river on the wind for the next twenty minutes. From there, there was not too much of note, save watching all the rowers out on the Thames training (I passed the halfway point of that famous rowing race).

Apparently, the ABs are playing Wales now & it’s on BBC – so I’ll go see how much of that I can see before leaving for Heathrow & more adventures & (hopefully good) riding in Kenya (three weeks).

around home, London, UK

A month around London

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Crikey, it’s four weeks since I returned from Paris – so a little update is due I suppose. The days have got shorter, summer time has finished, there are lots of crunchy leaves to walk through & over, the weather is cooler (it got horribly cold for a day or two, but that turned out to be an aberration – October has been quite pleasant) & I have spent a lot of time tripping around London, walking tours, a weekend near & in Oxford (with a MTB ride thrown in), visiting friends & family, reading, watching the DVDs that turned up of The Big Bang Theory Season 2, sorting out insurance & slowly preparing for next week’s trip to Kenya. After that brief summary, here are a few more details. of the highlights.

About the time I was getting over my cold, Trish, a friend of hers & I went for a day trip in to Kent to visit Hever Castle. It was a particularly bleak day, thankfully the rain was quite light. Due to the weather we spent quite a bit of time in the castle, which was a good thing as it was really well presented as a museum. As it was the childhood home of Anne Boelyn, there was a lot of Henry VIII history there & I was able to brush up my knowledge of that period. More recently, the castle was owned by branch of the Astor family (as in Wardolf Astoria) that returned to England over a century ago. It’s always neat walking on a drawbridge over a full moat. The garden, which we went around in quick fashion, was also very impressive – one of the Astors had brought a lot of Roman & Italian sculptures back (they were huge & it must have cost a bundle) – & the numerous roses were still out.

The first Friday I was back in town, I went out to Earls Court for the cycle show. Basically it was an excuse to go & stare at bikes – & there was plenty of it. Of course everyone was exhibiting their 2010 wares & there was a lot to drool over – mountain-bikes, single speeds, uber cool fixies, road & track bikes, city bikes, regressive bicycles, touring bikes & a lot of retro styled cruisers (not the beach-type cruisers that were everywhere in San Diego. Thankfully I kept my wallet in my pocket, as I could have been significantly down on pounds;

it was also great to see a couple of NZ companies exhibiting – Ground Effect & Two-Stage. The highlights of the day were the couch interviews with various cycling personalities – of note Alberto Contador

& the Atherton siblings (Lee, Dan & Rachel), the world triathlon champ Alistair Brownlee & an Olympic gold medallist from Britain’s 2008 track team. There was also some diverting BMX dislplays.

Most weeks have two or three trips in to London (it’s most economical to buy a travelcard for the day, so I try to combine a few things at once). Amongst a lot of walking around I’ve managed to catch up for a meal or a drink NZ cousins, Palmy friends, a couple of schoolmates, family friends, a steel mill mate & some English riding mates. It’s surprising just how many people are around. Trish had a previously-unused book of London walking tours kicking around; so whenever the weather is agreeable & I’m in town I’ve trundled off finding out more of small areas of this most fascinating city. The first I did was from Westminster through all the central parks & in to Kensington – this was quite a long walk, but a gorgeous day (the squirrels were out in force – squirrelling away stores, funnily up) & as I wandered past Wellington Arch, I couldn’t help taking a photo as Trish & I had just finished watching the Sharpe series (like Hornblower, but in the army during the Napoleonic Wars).

The most amusing fact of the day was an elephant kept by James I in St James’s Park used to drink a gallon of wine daily.

There were plenty of birds & such like around the lakes & ponds (including one that thought I would like a little present).

As the walk ended in Kensington, I did the Kensington loop – this of course had a lot more houses in it (& quite nice one they were too); of note was John Stuart Mill’s (of his own free will, on half a pint of shandy was particularly ill). On the Chelsea walk, it was another gorgeous day & I spent a bit of time around the Royal Hospital & saw a few Chelsea Pensioners.

Due to a big marquee going up (on the site where they have the Chelsea flower show) I had a to do a big loop around, through a park & then found I couldn’t get out. So a lot of back tracking later I was back beside the Thames & walking past the former houses of Wilde, Whistler (whose mother I had seen not two weeks before, & this is where she sat for the painting), Sargent, Lloyd George, Gaskell (Cranford). Curious fact for that walk was the main street of Chelsea used to be Old Church Street, as King’s Road only became open to the public in 1830 – previously it was for royal use only on their way to various country retreats). Beer with Tori & Greg near Victoria after that & then a wonderful (“amazing”, if you’ll allow it) Moroccan dinner with Amy (flatted next door in Union St) in South Kensington.

On the day I was to meet my Pheasant cousins in the city, I did a couple of city walks (makes sense really). The first was around Fleet Street & St Paul’s; before I got to the Old Bailey I stumbled upon an exhibition of Royal Mail artists – there were a lot of landscapes & with all the pheasants in some of the pieces, it was delightful. Here is the best photo I could get of Old Bailey – without too much effort that is.

Other highlights include the Black Friar & learning a bit of its history (there used to be a monastery there until it was dissolved); Stationer’s Hall – pretty much the home of printing & publishing in Britain; Dr Johnson’s house (couldn’t get Robbie Coltrane out of my mind) & hangouts (close to Hind Court). Great to catch up with & here travels stories from Chris, Sasha & Blair.

Somewhere in all this I took myself & my bike off to Wallingford for a couple of nights to visit & ride with a couple of English guys I had met in NZ a couple of years prior & then seen again in Somerset last year. I was great to be around real bikes & real MTB mad mates. The Saturday morning ride started late after a big cooked breakfast, but it was still quite cool when we headed out. Off on to bridleways and I quickly found how much bike-fitness (& probably altogether-fitness) I had lost since California in June as we were up a few rather gentle hills. Magically it didn’t rain for the whole ride & we got over thirty miles in with some pleasing downhills, with out too much more hard work. On the Sunday Richard took me the twenty minutes up to Oxford & dropped me off at Rob’s flat – Rob is a mate from NZ Steel, who started at the other end of the process a year after me. While his girlfriend was off studying at the library (Cat is doing her Masters – the reason for their stay in Oxford), Rob & I strolled around Oxford looking at old buildings, colleges, rowers on the Thames, the inside of too many pubs that didn’t have tables available for lunch & so on. Back on the train to Paddington, & home late Sunday night.

Last Wednesday Trish & I were well too cultured for our own good & hopped on the train & had dinner on South Embankment before heading off to the Royal Festival Hall to hear the London Symphony Orchestra. There was short piece from Bizet (The Black Gondola) to start & then Beethoven’s third piano concerto & Mendelssohn’s third (Scottish) symphony. They were not particularly well known (at least that’s what Trish said, so what chance did I stand?), but it was an amazing performance (I have never seen such long & sustained applause) & even though I’m not all that musical, it was enthralling. We had seats above & slightly in front of the orchestra & they provided a good view of the instruments, the facial expressions & fingering of the players, & the conductor (I think if the orchestra was not there & the conductor performed in an identical way with as much intensity, I would have been quite amused for two hours). On the way back to Waterloo, our large dinners had gone down a bit, so we stopped for hot drinks (I’m still resisting coffee, but after a horrible hot chocolate that may become harder) & dessert – the restaurant was in the arches under the railway, so from the symphony we were now listening to trains rumbling overhead – not an unpleasant sound actually.

Thursday dawned very nicely, so I was off in to town & did a great walk from Warwick Avenue to Little Venice, down Regent’s Canal, a slight detour past Lord’s, through Camden Lock, past St Pancras & into Islington. Plenty of interesting canal boats cruising up & down the canal & even more permanently moored; with all the leaves turning various shades of red & gold, it was a beautiful walk.

Walking through Regent’s Park I passed the London Zoo aviary & the hyenas were on the other side of the canal; after the brilliant San Diego zoo, it would take quite a bit for me to go to London Zoo as apparently it’s not as good. The history of these industrial highways between the factories of Birmingham & the dock of London was fascinating & in many places you could see where the iron work of bridges & so forth had been worn by the tow ropes over many years (“Oh, the tension!”). In a couple of places the canal disappeared in to a tunnel & the horses would have been unhitched & walked over the top while the bargemen lay on their back atop the barges & “walked” on the roof of the tunnel to propel the vessels through it. In other places main railway lines & tube line passed overhead & unseen rivers were deep below the canal. Near some of the overbridges, there were little ramps in to the canal where startled horses were rescued from the canal when they jumped in in fright of new-fangled steam engines passing overhead. Useless fact of the day was the concourse of St Pancras station is six metres above the ground so that it is level with the railway after it has passed over the canal.

I met Louis & Emma (they came down for the weekend from Ipswich) at the London Eye last Saturday & we slowly wandered out to Waterloo to get the train to Twickenham. The full train emptied of Kiwis & Aussies at Twickenham & they started marching off towards the Stoop (the smaller ground & home of Harlequins). We were off to my first live league in a few years & the second game of the Four Nations series; it was easy to see why this game was down in London – rather than the league heartland of the North – there was gold & green and black shirts everywhere. Just before the game & I bumped in to a school mate, Josh, & was able to find him & Kelly again at half time. Louis managed to get us pretty good seats, they were on the north goal-line looking across to the only big-screen in the ground. It was great game with plenty of massive hits, some good tries & we were unlucky to draw in the last two minutes. A win was so close & that would have been quite an achievement after the bruising defence the Kiwis pulled of for the first quarter & the ridiculously high penalty count.

I ventured in to new territory on Tuesday near The Oval and came away with three holes in my arms, nine malaria pills & £150 poorer. Still, better than getting sick with some horrible disease. After my packed lunch (I was organised for once) & a stroll in Kennington Park (I did well to resist running through the massive piles of leaves the council workers had make), I was heading out to Kew Gardens when I got a message from Kelly so I diverted to Acton Town for a second lunch & a big catch up; I especially enjoyed tales of their recent van tour of Europe in “Munter” – a horribly purple, but inconspicuous, Leyland DAF van. Once I was in Acton, I realised it was really pretty close to Kew; so on leaving Kelly & Josh I strolled down to the Thames & took a little look around Kew before it got dark. The Public Record Office is also in Kew so I popped in as it was late night Tuesday & Mum occasionally asks me to do a little family history research; the place is huge & full of people beavering away finding ancestors & there was a cool little museum all about record keeping & I was pleased to see the two Domesday Books.

Two days ago I made it to St Pancras just in time to see most of a Eurostar empty before (even when I rode it, I had no idea there were so many passengers on it) easily recognising Megan – despite it having been ten years (we think) since we last saw each other. The fact that she & Alex both had fully loaded touring bikes was also a bit of a give away. Megan is the daughter of a good friend of my mother’s, & most times we visited Mum’s family in Sydney we would make the very long drive down to rice-country in south NSW & visit the Dunns. Megan & Alex have just done five months & over ten-thousand kilometres of cycle touring in Japan, Britain & Europe. I was somewhat jealous, but I don’t think I would ever be able to handle that much ride roading, slick tyres, fully rigid & loaded bikes. They were in London for two & one days respectively before flying out to Australia & Canada. In another of the series of coincidences Megan is going on to NZ with her mother in a couple of weeks to visit my family & do a bit of hiking before returning to Canada where she & Alex live very close to where Adele & I are going in January. After negotiating the tube & trains back to Sidcup, we made use of what daylight remained cleaning, dismantling & packing the bikes in to Tardis’s (the same bike bag I use for my travels, but they were in much better condition & the adjustable shoulder strap of the new version looked quite good) . It was great to hear various touring stories & have bikes to tinker with & scratch knuckles undoing tight bolts, get covered in grease & brake dust (just another thing not to miss of vee &, would you believe, cantilever brakes). Trish cooked up a storm & heroically volunteered for the drive to Gatwick at half-past four the next morning. After being the geeks we are & having a Trivial Pursuit quiz, there wasn’t much time for sleep before we were all up again & off to the airport – I was very surprised that a Tardis fitted in the boot of the Micra.

Friday started again at about ten o’clock for the rest of us (Alex was in the air by then) & Megan & I continued the cleaning & packing of her bike – it got called off the previous night when I dropped a bolt on the pavers & couldn’t find it – trying to shed as many parts as possible due to QANTAS’s stingy baggage allowance for bikes (we managed to discard most of the drivetrain as it was showing the signs of a very long trip – the chain was almost as bendy crossways). We also worked out that Megan’s grandparents knew Trish’s parents from the cycling club they used to belong to – my grandfather was also part of the same club & I assume that is how Mum & Gill met; somewhere along here Trish was showing me photos & documents relating to my great-great uncle Stanley who was killed at Passchendale & we came across many Christmas letters that my Mum had sent from just before I was born & spanned over twenty years – they were fascinating & quite amusing in parts & brought back a lot of memories of growing up on the orchard in Papamoa & then later in Te Puke. My attempts at learning to swim & participation (a euphemism) in sports through school were recurring subjects! We are just back from dropping Megan at Heathrow at the more respectable hour of nine-thirty & after two nights of a full house (Trish’s sister Jan also stayed last night), it’s a little quieter now – which is useful as the last five paragraphs of this discourse had been left unwritten for a few days.