BrownhillsBob

#365daysofbiking Into the light

March 19th – It’s not just public transport that was deserted, either: The roads and towns are too.

Like something in an apocalyptic 1970s drama, all of a sudden people are draining out of view in this country. It’s most odd.

At this time on a weekday on the canal at Catshill Junction I’d normally see a dog walker or two, usually some runners.

But not today. Even in these final days of winter time, before the clocks change and light floods back to the evenings.

Very quiet.

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#365daysofbiking Dead quiet

March 18th – Every day the streets are a little bit more dead. People are wary of each other. Public transport is emptier and emptier as worried people abandon their journeys and work from home.

I had to go to Telford.

I’m using sanitiser, obeying instructions. New Street and the train services I caught were eerily quiet.

This is a momentous time, yet it feels like it’s arriving by stealth. While everyone is… Out.

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#365daysofbiking Still

March 17th – Returning that evening, I was again cheered by the stillness and spring beauty of the canal, this time at Millfield between Home Farm and Anchor Bridge.

The sky was subtly beautiful and there was little wind to spoil it.

For a good ten minutes I gathered my thoughts here, admiring the blossom, blackthorn and forsythia I think.

There’s real serene beauty in Brownhills, if you know where to look.

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#365daysofbiking Currant affairs

March 17th – Unable to process the current madness as regards pandemics and panic buying, I find my daily reassurance in the emergence of spring.

At Shenstone, the currant blossom is pink and fulsome once more.

A sadly short-lived bloom, it’s a real harbinger of warmer days to come.

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#365daysofbiking Trouble on the wind

March 16th – Due to coronavirus, there appear to be odd times coming, and I don’t much like the look of them, I can tell you.

Returning home in the dusk the canal was still as I paused before heading to Silver Street and central Brownhills. People had been panic buying hand sanitiser, cleaning products, long life food and toilet rolls.

All because of a virus we are lost as individuals in the face of. There is not much we can do, so we panic buy for the reassurance of affirmative action.

This is not my country.

Thankfully, though, the calm of the canal and falling night was still reassuringly so.

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#365daysofbiking The stars of spring

March 15th – It feels like Narnia’s winter melting. We didn’t have the cold, but we had the grey and endless, endless rain: But at Springhill, some youngsters put on a performance for me that chased the winter away.

These are the true stars of spring, and how welcome they are.

Gorgeous.

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#365daysofbiking Country roads, taken me home

March 15th – The first real ride out for the hell of it in a few weeks proved to be a real tonic. Not far: Just up over to Walsall Wood, Lazy Hill then around the lanes of Lower Stonnall, Hilton and Warrenhouse, but a delight all the same.

I hadn’t been in these lanes for the devil of it for so long. It felt like coming home – and the flowers, views and rain-sodden landscape made me feel at once refreshed and home again.

Whatever happens in coming months, I’ll always have this, my spiritual home.

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#365daysofbiking Approaching equity

March 14th – One of the nice but pointlessly geeky things about riding with a GPS bike computer is the ability to see sunrise and sunset times change every day.

That’s not so great when nights are closing in, but when they’re opening out, it’s lovely to watch; and one of the things that always makes me happy is the spring equinox.

The science of the equinox/equilux is basically beyond me but the equinox is when the length of day is equal to the length of night, and the difference between sunset and sunrise is 12 hours. I always find it intriguing that thins’t smack bang at 6pm and 6pm, which would be neat, but usually around 6:15.

Every year this gets me, and every year I’m as delighted and inspired by it.

Find out more about the science of the equinox here.

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#365daysofbiking Monumental

March 14th – Passing through the Wood on an errand. The world is clearly on the brink of something and people have been panic buying toilet rolls and other silly stuff needlessly because they fear the spread of coronavirus.

I swung over the playing field of Oak Park to admire the pithead sculpture to Walsall Wood Colliery while I was passing. It was solid. Strong. Ever present. Reassuring in a world that seemed to be losing it’s composure.

Sometimes it’s the monuments and monoliths that make you feel most secure.

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#365daysofbiking Sodden, still

March 13th – Between Walsall Wood and Clayhanger in the failing light, the towpath was sodden and the going tough, but the wet environment did catch the light rather well.

I keep grumbling about the rain, and this winter has been truly, remarkably wet. I’m at the stage now where it just doesn’t bother me anymore. If it’s raining, I don’t grumble – I have no choice. I just haul on the waterproofs and get on with it.

But I do kind of think fate now owes me a very dry, warm and sunny summer to make up for it…

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