Tag: 365daysofbiking

#365daysofbiking Under the cloak of darkness

Tuesday, October 27th 2020 – Another cycleway, beautiful in the autumn night, but very treacherous as I found out, very nearly taking a spill on a corner.

This is the shortcut between the A51 near Beacon Park and Leomansley, a great way of cutting off the Friary island that pops you out further up the Walsall Road, giving a great route through the park when coming back from Lichfield.

The leaf mulch here was very wet and slippery, and despite taking care, my summer tyres still failed to grip as I skirted the anti-vehicle barrier.

Thankfully I held it and no harm done, but a timely reminder that there’s danger in the darkness.

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#365daysofbiking Declining cover

 

Monday, October 26th 2020 – Back in Telford, I noticed with sadness the cycleways here that are so beautiful in summer with their tree canopy covers are now opening back out as the leaves fall.

People don’t really seem to appreciate how beautiful these routes are – and mostly they’re unmapped. Cycling around Telford is generally a real joy to the heart as a result.

The colours are gorgeous, though, the downside being that the fallen leaves make for a slippery, wheel-stealing challenge to the unwary rider.

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#365daysofbiking Getting the abbey habit

Sunday, October 25th 2020 – I’m enjoying the long rides this autumn, which is making the whole experience of the season much nicer, I must say.

This grey Sunday I wrapped up warm and headed back to the Churnet Valley, and caught the area in a lovely sunset golden hour. On the way I took an alternate route bypassing Willslock and Uttoxeter and found myself passing through Croxden, where the immense and beautiful ruined abbey took me fair by surprise: I must come back and spend time looking around it. I’ve never seen a lane actually run through a set of ruins before…

The Churnet Valley was as beautiful as it tends to be, but I had a different target in mind. Crossing the valley by Lord’s Bridge, up  the gorgeous Barbary Gutter and past the dreadful Alton Towers, I pressed up past Star Bank and Threelows, looping back over the Weaver Hills, to catch them just as night fell.

I returned via Ellastone, Marston Montgomery and Sudbury, blasting down the A515 for a fast run home.

Another beautifully autumnal ride that really lifted my spirits.

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#365daysofbiking Shine

Saturday, October 24th 2020 – Another wet day, and it was raining heavily as I nipped out for shopping in the evening.

This weekend, the clocks go back and I hate the loss of evening light with a fierce passion. The wet Saturday just compounded that and I felt miserable.

But something about the lights of the town, the fresh air and sounds of the rain combined and I actually began to find it quite soothing.

The shine of rain at night is very underrated, and it can make the most mundane places beautiful. But also this year I am determined not to be brought down by winter. I must keep on, must keep finding the beauty in the everyday, and try myself to shine through the gloom.

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#365daysofbiking A quiet Chase

Friday, October 23rd 2020 – I had to nip over Penkridge Bank on Cannock Chase for business so I cut across Maquis’s Drive to catch the autumn colour – and wasn’t disappointed.

It’s always a lovely route, and being a Friday, wasn’t very busy. The Chase itself was quiet.

I was on the lookout for interesting fungi but sadly the only example I came upon of note was wooden…

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#365daysofbiking Harsh but beautiful

Thursday, October 22nd 2020 – I’m still ambivalent about the iPhone as a camera. It’s a huge advance in photography without a doubt, but outside of it’s quite narrow comfort zone, you can really tell that it’s relying heavily on software post-processing.

Nowhere is this more evident than in the lauded ‘night mode’.

Here on the canal near Silver Street it took a stunning image on my way home from work – yet look closely and it’s very harsh.

I know I’m expecting way to much from something in an incredibly small package with tiny optics, and it is extraordinary, but the technology still has a very long way to go.

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#365daysofbiking Just resting

Wednesday, October 21st 2020 – Also looking good in the royal blue dusk that’s been coinciding with my evening commute is Coppice Lane, alongside Brownhills Common.

A lonely, quiet and often desolate part of Brownhills, an edgeland populated mainly by silver birch copse on scarred industrial land, it has a ghostly, haunted atmosphere at night.

But in the right light, the sky, trees, road and streetlights combine and make it special.

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#365daysofbiking Cornering

Tuesday, October 20th 2020 – Home late, I found myself waiting at Streets Corner lights in Walsall Wood, which are on a fairly long cycle. This junction was rebuilt a couple of years ago, and has been made a lot smoother in operation, and nicer to use with added filters, slip roads and refuges.

You know a good job was made of the redesign as you never hear anyone moan about it now. They don’t praise it, either, but it doesn’t register as an annoyance which has to be the measure of a great success in the UK.

With the imposing Ivy House flats, rebuilt in the early 2000s and named after a house demolished in their construction and the wide open, quiet tarmac, it’s an interesting night time subject while I wait patiently and dream of a hug and mug of tea.

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#365daysofbiking A gentle fall

Monday, October 19th 2020 – The autumn is now in full swing, and the leaves are dropping at a rate.

Combined with the rains, it can make cycling hazardous as the leaf litter turns into a slippery goop that steals wheels and makes for interesting braking.

No such concerns on the Black Bath beside Holland Park, however, where the lights, sky and seasonal detritus gently combine for some great dusk colour.

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#365daysofbiking Just resting

Sunday, October 18th 2020 – A rest day, with just a small loop around town in the evening to keep my legs moving.

It was dry and quiet when I rode up to Catshill Junction and back down the High Street. Not a soul around in the blessed, blanketing dark.

I love to see the town like this. It has such a curious character at night, when you feel like you’re the only person to witness it.

Long rides are wonderful, but sometimes the short ones are pretty fine, too.

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