Tag: exercise ride

#365daysofbiking – You shall not pass!

April 26th – Second attempt to sort the noisy bottom bracket appears to have worked. It’s true what they say, you’re never alone with a square taper chainset…

On a test run, I encountered this female mallard. Not a happy bird, it had settled on Coopers Bridge and was defying me to pass.

Unusual for mallards, as whilst fearsomely vicious to other ducks, and occasionally their own clutches, they are generally affable to anything else.

There was a bit of a Mexican standoff. Then she clearly remembered she was a duck, and flapped and honked her way back to the water, leaving the confused cyclist wondering what that was all about…

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#365daysofbiking – Silken

April 25th – In recent days I recorded the the female flowering of the sallow trees in Walsall Wood. At the Old Cement Works Bridge in Brownhills, the catkins are starting to go to seed.

The spines of the flower heads split and curl away, releasing the downy, silken fluff inside, each one attached to a tiny seed, easily carried long distances on the wind or any moving thing.

A fascinating and beautiful mechanism that will see the area around these trees soon coated in fluffy down.

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#365daysofbiking – Regardless


April 25th – Saturday morning, again shockingly quiet despite protests of ‘too many people ignoring the lockdown’ on social media. Brownhills and the countryside around it simmered gently in the warm sun.

Things are greening over nicely now. The azolla bloom on the canal is gradually decreasing and everything looked magnificent.

I need to record and cherish these times, for they will, I think, get me through future bad ones. These times when you can enjoy the peace of the old cement works bridge or the view over Home Farm and not hear traffic, not see people but just drink in the warmth, the season and the song of birds and the buzz of bees.

Nature is regardless of human woes and that’s a good reason to keep taking the next steps.

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#365daysofbiking – Alone again, or

April 24th – It was a pleasant evening so I hopped off the canal near Aldridge and did a loop over Lazy Hill and back into Brownhills over Shire Oak.

People keep saying things are getting busier. Sorry, I can’t see it.

This is 6:30pm on a Friday on one of the main arterial routes in the area. I had to wait ages for a car to come the other way and change the lights for me. I barely saw a soul in a seven mile ride. I saw more wild animals than people.

I have never seen days like these.

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#365daysofbiking – Multiplication

April 24th – A short exercise ride, still working from home, mostly. Despite the strangeness in everyday human society, the natural world continues as normal.

Nice to see the moorhens pairing off to mate. Such humble, unassuming little birds.

I keep saying it, but it’s the normal, beautiful events of spring that are keeping me going day to day at the moment.

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#365daysofbiking In the pink

April 23rd – It’s appropriate for St. George’s day I guess that apple blossom is now out. For all th frilliness and glamour of the ornamental cherries, you really can’t beat traditional apple blossom. Pink and white, it’s a gorgeous spectacle, and very British.

It smells rather nice too.

It’s in hedgerows all over, but this lovely specimen is on the canal between Clayhanger Bridge and the Black Cock.

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#365daysofbiking In the meadow

April 22nd – With this working from home malarkey (I still cannot get used to it) I’ve not been seeing some familiar places this spring, much if at all.

Jockey Meadows is one such place.

Usually one of the last places to show signs of spring, when I took my exercise ride today it was beautifully green, almost verdant. A real feast for the senses with bird and wildlife clearly happy and getting on with life in a way we can’t.

Hello old friend. Happy spring!

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#365daysofbiking You ring a bell

April 11th – I wasn’t feeling great, so a short spin out over Castle Hill and back to Brownhills up the Chester Road.

In the last day, the Spanish bluebells had come out in the hedgerow near Fishpond wood, and as usual with this colony they ranged in shade from blue, to pink, to white.

A gorgeous spectacle on a day when I didn’t feel great.

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