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#365daysofbiking A host:

March 19th – I notice this year, due to the early then slightly stalled spring, that the daffodils have been really slow-burning: The came out early, then paused for a while and are now coming out fully.

This is the time of year when verges in towns and industrial estates like here in Telford are absolutely stunning for a few all too short weeks.

These yellow wonders are gorgeous and the perfect antidote to a dark winter.

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#365daysofbiking The world spins

March 18th – I keep banging on about equinoxes, and like the idiot I surely am, I thought I knew about them. It turns out like many things I think I understand, there’s so much more to it than I knew.

Today, the length of the daylight was near as damn it 12 hours: the sunrise was 6:16am and sunset a 6:15pm. Tomorrow, the daylight will be longer than night.

But this is not the equinox (when the sun crosses the equator). This is the equilux – equal light. Although, it’s not really equal at all: A number of factors including how we might use the three definitions of twilight complicate this.

I looked it up tonight and was fascinated. The equinox actually happens on March 20th this year – that’s Wednesday.

You can find out all the gory detail of how this stuff works at this excellent blog post here – the comments are worth a read too if you have time to spare.

You learn something new every day.

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#365daysofbiking Well underway

March 18th – On a grey, cold morning in Darlaston, the hedgerows, scrub and edgelands are turning the colours of new growth.

Everywhere you look, leaf buds are opening and the fresh colours of spring’s palette are coming to the fore.

As winters go, it’s not been a bad one. Let’s hope summer is as good as lat year.

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#365daysofbiking A lifetime away

March 17th – On Lea Lane, between Newton and Admaston, a nice country house. Rambling, large, with half its garden oddly over the road, it’s a curious building.

What casual passers-by don’t realise in many cases is that this house, up until very, very recently, was actually a pub called The Wicket. In the middle of nowhere, I guess the pub had a hard time surviving, and closed like so many others. And now, you’d never know.

I went in there once. It was nice enough, but quiet as you’d expect. It seems odd now that I sat with a Guinness in what is now a total stranger’s lounge.

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#365daysofbiking It’s about time

March 17th – Finally a day with a more manageable wind, although it was still hard work, and an afternoon mostly without rain, although it caught me on my evening return. But a good ride, none the less.

Rapidly going stir crazy, I was pleased to note a more temperate day – although it was cold the sun shone frequently and the rain was mostly short sharp showers.

I headed up to Cannock Chase for a decent 45 miler, Pye Green and Brocton Field, the dropped into Sherbrooke Valley and on to Milford. From there, up to Tixall, a place I’ve not been in far too long a time. The architecture and atmosphere of this gorgeous place cannot be overstated, yet it’s mostly missed as it exists in the shadow of tourist magnet Shugborough, just down the road.

I continued to Hixon and skirted Blithfield Reservoir via Newton and Admaston, and passed back through Rugeley and Longone as darkness and rain fell.

Spring is really coming on a pace now, with plump spring lambs in the fields and green evident on the hedges, woods and fields; and on Brownhills Common the deer were clearly currently entering the moult and will soon look like threadbare old rugs that nobody cares for, despite being in excellent condition otherwise.

I’d love to know what a solar loo is though…

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#365daysofbiking A lifetime away

March 16th – In Brownhills High Street, it was largely deserted. Not just due to the lateness of the hour, but because of the awful, endless rain and scouring wind.

I don’t mind Brownhills these days: I used to find the High Street problematic, with its reminders of a more prosperous past and failed dreams of regeneration, but of late, despite the derelict scar of Ravens Court it’s actually perceptibly on the up.

New housing has bought short, local footfall, and local convenience services are doing well, I think. Slowly, very slowly, things seem to be improving.

But here and now, in the grey dusk with rain falling steadily, better days seem a whole lifetime away.

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#365daysofbiking Goosed

March 16th – A genuinely foul day, at least weather-wise. There were very strong, blustery winds and near constant rain, so I was limited to a short journey into Brownhills to get some shopping.

It was wet, cold and muddy, and really not a great day to be out.

In fact, the only souls I actually saw outside at all were the Canada geese. Even the mallards seemed to be in hiding.

Here’s hoping this grim spell passes soon.

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#365daysofbiking Often overlooked

March 15th – One of the nicer, more beautiful and sadly neglected flowers of the spring is the pussy willow. I spotted this one as dusk fell on the Chester Road near Shire Oak.

These complex, pretty catkins start as grey, furry buds and change as they bloom fully to a bright yellow green bay of stamen filaments which are actually fascinating when you look close up.

Sadly, not many folk ever seem to notice…

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#365daysofbiking It must be spring!

March 15th – Heading home from the station after a long afternoon legal meeting in Birmingham, in order to mitigate a rather evil wind, I took to the back lanes.

On my way, I passed this wonderful sight, which catches me by surprise every spring.

They must have been planted by some wonderful individual as they go in colour bands.

A beautiful thing.

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#365daysofbiking Courtesy, the lack thereof

March 14th – At the traffic lights on the junction of Hatherton Street and the New Ring Road, Walsall, lunchtime. Waiting at a red to turn right.

Why is it so often the most uncourteous drivers are those charged with teaching newcomers to the road the tenets of good driving – respect, obeying the law and consideration for others?

I despair sometimes. Not indicating, either.

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