June 26th – Work is a lot busier this week than I expected, and I /was/ keeping on top of things… until today, when I left my camera at work. I’d spotted these cute little violet flowers on a verge near Telford Railway Station and have no idea what they are, but they’re quite small.
Sadly, as I left my camera behind, it mean 365days got behind, too…
June 23rd – Long, hard day at work on a gorgeous summer day; I only caught the beginning and end. The sky was a lovely blue this evening, and as I passed Little Aston church, I stopped to take a few shots over the meadow. That’s a remarkable spire on a very nice, underrated church.
Even better on a languid summer evening…
May 12th – Whilst taking my call and being glared at by the local wildlife, something else caught my eye at the canoe club on Silver Street. Tethered out of harm’s way is a mobile work raft. I can’t be certain, but Brian Stringer mentioned that the exterior of the Pier Street Bridge was to be cleaned for the canal festival, and I think that’s probably what the platform raft is for.
They’re a common sight where bridge maintenance work is going on.
April 13th – Hmm. Something is happening. Put on to this by local history wonk [Howmuch?], he told me in the week that he’d noticed that there was a crew drilling a borehole on the former marketplace in Brownhills.
Today, I swung past to take a look. He was right – a pile of fresh earth, and an access cover. Marked further towards the pedestrian bridge, a surveyor’s mark ‘BH2’ – presumably borehole 2, yet to be sunk. If that’s all the spoil to be removed, they’re not very deep.
Coupled with reports of surveying in the area of late, someone’s either taking measurements in preparation of building something, or there’s a problem underground, like a leaking drain.
Whatever it is, it’s very much worth keeping an eye on.
January 26th – Reader Jeepboy contacted me this morning, noting that the heathland restoration work had begun on Brownhills Common and things were a bit lumpy. My curiosity piqued, I took a ride over the common west of The Parade to have a look. True enough, the conditions up there are muddy and wet – take wellies if you’re walking. But it’s interesting to see the landscape open out a bit.
Nothing much grows under the conifer plantations, which have spread widely. This threatens the historic and biodiverse heath, and the wildlife that thrives upon it – everything from red deer, who munch on the sedges and lounge in the low cover to the birds that feed from the berries and seeds of the broad-leafed trees here.
Whilst the clearance looks shocking, only selected batches of coniferous woodland are being cleared, and deciduous trees left to thrive. It’s interesting to see the landscape re-emerge here. Come some decent weather, the mud will soon dry out and conditions will improve – however, it may be some time before access from the A5 drains sufficiently… it’s the closest Brownhills has had to a lido for some time.
I know this work has been and will continue to be controversial, but I honestly think it’s for the best. It’s sad that the situation was allowed to get so out of hand that dramatic steps were necessary.
January 2nd – First day back to work, and a lovely commute. The roads were quiet, and the weather reasonable. I just got time to take a quick shot of the dawn over Hill Hook and the Sutton Transmitter. It’s somewhat out of focus, but not too bad. I felt good, and despite the trains being abysmal, it was good to be back.
It felt doubly magical, because this is the second birthday of 365daysofbiking. I actually started the project in April, 2011 in order to ride every day of the 30 days of April, mainly to stop fellow twitter cyclist Renee Van Baar from nagging me about it. At the end of that month, i was enjoying the thing so much I carried on, and vowed to make it 365 days.
Sadly, over the new year of 2011/12, I suffered bad food poisoning, and was off the bike for two days. I was gutted, and so feeling cheated, I started again. 2nd January 2014 – today – was the second anniversary of that resolution.
Last year I agonised over whether to continue, this year I don’t. The eagle-eyed may have noticed I installed a hit counter here a couple of weeks ago – just under the search box on the right. That tells me lots are still reading this, so it seems worth continuing, and it’s part of me now. The urge to get off the bike, stop, and look around is now so habitual that I don’t think I could really stop.
Statistics for this year gone have been a tad more modest at 8,732 miles. That’s still about 24 miles a day. A remarkable total of 15,356 photos have been taken. On the journal so far, there have been 2,212 posts. I have cycled continuously, every day, for 730 days. It seems wrong not to at least make the 1,000.
In total, the journal has run for 1,003 days from the start, and something in excess of 25,000 miles.
Thank you for riding it with me. As long as people are enjoying this, I’ll keep doing it.
Your comments are, as ever, welcome, even if it’s just to tell me to shut the hell up…
May 31st – At Telford, the Cycle-to-Work scheme has been a great success. This project of the previous administration, like most things, has been severely curtailed, but it’s still a decent deal. I used to be one of only a couple of cyclists here, but now, on this summer morning, there’s barely room for my bike in the shed, and they’re due to erect another. Each one of these bikes represents a car not taking part in Telford’s rush hour, which has to be good. Over various shifts, there must be 50 or so cyclists here now, and some pretty nice bikes of all varieties. I like to see this.
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