It was time to return to Milton Keynes. I’ve never said that before; but there is a first time for everything. After a couple of days at home, a Led Zep concert, a haircut, a band rehearsal and a get together with old friends, I needed to be back on the road. The days were getting ever shorter; but the forecast was good in the southern part of the country and I had time to see my sixteenth compass ride through to a close before the clocks went back at the end of October. As I have been finding almost every day, you are restricted in what you can attempt by available daylight, and the spectre of being stuck in busy traffic in the hours of darkness is not a pleasant one.
Although I knew all this, and I am generally pretty good about managing the time things take. I would not be cycling away from Milton Keynes until noon. That gave me six hours before the sun was gone and the light was fading. Just enough, I felt, to get me as far as my friend Neil’s house, close to Ascot – and directly on my line of travel. Perfect.
To achieve this I had to be on a train heading to Manchester at 8.30am. Not so hard, you would imagine. But you would be wrong, because it was cancelled! Thankfully Jenni checked this and I had just enough time to conceive and enact plan B, which was to throw the bike in the back of the car and drive half an hour over the hills to Whaley Bridge (Edwina’s home – remember that?) from where a train would depart to Manchester at 9.03 am. If I wasn’t on it, I had next to no chance of completing my ride in daylight. I got lucky with the last space in the small free car park right outside the station and made it with literally a couple of minutes to spare. I would have to collect the car in a few days. But my plan was back on! Really, though, it shouldn’t be this hard.
The lady train manager on the Avanti service to Milton Keynes was amusing. I was once again forced to lock my bike into a cupboard at the back of the train. I walked up to find her in coach C as we sped away and she asked if I thought her face was one I could trust. She also said she had never forgotten to let anyone out travelling in this direction. When the time came, she got off with me, unlocking my door from the inside. She was worried about getting home to Manchester in time to collect her grandchild from playgroup later that afternoon, and lamented that she wasn’t paid for doing that job! But it was all very good natured.
The larger-than-life guard at the electronic barriers in Milton Keynes station had just let someone through to help an elderly relative on to a train. It was smiles all round. He held the wide gate open for me, too, pointed to the outside world and said “That way to sanity!”. “Really?” I asked. He paused. “No, you’re right”, he said. But I appreciated the extra efforts these railway staff were making to improve my day.
The sun was shining and I wanted to get some miles under my belt. Things began with more miles of well-signed cycle path, this time along a stream-filled valley and past attractive lakes, before I reached the real, not-so-sane world outside Milton Keynes and began negotiating residential streets that appeared to pre-date the new town. I rounded a corner near some shops to see three faces looking out at the road over a high wall around a community centre, clapping and cheering as a car went by sounding its horn. They must know each other, I thought. But then they all started shouting at me. “Ring your bell” they said. So I did. It got a similar cheer.
And that was Milton Keynes, done and dusted. After that, I was back on familiar country lanes between pleasant villages, making my way towards the very attractive, small “Ancient Market Town” of Winslow in Buckinghamshire. This, I felt, was my best lunch option. I bought a pasty from a bakery van in the market place, left my bike next to an old coaching inn with scrawly ironwork signs, and bought a coffee in a cafe over the road, whose A-frame claimed it would be the best in the area. It was very good, to be fair. The lady served it in a glass, giving me a dilemma. But she was quite happy for me to sit in the cafe and eat my own food while I drank her coffee. So all was well.
A few miles later I was afforded sweeping views down over the Vale of Aylesbury, a broad, low lying area of villages, farms and fields bounded to the south, where I was heading, by the Chiltern Hills. It all looked green and verdant. But a couple of villages further on the peace came to an unexpected, shuddering halt. I had reached the course of HS2.
The quiet route I was following on my OS map was no longer in existence. Instead, a new – and very busy – main road and roundabout had been constructed across its path. The road led in one direction towards the large town of Aylesbury, which I was trying hard to miss. The other way was of even less help. What to do? I relied on instinct and guesswork and managed to reach the next big roundabout unscathed, and then peel away on the old A41, which seemed to be closed altogether by the next turning, which I took. This road also said it was closed; but I did what I often do and hoped that you could get through on a bike. At least it was quiet again. Eerily quiet actually. As I continued along – and uphill – with no obvious sign of anything amiss, it began to feel a bit like the Midwich Cuckoos. Was anyone here? I passed through a largely deserted small village and carried on. It would be a long way back now.
Then finally, ahead of me, I saw a car turning around on the road and heading back towards me. Then another. They headed down a tiny side lane that I was just approaching. It seemed to be the only way through and, luckily, was exactly where I needed to be. But it was barely the width of a car, so the authorities were right to put anyone off coming this way. It was very pretty, though, with delightful old half-timbered buildings in well tended grounds. Hereafter, for some miles, this became the norm. I was in the Home Counties, the affluent country lying outside the M25, and the wealth was not hard to spot. I saw many a thatched roof, and even an old forge.
Pretty soon, the hills began. The Chilterns are surprisingly up and down, and also quite densely wooded. In the autumn colours on this lovely sunny day, they looked perhaps at their best. I was heading up the escarpment for Beaconsfield, after which I knew it would be basically down hill into the Thames Valley and the end of my ride. This was a good thing because the afternoon was getting older. Beaconsfield seemed to take forever to arrive; but it was very agreeable when it finally did. It has an air of being well heeled, with leafy residential streets and expensive looking shops and businesses. I was reminded of Wilmslow in leafy Cheshire.
I hadn’t stopped for a break since Winslow; but it became obvious to me that I didn’t have time. The next section down from the Chilterns to the Thames at Eton was excellent riding. As Windsor Castle came into sight a couple of miles away, the sun finally disappeared below the horizon and the temperature began to drop quickly under the clear skies. Eton High Street takes you past the famous private school and its many fine old buildings, and then winds through posh shops up to the cobbled pedestrian bridge over the Thames to Windsor. The sky was taking on an orange tinge and I paused on the bridge to take photos. Above the water, a murmuration of starlings was dancing across the sky like a shoal of fish above our heads. It was hundreds, rather than thousands of birds, but very special nonetheless, especially in this regal setting. Another cyclist, watching beside me, said this was something he’d wanted to see all his life. I’m lucky: I have seen a murmuration of many thousands – perhaps millions – of starlings not far from where I live, and it is a truly remarkable experience. But this was an unexpected treat today nevertheless.
My plan was always to arrive next to Windsor Castle by around 5.30pm. I was probably 15 mins late; but that was enough to scupper my plans to ride the final section of the day to Neil’s house via Windsor Great Park, traffic-free. A Royal estate policeman made it clear to me that this was not an option, so I was forced onto the main road around the perimeter of the park for the last 5 miles or so. It was getting darker all the time and I needed my lights to be seen by the fairly steady stream of cars. But soon it was over and I was able to relax over a cup of tea, enjoy a hot shower and let a very comfortable evening unfold.
