Attack of the killer hedgehog

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One of the fears at the back of your mind when you are camping is that of theft: Your bike being stolen at night, your gear being pulled out from under the tent flaps (our tent being so small that we couldn't acutally fit anything in it but ourselves), basically waking up in the morning finding yourself with nothing left but the sleeping bag and sleeping mat you went to bed in.

We decided to cycle up from Dover to London, partly to pass a few days, partly because I wanted to see Canterbury, and partly because we wanted to pass the 4,500km mark on our trip, but basically because we had more time than money and it was somewhere to see. So we bought a cycling map when we arrived in Dover, had a large cup of Costa's coffee each and set off up the first hill towards London.

We followed some lovely backroads to Canterbury about 25 miles away, but were driven out of town pretty quickly by the crowds and the assurance by the Tourist Information Office that we'd have buckleys of finding any accomodation at the local campsites as it was peak season.

We then followed the 'famous' Winkle and Pilbury route (actually it wasn't called that, but I can't remember what it was called but nor do I think that it was really famous so don't feel oblidged to recall it's name) out to the North coast, but then promptly got lost following a route marked on my map which petered out into a rocky beach. I was assured by two locals sitting at the end of the path that in fact I wasn't lost, it's just that none of the maps actually show that the path ends where I stood, and that if we pushed our bikes along the shore for another 400 metres we'd find ourselves back on it again. This rates a mention only because the council had wisely decided to buld these wooden ramparts out into the beach, so the 400 metres probably took us something like 15 minutes to cross as we lifted our bike over one of these fences every 10-15 metres.

Back on the track, it started to rain, so we pulled off at a campground only to be told they only took caravans, but and the nearest campsite was about 5 miles back the way we'd just come (including on the other side of that beach). We decided that we don't go backwards (this thought being reinforced by our discovery that it was still about 80 to 85 miles to London along the bike track and that we were actually finding it hard to egt accomodation so wanted to get there in one more day).

Hence we ended up camping near Faverdsham in a lovely little campsite that was, after everything I've just said about crowds, half empty. It was that night that I was woken up by the gentle rustling of plastic bags being pulled out from under the tent flaps, I bolted awake in half a second, Christie not far behind, spun around and had the tent flap open before my brain had even really registered what was going on ... Fortunately it wasn't a robber stealing our stuff, but from what I could see in the darkness, just a rat trying to get into our breakfast cereal bag. Somewhat miffed, I flicked the bag a few times to scare it away, but it was a stubborn little bugger, so without really thinking about it, I just pulled back my arm and gave it a good, quick slap with my open palm to see it on it's way ...

It was an effing hedgeheg. Ever slapped a curled up hedgehog? It's not dissimilar to slapping an inside out pin cushion. It hurt. Chrisite found this hilarious, the hedgehog seeming to think that the danger was now probably over as I writhed around in the tent uncurled itself and wandered off, and I lay for the next 45 minutes trying to get to sleep as my hand throbbed painfully. In fact it was sore for the whole rest of teh day, and even now, almost 5 days later I still have one little bit of hedgehog quill embedded in one of my fingers.

The rest of the ride the next day was less eventful. We were up and off before 7am the next day, and the first 50 miles or so were along lovely back roads and bike routes (we were generally following Sustrans National Cycle Route 1) as we headed into Rochester and Gravesend (lovely name don't you think?). We were given a shortcut by one cyclist who, having come up behind us hooting his car horn to get our attention, kindly gave us the directiosn assuring us that many cyclists go the wrong way (we were in fact right on the route shown on our map and had just passed one of their signs telling us to go the way we were going) but taking his advice, we went his way and found ourselves on busy roads in commuter traffic, and completely lost. Somehow we managed to find our way back onto the route, and into the outskirts of London.

Reaching Graveside, the cycling turned grim. The route through Graveside was through smelly backalleys strewn with broken glass, and overgrown with blackberries. Once we left that behind, the next 12 miles to the next town were along major highways, and a hearty headwind had picked up, add to this that the route kept going from one side of the road to the other every 500 metres and it made for very slow and frustrating going. At this point we also rode off the map we bought in Dover and had a 15-20 mile gap before we rode onto the next map I had of London. The Tourist Information Centre had shut down so we had to trust that we could just follow the signs .... which of course we couldn't. We did OK for 3 miles or so, but then found ourselves on a busy highway again with absolutely no signs, we must have missed a turn, or a sign had been taken down. After a brief discussion we decided to just head to Elgin and pick the route upo again there, which in the end seemed to cut about 4 miles off the trip and we found the route again pretty easily as it moves back out onto the Thames river from there for a long way into Central London.

The rest of the ride in was fascinating as intially we were out in the old Industrial towns with run down wharves, smelly storage facilities, leaking oil ... it was a real industrial landscape, but then as we got closer and closer to London, we started coming acorss patches of inner city renewal as old sites were turned into waterfront residences. The path stayed mainly on the Thames, but had to divert inland for several places. We got to go through Greewich (but the cutty shark which Christie had been wanting to see was all closed up until 2010), we went past the Thames floodgate system and then eventually back into the more familiar surrounds of London Bridge and Central London. It was just past London Bridge in fact that I had stopped to turn my map over when a nice guy emerged out of the crowd to ask if I was lost and said if I told him where I wanted to go, he'd tell me how to get there. I assured him I was OK and only turning my map over and we parted ways. It only hit me as I pulled off that after 4,600kms I finally was able to turn down the help of a good samaritan as I knew where we were going. it seemed somehow fitting so close to the end of our trip.

From there we were soon at Waterloo Station and bale to retrace our steps out to East Acton. Turned out to be our longest day in the saddle as we spent so much time riding slowly along bike paths ... somewhere around 7-8hours actually riding, though we left camp at 6.45am and got to Acton (123kms later) at about 5pm, so were actually on the road for nearly 10 hours. My backside was sore one last time, but gee it was good to draw back up at Kim's place.

So for the last four days we've been very lazy. Reading books, cleaning the gear and bikes ready for transport, drinking coffee and reading the paper (we'll so miss Costa's) and watching TV. We did go to Madame Tussard's wax museum yesterday, but found it to be rather funny in all the wrong ways. We had an interesting coffee at one Costa's where just after we sat down a fight broke out at the table next to us resulting in huge coffee cups full of steaming latte's being hurled above our heads, a pot plant being thrown from one end of the restaurant to the other (getting me a bit dirty in the process, but fortunately not spoiling either my coffee or walnut cake) and then as the two protagonists left the restaurant, seperated by the two others who were at their table, one ran off and picked up a chair and the last we saw of the fight was this guy running off after another one with a grim expression on his face and a chair held aloft above his head ... we just went back to our papers and drank our coffee ... this is London after all. If only they had spken English so I knew what it was all about, though I think it was simply because one guy spilled his coffee on another accidentally.


So now it's 8.34am on the 6th August. All that stands between me and a flight home is a shower, a ride on the tube and a train trip to Heathrow. We fly out at 2pm this afternoon, and should get back to Hobart abour 40 hours after that (groan). I'd love to be able to finish with some great observations on what this trip has done to me, but to be honest I'm still digesting it all. The natural beauty of some of Europe stands out, and my desire to return to Switzerland in particular is very strong. The sheer generosity of all those people who pressed pause in their lives to guide us back onto the tracks we had wandered from stand out as a trail of kindness, but then the crowdedness and disconectedness of Europe was really rather brutal, the pools of tourism you find yourself in obscene. I guess I'll digest it all in time, but until next time I travel, good bye.

Photos of France

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Comments

[Rachel]

ouch
oh god I bet that hurt! it is funny-but like when you digest your holiday experience-it will be in retrospect that you find it funny : ) wow to coming home, hope you have a relaxing flight and will look forward to seeing you both. Mum said you were heading to bed on your arrival-very sensible! I was going to bring out Robbie to see the planes and greet you but will catch up when you have recovered. We are heading up to Lonnie this w/end to see the Hawka's play. It has been great reading your blogs..wonderful. See you soon! xxxx