Today’s route was more or less a straight dash to the coast. For the first section we cut out all the small roads round Essex villages that we’ve been using for the practice rides, and went straight through Takeley and Dunmow.
This meant a certain amount of cycling rather close to Essex Van Man. It’s funny – we were passed by hundreds of drivers today, almost all of whom were excessively courteous, and then you remember the two or three who weren’t. I’m sure someone’s invented a name for that (the phenomenon, not the van drivers).
It was fabulous weather today, leaving us with great memories of England. Essex was at her finest, the picture here is of Dedham Vale.
The road surface was often a bit grabby, and the provisions for cyclists (cycle tracks, reserved lanes, help at major junctions etc) was pretty non-existent. But there was not too much bumping around and we only got lost (sorry, off-track) a couple of times.What do you think about when you cycle? I tend to suffer terribly from earworms. Today’s #earworm was “Algy saw the bear”, which is extremely irritating as it’s only 4 pedal strokes long (a pedal stroke being both left and right).
I am completely calm that we have left the house properly secured and under control. Anyway, I’m definitely not going back to check.