Water

Me, investigating the water in a well near Godinje, Montenegro.

After asking what my favourite place was to cycle during our long trip, the next question is usually what was the most dangerous place or the worst part. I never can think of anything on the spot. But this photo sums up the times when I was most concerned about our health while on the trip.

There were only a few occasions when we were insufficiently prepared and did not carry enough water. If I recall correctly, there were three. Once in Morocco and twice in Montenegro (where this photo was taken). We would not have expected Montenegro to be a problem (and certainly not more of a problem than Morocco!), but our plotted route was sparsely populated. Sometimes, we could see villages or homes which did not appear that far away but they were clearly off the main road, and usually downhill. A detour of a few kilometres in a car is nothing; on a bike, with luggage, it is a big deal. Especially if there is a steep hill involved. Or if you know the rough distance you have to travel to the next town; adding a ten kilometre detour could mean you don’t make it to the town that evening.

Before I did any long distance cycling, I met a Canadian cycling along a highway in Australia. He was cycling on Highway No. 1 – the Pacific Motorway – between Byron Bay and Brisbane, one of the busiest, craziest stretches of highway in Aus. I was driving home from a visit with my partner’s parents; he’d stayed on and I was driving back to Brisbane on my own. The drive takes me about four hours (I’m a stickler for speed limits as Limits), though many people say it can be done in three.

I passed him and pulled into a rest area to take a break from driving. I hoped to see him come past the rest area while I was there but I did not see him; he may have passed during the little nap I took.

Further down the highway, I saw him again. The road was entirely clear and so I pulled over in a stopping bay and waited for him to get closer. He came to a stop behind my car and told me – me – that I was brave for stopping on the highway. I laughed, and told him he was brave for cycling alongside it. I also asked why he wasn’t cycling either a more coastal route, or a more inland route and he told me that a police officer a few towns back had told him he had to cycle on the highway. This information I found absolutely astounding. Although there is a wide shoulder, cars and trucks are travelling at 110 kms per hour – often more – on this road. He also said it wasn’t fun and he was hoping he could exit at the next exit. I felt bad for him – the next exit was about 50 kms away. At that stage, an entire day’s cycling for me. I couldn’t fit his bike into my car but if I could have, I would have offered. Instead, I offered him the snacks I had with me: a muffin and some fruit. These he accepted but, emboldened by my friendliness, he asked if I had any water. I had just drunk most of my water, but I had a half a bottle left and this I decanted into his water bottle, he protesting that I needed it. I pointed out (not cruelly, I hope) that I would be home in a few hours, probably before he’d even reached the next exit.

We parted ways; me realising only later that I hadn’t asked his name. I hope he had a wonderful cycle up Australia’s east coast and that lots of people gave him water.

While on my own long trip, I decided that if I ever ended up in a car, on a long drive, I will carry excessive amounts of water and offer it to every travelling cyclist I see. I haven’t had that opportunity yet, but look out travelling cyclists!

Departures

Sunset over the Boating Lake at Southampton Common, June 2010

A couple of months ago, I handed in my notice at work. Now, it is a mere one month until I depart the shores of Great Britain to return “home” to Australia. I’ve been alluding, for a while, to this departure and it is now upon me.

I have been weighing up whether to tell this blog, My Blog, of my grand plans and decided that, yes, of course, I should tell you, my dear friends. Hopefully the random strangers won’t be that interested. And if they are, as long as they’re well-meaning, that’s okay. And if they’re sinister but don’t let on, that’s okay too.

My partner and I will be cycling over land (and, of necessity, sea, though we’ll use other means for that bit) from our hometown in the UK, Southampton, to our sort-of hometown in Australia, Brisbane. There is another blog, elsewhere, that will document this journey. If you’re interested, you can check it out here. Even if you’re not interested, you should just click over there once to find a photograph of me and of my partner.

In the interests of full disclosure, I must admit to having another blog, with my partner, that has documented all our travels while we’ve been over here. I call that one (in my head), Our Blog. You can find it here and be shocked that I’d been keeping this other blog from you for so long. Sorry. There were reasons and things but none of those reasons etc really seem very persuasive any more.

Maybe I’ll start using my partner’s name now that it’s just out there and all.

I will be keeping My Blog going and I will update it occasionally, probably even more sporadically than I have in the past. I really don’t know at this stage but I do know that I still want my own space on the web and that space is here. After all, there are bound to be stories that don’t quite fit on The Cycling Blog and maybe all the readers of that blog will get exasperated with my continual, “Ooh look! A pretty flower!” posts, whereas I know you guys love that. Weirdos.

I know I’ve been vacant for a while. Here’s to say that I will continue to be vacant (surprise!). This last month here is bound to be a bit crazy busy, and I’ll also be spending time birthing The Cycling Blog. Then after that, I’ll be dealing with life as a cycling traveller.

Thank you for reading and looking and commenting. This feels like goodbye, but it’s emphatically not. I’ll still be reading you!

Passing

Me, posing, with my new bike! Aside from being about cycling, the photo and the words below are unrelated.

I don’t mind being passed by faster cyclists. I’m not slow but I am certainly not fast either. And I have a habit, also present when walking, of drifting off. That is, my mind wanders and, depending on what paths it wanders along, I am either fast or slow. I don’t do anything terrible or dangerous like cease paying attention; my speed is just directly proportional to the speed of my thoughts.

When I used to walk home from work in Brisbane – a walk of about 4kms – it could take me anything from 30 minutes to an hour. The variation was almost entirely due to what was going on in my mind. A particularly busy or bad day at work and my mind would be racing or ranting and my feet would keep pace. A lovely evening with many things to admire and my mind and feet would both slow.

So too it is with cycling, although cycling engages my mind a lot more than walking does; in traffic, my mind and feet tend to match up as I am alert to what is happening around me and a burst of anger at some driving stupidity that endangers me, usually spurs a burst of speed. On the traffic-free cycle paths, however, particularly on a nice day, I can slow right down, taking in my surrounds and just pootling along merrily.

Recently, on the way to work, I did just that. Pootle. I was passed by a young woman on a red bicycle and she was pedaling furiously. This was okay, I did not mind. But being passed made me snap out of my reverie and I decided to try to keep pace with this young woman. I do this often when I am passed. Sometimes I decide to race (though the person who passes me rarely knows I’m doing it because I never actually put in enough effort to overtake; only enough to keep up for a bit and then drop back again).

Once, I decided to race another cyclist who was about 10 metres in front and cycling strong. My goal was to keep the distance between us – that is, not to let it lengthen but maybe to close it a little – until our paths diverged. This I did successfully for about a mile by which stage I was flagging. Thankfully, he turned left where I would turn right, as that meant I could stop my silly little race but still claim victory, with a little punch in the air.

As today’s red-bike-woman passed me, I watched her manic pedaling, wondering when the cadence would fall again to a more comfortable rhythm. She was hunched over and breathing hard, but otherwise dressed much like me: comfortable clothes (rather than racing cyclist clothes). So I dragged my mind away from its fanciful flights and to the task of cycling. As I did so, I quickly realized I had been going really rather slowly indeed because even a tiny effort on my part meant that I had closed the gap between us. But I do hate it when I overtake someone and then they put in an effort to overtake me back, so I dropped back, thinking that if I let her get a decent distance between us then if she continued with her current effort and I put in my usual, we would remain as we currently were, with me behind, and before long, we would reach the end of the cycle path and our routes would most probably diverge. So I dropped back. I pedaled with my usual reasonably comfortable cadence, watching her pedal at a much higher cadence

In case you’re wondering, ‘cadence’ is the speed at which your feet go around when you pedal. The faster you pedal, the higher the cadence; the slower you pedal the lower the cadence. I thinks it’s like revolutions per minute (RPM) in a car. However, the cadence is not indicative of speed or effort: a higher cadence can be less effortful because there is less resistance (which is why your feet are going around faster) but does not actually propel you that much further forward; a lower cadence can be more effortful because you are pushing harder, but for each turn of the pedal, there are more turns of the wheel. There is usually an optimal cadence for the type of cycling you are doing and the terrain you are in. Pedalling at a high cadence on a flat is really rather tiring.

The distance between us closed without much effort on my part until I was behind her back wheel, roughly the distance I try to sit behind my partner when we cycle together over short distances (over long distances we cycle at our own pace and he waits for me at strategic points). It was actually more effort to not catch up with her. I stayed behind a short period of time before I realized I would actually have to stop entirely. I therefore overtook. I felt a little bad doing this and tried to decide whether to overtake how I normally do – put on a burst of speed and increase the distance before reverting to a more normal pace – or whether I should just keep pedaling as I had been. In the end I put on a little bit of speed to overtake comfortably but not too much speed so that it looked like I was trying to overtake someone who had overtaken me. I then continued at my usual pace and was well away from red-bike-woman. As I reached the intersection where most people go left but I go right, she was about 20 metres behind. She caught me at the lights just as they changed from red to green and, thankfully, we went separate ways.