A Village at War

On Saturday morning we set off on the return ride from Street to Bristol, heading towards Frome. In an attempt to avoid the traffic I had plotted a convoluted route through winding lanes and small villages. Although pretty, progress was slow. In two and a half hours we had covered less than twenty miles. It was also very hilly. Mick at one stage decided he had had enough and tried to hitch a lift.

Unable to get a ride, we carried on to the A37. Stopping for a refuelling of calories at a garage, we felt somewhat downhearted. At this rate it would take us months to do the end-to-end ride. We realised that whilst we would try and avoid main trunk roads on the Ride Proper, we could not waste too much time on very minor roads either.

We detoured into Nunney on our way into Frome. Nunney castle was never intended as a defensive structure. It was built in the 1370's by a local knight, Sir John de la Mere. He obviously had quite a high opinion of himself, and after returning from France he decided that he would build himself a home in the style of a French castle. It may come in handy however, as apparently war has broken out in the village.

We discovered that all was not well in this most pretty of places whilst innocently sitting on a bench eating our sandwiches. We were admiring the village which, in our naeivity we thought must be a splendid place in which to live out one's days in peace and tranquility. Not so. The controversy is over a green planter which has been placed next to the castle wall and which has metaphorically divided the village. Organised by the local committee, some residents do not think it is in keeping with its surroundings. A man was filling the offending article with soil and in the half-hour that we were there, three people took the trouble to tell him that they thoroughly disapproved of the scheme. Despite his assurances that it would look lovely when it was finished they evidently were not swayed. After being berated by a woman who was about ninety, he sighed.
"I've known that lady for twenty years", he said ruefully. "I doubt she'll ever speak to me again. I was only getting rid of some spare top soil."

It just goes to show that even in Paradise we humans would find something to moan about. Someone would complain that the golden tree was blocking their light or that the bird song was waking them up too early.

We made our exit from Nunney and high-tailed it into Frome. Mindful of time, we took the main roads to Bradford-on-Avon which certainly did improve our time if not our nerves.

Bradford-on-Avon is one of my favourite places. It was a prosperous textile town until the nineteenth century when the wollen industry moved north to Yorkshire and the Other Bradford. It still seems to do pretty well though. It is also home to the famous Alex Moulton Bicycle Company, designers of the classic small wheeled bicycle. Alex Moulton also designed the suspension for the original Mini.

We stopped for a cup of tea at the Kennet and Avon Canal Trust cafe and then, as the sun was shining we thought we would gongoozle for a bit at the canalside. A long held dream of living on a narrowboat was resurrecting itself....

Being a lovely day the towpath was thronged with people and we carefully pushed and picked our way along to Avoncliffe. I have mentioned before that our cycling style is ambling with plenty of stops, and we did indeed stop once again at the Cross Guns for a pint of Tunnel Vision from The Box Steam Brewery. Sitting at the bottom of the garden is a lovely spot to admire John Rennie's aqueduct.



The ride from here to Bath was gorgeous, crossing the other aqueduct at Dundas and under the two hundred year old bridges at Sydney Gardens.



Travelling from Bath to Bristol was straightforward and familiar along the Bristol And Bath Railway Path; the first Sustrans project. Another example of the Beeching Axe, the line, part of the Midland Railway was closed in the late sixties as it was "un-economic". At the time the government argued that many services could be provided more cheaply by buses, and promised that all abandoned rail services would have their places taken by bus services. Since then, of course, we have had the further public transport disaster of bus deregulation. This morning I read that First, who have no effective competition, are withdrawing even more rural bus services across the West, from a service which is already woefully inadequate and ridiculously expensive. Grrr.

We coasted into Fishponds, off the path and home. Today's ride, sixty four miles. We thought we had done rather well and treated ourselves to a Chinese takeaway and a carry out from Humpers, which has been listed in Camra's Good Beer Guide for many years, and is the only off-licence I know which serves real ales on draught. This week it was Hidden Quest from the excellent Hidden Brewery in Wiltshire which we enjoyed very much. Cheers!