We're Feeling Moby Dick!

Hello blog lovers.

Me!

It's the last days of holidays, some kids have already gone to school but today I have a free day!  No kids, nothing!  Darren was waiting for an answer about whether I could meet up for a 'Training Ride' with some other ladies, but I was still waiting for a text last night to see if I was needed today.  It had arrived too late and Darren then booked himself to lead a spin class instead!

Which left me with a free day to do sweet nothing!  Until my sister had seen my post to Darren saying I had no kids!  She rang me this morning and encourage me to go for a bike ride!  She wanted to go to Eynsford.  But I wasn't 'feeling' Eynsford.  So I suggested The White Bear route.  Ok so it's a shorter route, it has one bastard hill, but with having all day to do it, add extra roads, maybe even get lost a bit, we could make it fun!

But Bims wasn't 'feeing' White bear.  But then she suggested up town.  Up to London, have a lunch, maybe even try the Wibbly Wobbly, if not the Moby Dick!  Well, we were both 'feeling' Moby Dick.  The Moby Dick route is a doable one!  We have all day, the weather looks stupendous and there is no pressure to pedal fast or anything!

I was still thinking the White Bear by the time she came to my house, but London it was!  I started to procrastinate.  First off, Bims was going all bloomin pc with the helmet thing.  I hate wearing my helmet, I didn't even know where it was, but of course we had to find it.  Then I had to find my gloves, and my glasses, and whatever else I may need.  And then off course to pump up my tyres up!  I haven't been on my bike for ages!

Eventually I think we set off about 11;30 ish!  I have no idea, broken Garmin!  Plus Bims had forgotten to bring hers along as well!  But we know the mileage more or less, so it don't matter so much.

We set off and headed for Beckenham.  Already I started to feel better!  Yeah, I think this is going to be a perfect day!  We pedalled and twiddled, and snaked our way all the way through to Cater park.  We can do this almost blind folded now!  Once we got to Cator Park we were just so relaxed, enjoying just being out in the last throes of summer.

I do love this ride, this route!  It is just perfect, virtually no traffic to worry about, well from Cator Park that is.  With just a few little roads its a very easy ride, and not hilly whatsoever!  Just getting to the park is where the hills are!

We followed the little water way, which is where the name comes from the Water Way Link, and now that the kids are at school it is really quiet too!  We have to go over a few bridges to get to our ultimate goal but there was this one bridge in particular. To get over it you have to take a 'run' at it, to get up over the hump.  But as I was 'going for it' I slowed down and then stopped on the bridge.  I spotted a group of gentlemen, wearing waders and wellies, and it looks like they were about to make a brew!  Their van had Thames something or other written on it and they were cleaning up the waters, weeding and generally looking after all our water ways, ponds and lakes, for our wildlife!

"You shouldn't have stopped" they said to me  And I had to be honest and say that I was being nosey!  And also thought that they were about to make a cuppa!  "Would you like one then" said another chat! "Well, that would be very gentlemanly of you" I said.  And the next minute we dismounted, helmets off and a cuppa put in our hands!

Now that wouldn't have happened if we to Eynsford or the White bear!  We had such a lovely time, just chatting with the 5 or 6 gentlemen and Lucy the dog!  I wished I had taken a photo of these guys, they were just so friendly!  Then to top it all one of them came out with a bag of onion bhaji and chocolate biscuits!  Heaven!  Although I didn't take the bhajis, a choc biscuit to dunk in my tea was just the job.

After a few more minutes we said our goodbyes and then carried on a way, with a smile on a faces, and just a renewed sense of 'kindness' in the world we live in. We were riding along towards Lewisham and just before we got out of the park we passed a group of ladies who I recognise.  They were the Breeze Ladies on one of the weekly outings!  Also on the way to Surrey Quays we pass a friends office Big E, I wondered if he would be in his office today!  Probably expecting a cuppa would probably be expecting to much!  But I sent a text to say we would be riding past very soon!

He did come our to say hello!  He is bike crazy, he likes to look over bikes, they man rides mega miles in just one day!  He rode back from Doncaster just a few weeks ago, and there is me, wanting to do nice short easy, flat routes!  With pub and tea stops thrown in of course!

After we chatted for just a few minutes we carried on.  The Moby Dick is now put on hold as Bims fancied trying the Wibbly Wobbly, its a pub on a boat, or at least the boat is the pub!  But when we got there it was closed!  So it deffo was the Moby Dick for us!

Bims, and our
lunches

I couldn't get my
leg over!

We had a great lunch there, took pictures of course, of lunch drinks and ourselves!  Then we made our way to a huge sports store Decathlon.  I had told Bims that it's a big place and would deffo do something nice for her, a cycling jersey, at a reasonable price!  It said so, on the walls and floors, "Over 70 sports" catered for!  I can't even think of 70 sports!









We asked the chap for the cycling section! Of course it was quite obvious,

She could!

it was were all the bikes were!  We walked over to it and looked for the clothing.  We looked behind the long aisle of male clothing, and we looked along the next aisle.  "Oh here how about this" says Bims. "Its running stuff" I told her.  So we decided to ask someone.  He showed us where the womens section of cycling clothing is!

Well! I couldn't believe it. If you take the size of a football field, fill it with 70 sports equipment and accompany 'stuff' and gear, the mens cycling gear would be the size of say the goal posts, the ladies section would be just a quarter of that!  If indeed that is not being too generous!  We just left, totally disappointed!  Even asked the stuff if there was an Aldi's near by!

We began to make our way home riding all the way back through where we had ridden earlier!  There were more children about now as the first day of school had finished, yet the park at Ladywell was clear.  I made sure I was in front of Bims, and totally focused on cycling without stopping, but I could hear her "It's clear" and then again "There's no one here" and still "Come on"  I replied "no" of course.  I wasn't going to try and get on that one piece of apparatus that we tried once before!  Bims peed her pants and I am sure a little bit of wee came out as well as we both fell about laughing to get on it!  No that was not going to happen today!

It didn't take long to get to Cator Park, and then Beckenham!  But as we were going through there I got a puncture!  Darn it!  But the thing is, the tube in my bag was an old one!  I had forgotten to replace it!!  So I walked up to the high street, Bims rode up there and bought me a new tube.  My bike all fixed we made our way to our last watering hole The Richmal Compton at Bromley South!

Just had we had finished our refreshment then the rain started!  With just 10 or so minutes to get back home it wasn't so bad!  A great ride and we met a great bunch of guys too!  I am so glad that we went up to London today, a nice easy, un-pressured, none training day, perfect fun bike ride!

Cheers everyone!

Cheers!