South Riding 11: Horsham

When I lived here it was not surrounding by all the fencing and keep-out notices. It is the old gatehouse to Denne Park and when I was there it stood open to the world beside the pathway. Now it is a closed-off private space, a privileged enclave.

Of course there was no way I could have ever afforded to live in such a place - except it was a shared rental. My wife and I rented the ground floor rooms but it was not self-contained.  The front door and hall were common with the person who lived upstairs and our rooms were just as open as any ground floor in any single occupancy house. Luckily the arrangement worked fine and it allowed us to live in an interesting building

I remember the 1976 summer of the heat and the drought and how lucky we were. Because of its thick stone walls it was always cool. Surrounded by open fields yet only a short walk from the town centre, it was the perfect place to spend a long hot summer. It was also here that my son was born and so it has some happy memories.

When I wrote about Sutton I mentioned my daughter was born in a large hospital. It took-over the birth: all monitoring machines and medical staff, with me banished to the waiting room. Horsham was very different: a small cottage hospital with just a midwife in attendance. I can remember two things very clearly. The first was indigestion: at lunch time the midwife had told me it would still be some time  so I should go and get something to eat. I went home and was half way through some sardines on toast when I got a call to say “come straight away!” Bike out, cycling at top speed, it was not long before I started to taste those fish again. The other thing was the oxygen. When my son was born he did not cry immediately so had to be given oxygen but the valve on the new cylinder was very tight and the midwife did not have the strength to open it. That had to be my job and probably it is the most direct contribution I have made to the births of any of my three children.

Horsham was also the place where I got back on a bike. I had not cycled for a number of years (since a previous bike had been stolen) but here I bought a new one specifically to commute to Crawley. I could have carried on with the train ( it was a perfectly easy journey) but I thought cycling would be more fun. I almost gave up though after my first ride, as I felt nauseous with the effort after such a long lay-off. But I was not put-off because I had experience to fall back on. The first training session of the season or hard ride after a lay-off had often left me feeling green. It soon passes though and I tended to think of it as an initiation rite into getting fit again. It was the same this time and the journey soon became routine.

South Riding 10: To Horsham

Breakfast was I the conservatory and at 7:45 the sun already felt hot. My first reaction was “this is nice”, followed immediately by “No. I don't want it too hot!” – for every up there is a down!

One of the best things about credit card cycle touring is the breakfast. It is only when I stay in hotels or B&Bs that I have a cooked breakfast and it always feels like a bit of a treat. Odd little things – I always start with orange juice, always enjoy the orange juice, but never drink it at home. Why? ... I have no idea. Perhaps it is a matter of ritual. Away from home I take my time and slowly, rather deliberately get ready for the day. At home I go into the kitchen and grab a bowl of muesli and a cup of tea. It is a matter of habit (breakfast is probably the most habitual of all meals). The advantage is that you do it quickly and easily because you don't think about it. The down-side is that you don't think abut it. Perhaps I should learn a lesson, slow things down, pay attention and add some variety.

Anyway I got on my way in may calm breakfast mood and the temperature perfect – a warm summer day but not too hot. Even better the my route to Horsham was lovely cycling: small quiet roads twisting through wood and farmland. Past Rusper, I even had the exhilarating luxury of a long, fast downhill, where you could enjoy the sensation of air rushing past. Brilliant! For the first and only time on my ride I felt like a cycle tourist, enjoying the beauty of the countryside. 

Into Horsham and of all the places on my journey this is the one which is most changed. Riding from the station to the town centre I am a little baffled: the road seems to have changed, loops further East. There are new office buildings and the Carfax, which always seemed like the natural focal point of the town, is hidden behind new shopping precincts. I look around trying to picture how it as it was when I lived here but it is very difficult. I soon abandon the effort and just look at what is in front of me. What I see is rather pleasant: a bustling, prosperous town with enough of its older buildings intact, mixed in with the new. 

Of all the places on my tour it is probably the one that I would not mind living in again. But I don’t really believe in going  – only in journeys of remembrance.

South Riding 9: End Of Day 1

Day 1 draws to a close. For any of you who are still reading, I apologise. It must seem like a very long day of endless wittering. On the bike it felt longer  and by the time I got to the guest house I was completely spent.

66.5 miles with a lot of extra wandering around. It had been a very full day from 8 o'clock in the  morning to 5:15.

There was one final act of cruelty. The guest house I had booked into  was near the top of a hill. Not a huge incline but when all I wanted was a shower a lay down, it felt as tough as a tough thing. But when I arrived everything was good. It was nice and comfortable and the owners were very friendly.

Time to unpack and see what I had got wrong – I always get something wrong with my packing. Today it was the lid on the small tube of shower gel had somehow come loose and the inside of my washbag was covered in sticky gunk. But I had not forgotten anything and so l had got away lightly.

Anyway after a couple of pints of beer and a meal at the local pub I almost felt revived and settled down in my room to watch the 10,000km at the European Championships.

This being a running blog and all that, I have to mention how great it was to see the two British runners dominate the race. As for Mo Farrah I thought he looked beautiful in the way he flowed. He is built for distance running: small, slight of frame, with proportionately long limbs. He has grace.

Of those characteristics of a distance runner the only one I can match is  I am fairly short. For the rest I am solidly built (which a could be changed a bit by loosing some weight) and have short legs in proportion to my body and nobody would look at my running style and say it flowed. Ho hum. The only consolation I have is that for my sort of non-competitive running it doesn't matter, my only objective is to make the best of what I have. I may not be ideally built but at least I can try.

South Riding 8: Salfords

This was an odd house: a semi detached with the two halves built at different times. Ours was built in the 1960s and attached to a much older cottage.

The original house was on an enormous plot of land that was divided in two, as a result we had a very long but thin garden, big enough to be divided into several areas. We had a rockery with alpines, a small pond, lawn, flower area, and vegetables. The trouble was both my wife and I were working, with commutes, and did not have enough time to look after it properly, so it gave both pleasure and dissatisfaction in equal measure.

But the dissatisfaction loomed large when we moved house as we were very concerned not have too large a garden. We were too conservative about what we could manage and as a result our present garden is a little bit too small. So this house is one part of a moral lesson: when making decisions do not over compensate (in other words put your concerns in perspective).

When I think about the garden I also think of a couple of accidents: me on unstable steps, trimming the hedge and falling gracelessly into the pond. No serious damage was done so I emerged damp, rather sheepish and acutely aware of my dumb streak. The other was my wife being speared by a long shard of thorn that lodged so firmly it hung from her hand like a dagger. We went to the the nearest A&E and then waited for hours. People came in after us and were treated beforehand but we still waited. When we were seen the doctor was surprised to see half a branch hanging from the hand and the extent of the injury. He remarked that the admissions nurse described it as a splinter and so it had been given a low priority. Sometimes forget how much the health service has improved over the past 10 years.

There is also a lesson in that experience: definitions matter and you have to be vigilant when being defined by someone else.

Not only was the house a bit odd, Salfords itself is not easy to characterise. It seems one of those places identified as being between other towns or en route to somewhere else. Sometimes all the traffic stops and then it feels very quiet. I remember this sense of stillness in the aftermath of the great storm of 1987. For several days fallen trees stopped the trains and road traffic was also badly hampered. I used to go to the footbridge over the railway just to listen to the sound of emptiness. Luckily our house wasn’t damaged and so my main memory was how it brought the street together. We were all outside looking around, talking to each other, trying to make sense of what had happened. As the electricity was down, those with gas cookers offered to make tea for those of us who totally electric.

The devastation was great and the surrounding woodlands and forests lost a lot of trees. I can remember a load of people on the television and radio getting hugely sentimental about the trees. But every so often things need to be cleared and renewed. I actually think places like Ashdown Forest were improved by the storm.

That is another moral: every so often things have to be cleared and renewed and that applies just as much to habits and attitudes as it does to landscape and structures.

Wow three lessons from one visit! I had no idea that this house would be so instructive.

South Riding 7: Coulsdon to Salfords

The journey between Coulsdon and Salfords is very familiar. When I lived at Salfords I worked in Croydon this was part of my route. It was not the same as Sutton when I had to cycle, instead I rode a couple of times a week with the aim of keeping fit. It was probably the first time I had ever done anything just for fitness; previously it had always been a by-product. If I commuted by bike – well that was the way it had to be; if I played games – then I wanted to be able to keep up.

The thing that surprised me this time was how much I had forgotten. When I passed the M23 junction I thought Redhill was not far away.  But I was puzzled whenI came upon some houses so quickly “I didn’t think it was that close” I said to myself - it wasn't. I had completely forgotten about Merstham. How had that happened?

I might not have remembered a village but I was very aware there was going to be a stiffish hill on the other side of Redhill and I didn't know how well I would cope. I was feeling very tired and rather dwelt upon the prospect. In the event it wasn't to bad (low gear, maintain cadence, job done). It was bigger in my imagination than in reality - like many things.

This is one of my weaknesses: I tend to build up difficulties. Sometimes it makes it almost impossible to get out of the door as I put off facing something or other. It was after all only seven hours ago that I was standing, very apprehensive, at the start of this journey and could easily have looked for an excuse to put it off (and almost did when I had the puncture). It is the same with running. I like run in the morning before I start to think. If I leave it too long I become prey to doubts and fears: do I really feel like it? Will it be unpleasant? Am I fit enough? Have I got the right plan? Am I going to feel better or worse? Am I tired? Invariably when I get out and get on with it these thoughts dissolve and I feel the pleasure and/or the satisfaction. But damn it those mental barriers can build up.

Anyway after the hill the rest was plain cycling  and I came to my old house with a sense of satisfaction knowing this was the last stop of the day before the guest house and rest.

South Riding 6: Coulsdon

This was the last house my parents owned before retiring to the coast, and probably their most valuable. Coming back to it, I now realise realise that this journey, which I initially thought was about me revisiting my past, is just as much about their life story.

Although there are only a few miles between Colliers Wood, their first home together, and this leafy suburb, they feel like different worlds. Here there is space: the house backs onto open parkland with a short walk to some Downs. It is a perfectly pleasant place to live and one can feel content here. The change represents the career progression of my father and the careful way he used each move as a way of moving gradually up the property ladder.

The older I get the more I respect my parents and the way they managed their lives. My father came back from the war, and the campaigns in North Africa and Italy, switched from the more manual side of being a telephone engineer into an administrative role and then managerial posts. All his working life was spent within the same organisation: British Telecoms (even though when he started it was the telecommunications half of the GPO (General Post Office)). Within the organisation there was an expectation that people would stay for a working life and that there would be opportunities for progression and a chance for different types of jobs. It was its own ecosystem and typical of the time; people worked for ICI, Shell or Unilever with exactly the same attitude and expectations. It was a world built on an assumption of stability, managed career paths and final salary pensions.

The thing is that for 35 years after the War this compact, and its underlying economic and business model, worked. There was a gradual rise in the standard of living for almost everybody and especially for middle-income families, with a gradual decline in the differentials between the wealthy and the rest of the population.

My father’s working life spanned this period. A time when there was an underlying attitude of optimism: that things could be beneficially planned, and new means better. In America they call my parent’s generation, the people who fought the War, ‘The Greatest Generation’ and I can understand why. It is not just the War and all that was endured; it is the way countries were rebuilt afterwards.

South Riding 5: Sutton to Coulsdon

When I lived in Sutton my parents were still in Coulsdon so I am familiar with this route. It was a straightforward ride apart from waitingt an age to turn right at a T junction into Wallington High Street. There must be some psychological data about how long we can wait at junctions before we begin to get antsy. With me if there are continuous lines of traffic on both sides then I will settle back and wait but if the traffic comes in clumps with the gap one side being cancelled out by traffic the other, I begin to worry that I will never get out and there are gaps I have missed. At that point I repeat to myself: "there always is a gap". Nobody has ever got stuck at a traffic junction for the rest of their lives but is amazing how long short amounts of time can seem when held up in traffic.

Other than that there is not much to say about cycling through South London suburban streets. It is pleasant enough but not visually stimulating. However I wasn't worried about visual stimulation. I was starting to feel a bit hot and tired and needing a café stop.

Coulsdon itself was a surprise because I expected it to be relatively unchanged, apart from a few shop fascias. Suburban, commuter towns, full of houses from the 30s, tend to be fairly static with well maintained houses, quiet roads and a main street of medium sized supermarkets, smaller shops and cafes. Coulsdon is like that except its main street was the A23 and this has partly defined its character – a bit of a bottleneck with rows of traffic. But now there is a new bypass and the centre of town is unnaturally quiet.

This picture is a little unfair in illustrating the emptiness of the town centre with the site of a demolished building because it should be temporary. But I think it has looked like this for a few years as Aldi have been planning a supermarket since 2005, so something has gone wrong. It used to be the Red Lion, a large pub building that had previously been a coaching inn. It was visually the most arresting building in the town centre and now it is just a gaping hole. You don't know how important the look of these buildings are to a sense of place until they are gone.

They have tried to make it look more pleasant with new paving, flowers and seats but it is neither one thing nor another. To me it just feels a little dead. It is also a pity that no sooner does the council lay some decorative paving than a utility company digs up part of it and the repair is hideously inadequate.

However I was not really too bothered. The only thing on my mind was Café Nero and an ice cold fruit booster, with a pastry. As I stretched out my legs and relaxed in a comfy chair I conducted a mental check: legs tired, bum tender, left hand sore (where it rested on the handlebar), and head far too hot. Conclusion I needed a rest. How nice it would be to stop for the day; but no chance – the bed and breakfast was still about 18 miles away

There was a copy of the Times to read with an article about Tim Don (can’t link to it because of the pay wall). In it he said he cycled 300km and ran 100km each week. Hmm – put my little escapade in perspective. He also said he got through 25 pairs of trainers a year. That seems a bit excessive – they must do a very low mileage before being changed.

The example of so much mileage put my tiredness in perspective and it didn't take too long to put soft thoughts in their place, buckle up and get on.

South Riding 4: Sutton

The first house I owned was one of these two up two down terraced cottages.

Looking round the street I am surprised how little it has changed - there is not even much double glazing. I was half expecting the area to have been gentrified: a conservation area of Victorian housing in a prosperous borough, with easy links to the centre of London would seem to tick a few boxes. But no, if anything it looks a little bit shabbier.

However it still has the sense of quietness I remember. It is odd how some streets, just a few yards from busy streets or near a town centre can be quite peaceful. Not picturesque but reasonably communal.

I am struck by the wheelie bins and how awkward they are for small terraced houses. There is nowhere for them to hide. Our modern townscapes are characterised by the difficulty of finding spaces for wheelie bins and cars.

From the point of view of a running blog the most interesting thing about my time in Sutton is that it was when I was the fittest I have ever been.

I worked in Central London and not only was I not tremendously well paid, I had a family with a young son and a new house. In other words money was very tight. So I cut the commuter bill by cycling: 14 miles twice a day, 5 days a week, throughout the year. It did wonders for my fitness but the strange thing was, as it was a by-product, I didn’t immediately notice the changes: they crept up on me when I wasn't looking. There were however a couple of moments that showed me something was happening. The first was when I went to buy a shirt. I asked for what I thought was my size but the man queried it and asked to measure my neck. He was right – my neck had shrunk by a full inch. The second happened on holiday, in a cottage with a paved courtyard. For no good reason I started to play hopscotch like a kid, bounding from paving stone to paving stone. My legs felt like springs and I just enjoyed the sensation of bouncing up and down. The feeling of being alive was like a surge of electricity; something I don’t think I have ever replicated.

From this I know the importance of consistent exercise. To get truly fit you have to exercise for a decent amount of time (but not necessarily at high intensity), nearly every day, week after week, without respite. I could do it when commuting because I had no choice but running is a voluntary activity and it is much more difficult. Too often I fall off the wagon, have interruptions, periods where I feel too lethargic and can’t be bothered, and there are long stretches where I fail to maintain a routine. The barriers are all mental: the need for self discipline and the ability to maintain an inner compulsion. They are made more difficult because the benefits are not immediately obvious - they arrive gradually.

These small houses on a very ordinary street remind me how great those benefits can be if you just keep going for long enough.

South Riding 3: Colliers Wood to Sutton

The next stage from Colliers Wood to Sutton may only have been a few miles but it represented a gap of 19 years and a separate world. When I lived in Sutton I was in my 20s, married, with an infant son, getting in on with work and my own nuclear family. I never thought of visiting the place of my childhood, even though I was close, mentally it seemed very remote. It might be a sign of age that I am now going back, trying to knit together the different phases of my life, whereas when I was younger I was only concerned with what was in front of me, immersed in day-to-day life. Changes and continuities, both personally and in general, now fascinate me. It is for example one of the reasons I love running by my canal because along it I can see the traces of the 19th and 20th centuries.

Anyway if I am looking for threads on this journey this section has one so thick it is the size of a cable: St Helliers, Carshalton, was the hospital where both myself and my elder daughter were born. This would not be unusual in fixed communities where generations of families stayed put; but we had moved about. It is almost random chance we share a birthplace.

As I cycled nearby I wondered how my father got there to visit my mother during her stay. At the time he had no car, so he must have gone by bus but it would have been an awkward journey and I don’t know how long it would have taken or how he managed his work day. It is a small detail but one I will never know. I do know that at the time the National Health Service treated new fathers almost as if they were a nuisance which had to be managed. St Helliers is a big hospital and the maternity unit was round the back, via a convoluted route. Fathers were allowed only one hour visiting time, strictly enforced, but timed not from arrival at the ward but from when the front gates swung open. All the new fathers used to gather outside and then run to the ward so they could spend as much of the hour as possible with their wives and new babies.

It is in such details that we can see some of the big changes in social attitudes.

My parents are both dead and I can no longer ask about the details of their lives: neither their lives before children nor the things I didn't notice as a child. I regret I did not ask enough, was not interested enough, when I was younger. I regret they both died comparatively young.

These thoughts washed over me as I cycled this section of my route. A wave of sadness on an otherwise an enjoyable day.

A Slight Pause

I have never been good at timing. So no sooner do I start writing about my cycle trip then I have to interrupt it.

I will now be going on holiday for a couple of weeks. But when I return I will complete my account as well as writing something about running in France

In the meantime I hope everybody has a good time: either running or having other adventures.

South Riding 1 - The Begining

The Ridings are my physical challenge for the year. In three cycling tours I plan to visit all the places I have lived. The South Riding covers London and south of the river, North Riding extends to Farndon near Chester, and includes Birmingham, whilst the East Riding is a loop of Colchester, Cambridge and Nottingham.


8 o'clock in the morning and I was feeling quite apprehensive about actually starting the ride. Although I have regularly cycled through my life I have never toured or even gone on a very long ride (The most I have done in a day is about 35 miles and recently I have not been cycling that frequently, perhaps about once a week). I would thus be going into the unknown without much preparation. Lack of endurance would emerge later but there was a more immediate problem - I did't really know where I was going.

That last sentence sounds plain daft because heading off without a clue would be bizarre but there is a world of difference between knowing the destination and knowing the route. I knew once I crossed the river I would be OK because I know how places relate to each other but my sense of North West London is vague and I had to ride through it.

I had been to theTransport for London site for a cycle route but it is broken down into short sections and I know I could not keep it all in my head. So I fixed a few key places in my mind and looked hard at the map to remember the shapes and hoped that will get me through

10 minutes later and I was even more concerned as I had a puncture. A shard of metal had worked its way into my rear tyre - bugger! "This is not well omened" I thought "perhaps I should just cut some slack and take the train to Euston, where I would know my way." Oh the temptations you have when you stopped beside the road struggling with a tight tyre.

On the other hand a couple of miles is too short a distance to start changing plans and still retain some honour. So onwards I went.

It was strange to be cycling with full panniers - my whole rhythm changed: I went more steadily, in a lower gear, with the main concern: conserving energy. It was all very pleasant to begin with as the roads were not too crowded and I felt strong and as I looked around I started singing to myself. "Perhaps the day would be alright after all!" In fact the first half was trouble free, even the Hanger Lane gyratory system (because you can cycle through the middle of it). Traffic only got miserably snarled in Chiswick and around Hammersmith but even then there were odd patches of pleasure as I whizzed along the bus lane past stationary and frustrated car drivers.

My route took me over Putney Bridge (chosen because I always like to tip my hat to the site of the Putney Debates and remember the tradition of English radical thought. Any church that carries the inscription "I think that the poorest he that is in England hath a life to live, as the greatest he" should be saluted) and past Wimbledon Common. I would be passing the residences of some of the greater he before the houses of the poorer he.

I stopped for lunch in Wimbledon Village and sat at the table opposite was an oriental looking man, napping. I was tremendously impressed by the way he was sitting upright but obviously asleep (I ruled out meditation because his head lulled a bit and when he woke up he did so with a start). "I wish I could do that" I thought - have complete rest and recovery on my stops as well as refuelling.

After that it was a straightforward ride into Colliers Wood. A place easy to spot from a distance because it has one of the ugliest tower buildings in the whole of London (and that is a fierce competition).

South Riding 2 - My First Home

Colliers Wood was where I lived my first 8 years but I have hardly been back. The purpose of the journey is to give me time to wander the streets that bounded my world as a young boy: visiting the schools and parks and remembering random events.

But first the ugliest building in London (looking like it is soon to be demolished as this picture of part of it shows). It near to the bottom of my old street. When I was a child I remember the land being the home of giant rolls of paper from mills along the Wandle. I have a picture in my mind of high red flames and black smoke when they caught fire: one of my random memories. Any way the paper is a connection with where I live now (I have already mentioned John Dickinson a few times in this blog and will probably do so again).

This journey is all about pulling together threads that link places of my life, looking for continuities. Sometimes there are strange links that are almost invisible.

This is a picture of my first school. I look at it now and I think it is rather wonderful. It is the equivalent of late Victorian post-modernism in the way it has a little touch of Gothic mixed with a bit of Arts and Crafts. It was built in 1897 and designed by H P Burke Downing, who in 1905 built a school in Bexhill. Bexhill was the town my parents retired to - a tiny, invisible , inconsequential thread.

It is a GradeII listed building but no longer a general primary school. Instead it is a Muslim school teaching up to GCSEs and training missionaries. It was quite interesting that they were quite suspicious of me wandering around, looking closely at the building, taking pictures and challenged what I wanted. Once I explained, we had a really friendly chat and I actually like it that the building is still a school and has not been turned into apartments.

My house backed onto the school. You can see the wall at the end of the ten foot way, in this photo. The bricks at the top form an apex. One of our rites of passage was to walk along the top, keeping balance with both feet angled at 45º. At first I could only do it by crawling but as I grew a little bigger and bolder I managed to stand upright. I can still remember the sense of achievement, probably a greater sense of satisfaction than anything I achieved in the classroom.

The house I lived in doesn't look a lot different apart from the double glazing, door and driveway for the car. I looks like a 30s house but was built in 1950 (my grandfather gave the building plot to my father as a wedding present). The War probably meant that new housing followed the old templates.

Looking at it I start to remember more. The journey is working - this is what I wanted to happen.

Directly opposite is the old Scout Hall (now Royal Naval Association), called Atlasta Hall because the fund raising took a long time. My grandfather was on the committee that finally got it built. I used to walk along the pathway alongside the hall an into the garden of my grandfather's house. To me it was a place of wonder because it was full of so much stuff: bits of radios, masses of radio equipment, a roll top desk that I loved because it was full of secret drawers (well secret in my imagination), war time binoculars and a flying suit.

I used to spend a lot of time talking to my grandfather (who everybody called Pop). In my mind he looks like Mr Pickwick with a bald head, small round glasses and a comfortable paunch. The shock is that when I was born he was the same age I am now but I can only think of him as an old man pottering around in his garden or with his radios.

Perhaps that is what I have become an old man pottering around with his running and computer.