sussex
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Winding On
An old point and shoot, one roll of film. A week off work. Aeroplane mode, wider world switched off. Perhaps an audiobook in one ear. The sun stays close to the wide crisp horizon, bright light skims the surface of the sea followed by my eyes. Low waves lazily sparkle and ripple towards the shingle.…
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Beach Bivi Beach
8pm Thursday to 8am Friday
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Island Hopping
I make coffee in the almost-light that waits for sunrise. Shouldering the bike down the front steps into a silent city, the main road empty other than a gang of gulls ransacking the bins outside the local chippy. Urban foxes, an air of insolence and disobedience skulk suburban streets. Without the white noise drizzle of…
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Grey
No one bats an eyelid, raises an eyebrow, or tuts when a suggestion is made to drop down from the Downs to find coffee and some tarmac, maybe even the coastal suburbs to home. A quiet consensus. The weather hasn’t entirely matched the forecast, overcast has rather been cold driving drizzle. We’ve slipped and sludged…
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Between the Storms
As the day tilts into action a thin gauze of cloud stretches across the sky. A meek light casts weak ghost shadows, there out of the edge of vision but disappear when I turn to look. An upside down world existing in a flooded farm track. The sun rises through a bitterly eye-wateringly sharp wind.…
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The Old Ways and New Ways
Jump on a train west to Chichester to make the most of the forecast weather. Head for home with the wind on my back and scudding clouds and an intermittent shadow for company, looking for a route with as little tarmac as possible rather than the shortest way. Out of the city on back streets…
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From the South Downs to North London
Saturday – Rule 5 Bikes Summer Send Off Meet up with friends at Freedom Bikes, sign on and collect brevet card…and a pen, as usual I’ve forgotten to bring one. There’s a lot of dithering in the street after the pre-ride briefing inside the shop (didn’t listen, sorry Paul, assume it was the usual “Don’t…
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May Day
Awake before the alarm and sun rise. Fall out of bed, flick on the radio. The World Service, still too early for Radio 4. Thick black coffee, teaspoon of sugar. The Shipping Forecast, the long version, inshore waters included. It’s still early but light outside as I bounce the bike down the steps. Freewheel down…
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Out of the Shadows
Paths past garden gates, those neglected places where stinging nettles and wild flowers thrive. Next to a railway line and over a stream that is obscured from view throughout town; behind the houses, buried under streets, channeled through concrete, feeding into the Ouse somewhere in the Railway Land. It’s running high and fast now…
the man from icon 