31 May 2014 (cloudy, mild) 37km

As with real estate,the number one priority with camping is, location…..location……location…!

Last night produced the perfect site.  Just off the quiet minor road we were travelling on, corner section, beautiful part of the country, close enough in biking terms to major facilities, schools, supermarkets, coffee shops and pubs.(that’s approximately two hours riding time ).

We situated the tent at the far end of the section, which meant we had a small back garden and a lovely sprawling front lawn. It also provided us with enough time to view potential knife wielding attackers creeping up on us out here in “Hicksville”.

Our neighbours were all the landed gentry that this part of the country happens to be full of and best of all, they didn’t know we were there.

However, after our 5 star sleep last night at Burlington House in Oxford, this was a -5 star affair.

I woke (I say woke, which implies I fell asleep) feeling like a “bag o spanners”.  I had rolled around all over the place during the night trying to get comfortable using my core to keep me from listing to one side, like a sinking ship.  In fact the only “core” involved was the “cor blimey, that was a crap night” that I muttered upon ejecting myself from the tent at 4.12am, to have a pee. In fact anyone who knows me would realise this was the watered down version of what was said.

This was accompanied by vast amounts of gas, which I can only believe came from the steak and ale pie I devoured at The White Hart Inn the previous night.

At 5am as I was entering this account, we were suddenly involved in a scene from Mary Poppins.  A beautiful baby deer stood looking into our tent, head cocked, wondering when the new neighbours had moved in. He was in all truthfulness, gorgeous, as he bounded away to hook up with his mum, who was calling him. Pigeons were cooing from an early hour and to cap it off, a squirrel and rabbit hopped across in front of our home for the night.

Our surprise visitor at 5am this morning

About to pack up and hit the road when the deer came back.  We had the camera at the ready and although the light was still pretty dismal due to the early hour and cloud cover, we managed to snap some photos of our little visitor.  We watched and photographed quietly for about twenty minutes before he realised he was getting a bit close to this foreign looking object in his field and moved away.

Packed up and on the road by 6.30 am after an efficient pack up of our camping equipment and gear.  There’s nothing like being on a country lane first thing in the morning especially when you’re an outlaw on the run because you forget to pay for your coffees at the pub the night before.  No-one around, only the sound of the birds and the cool morning air on your face as you made your way along.  Followed a stream on our right hand side and followed that to a ford. 

Fortunately in England, they provided us with a pedestrian bridge over which we crossed the ford whereas any vehicles that came this way had to drive through two feet of water.  Checked ourselves a couple of times to see that we were on course, and came upon Elstree School, a very old boys boarding school for boys aged 4 and upwards.  It’s a feeder school for the well known Harrow and Eton (Hoorah Hazaar Tally ho!).  As we cycled past, we could smell the bacon and eggs cooking and wondered if they’d fancy feeding us in return for a geography/travel lesson.  Bet the boys would have enjoyed that way more than learning about onomatopoeia and other such useless time wasters.  

adorable cottage that we passed this morning

Into the small village of Woolhampton where, at the village store we bought a delicious chicken, bacon and salad roll, a long sausage roll and two cups of tea each.  Sat on the deck outside, plugged into the owner’s wifi and caught up with our other lives.

That was a perfect little stop and after breakfast we cycled along more lovely English lanes but the sign posting was a bit haphazard and we ended up veering off our planned route and onto the busy A340.  Thought we’d stop at the Curiosi Tea Rooms for a toilet break and a coffee and to check where we were with google maps and where we should be going to avoid the traffic.  This tearooms was something else.  Full to bursting with individual delicate pieces of china, (some of which were used to serve our coffee and Eve’s tarts), pieces of old furniture, bread bins and other curios.  But best find of all in this shop was Emma who served us lovely coffees along with some very funny tales and local information.  We laughed our way through easily an hour and even though we couldn’t access Google Maps, we were very glad we’d stopped there.  Then followed a death-defying ride uphill on the A340 for two miles into Basingstoke.  It really was like riding a tightrope on our bikes as cars and trucks came within inches and we tried to maintain a straight line without a deviation for fear of being roadkill.

Then we came across the ring road roundabout, and if we thought the A340 was bad, this roundabout really was like playing chicken with fast moving vehicles.  So we opted out of this ratrace and chose the only other road available to us, even though it appeared to be going in the wrong direction, and stumbled across a bike path which took us under the ring road and straight into the town centre. Here after asking one of the locals we were given directions to St Michaels church where we had arranged to meet our friend Dools, who was picking us up to take us to the Isle of Wight.  With time to kill, we wandered through the town centre.  

Pete wanted to join the troupe and show them some new moves

Here in the middle of a crowded shopping mall, we came upon another of England’s quirky features, Morris dancers.  Yes, here in a packed shopping centre were a dozen  people, men and women, poncing around with fruit bowls on their heads performing strange gyrations and smacking tamborines, wearing bells on their ankles and strange clothing. Still, great for a laugh, although I very much doubt they think it’s funny. Ended up lunching at a French restaurant where we could sample the local fare and Pete could practice his outrageous Monty Python French accent (you Eeenglish pig dogs, I spit in your gen-er-al direction).  As we are travelling with Dools to Portsmouth, our final mileage total for the day is 37 kms.

Later….. Dools got held up in traffic on the M25 and didn’t get to Basingstoke til after 4pm (you order a taxi at 3 and they’re over an hour late, huh!) but he was very well organised with bike rack and plenty of bungees to stow our bikes on the back of his car and all our panniers in the back.  Took about an hour to reach the ferry in Portsmouth and we left port at 5.30pm, the journey over to the Isle of Wight taking 45 mins.  It’s bigger and more populated than we imagined with 100km of coastline and some large towns to drive through.  Went to a very large Tesco’s supermarket where we were impressed with the prices and range of stock and had fun filling up our trolley with supplies.  Got a little bit lost getting to the Sandhills Caravan Park in Bembridge but finally got there at 8pm and unpacked our groceries and belongings and generally got settled in and ate tea at 9pm.  It had been a long day for the two of us and by 10.30pm we gratefully retired to a comfortable bed with clean sheets (thanks Dools), for a great nights sleep.