A pictorial guide to my favourite bike ride

The good news…and the bad news. A few months ago in the depths of winter I had my bike stolen. It was a nice bike, 27-speed Japanese gearing and all that, probably well over-qualified for my generally undemanding recreational needs of tootling round the local village lanes in the dog days of summer. Fortunately, I have been recompensed by the insurers and replaced my wheels with a bike that’s slightly superior.

I have a few routes near home but I really like this one. It’s around 21 miles duration and takes in no less than six villages and passes a whopping ten pubs along its winding way. I seldom, if ever, prop my bike outside any of these pubs, apart from on the way back at the Nag’s Head but I have often done a mental pub-crawl in my head! Just recently I’ve taken to cycling from my home the extra 5-6 mile each way to Woodborough and back up and down a couple of monster hills to complete this distance. At least the view is pretty whizzing down the steep slopes of Bank Hill – even on a hazily sunny day.

A right turn at the junction on the Dover Beck-lined Woodborough Main Street takes us presently past the Four Bells public house, so called after the number of bells in St Swithun’s church which stand diagonally opposite on Main Street.

The Four Bells, Woodborough

The wheels keep rolling through the village and past the afore-mentioned Nag’s Head in the pretty and historic village of Woodborough, Notts. I’ve written about my liking for this place before so I’ll leave it there as I work through the gears down Lowdham Lane and off around the pretty Trent villages.

The Nag’s Head, Woodborough

Lowdham Lane

There are few images of the Springfield Inn at Lowdham to commend it which is a shame. Here’s one I took anyway. This place is a bit of a curiosity I always feel in that, for me, it’s nearer Woodborough and certainly not within either that village or it’s address of Lowdham, rather sitting quietly off the old Epperstone Road. It’s a popular chain-run place these days though not unpleasant for all that. I remember as a teenager though when it was but a fraction of the size and a beautiful cosy pub before anyone had coined the phrase ‘chain eating place’.

The Springfield Inn, Lowdham

In practice, my little bike ride runs past the fourth pub on its journey in the World’s End at Lowdham Grange. Such a lovely rural hostelry with it’s still-remaining open fireplace a welcoming spot in the local countryside after a winter’s day walking. I really can’t comment the World’s End highly enough.

The World’s End, Lowdham

We move on however and it’s down the interesting main street in Lowdham village. The Ship Inn is an old-fashioned country pub in the centre of a popular village, traditional and welcoming, it feels like a home from home. When summer comes it’s possible to tether your bike outside and enjoy the quiet life that is Lowdham Main Street in the afternoon sun. Who wouldn’t want to? The annual Lowdham Book Festival is based opposite during every June. A marvellous and well-respected event for such a relatively small community

The Ship Inn, Lowdham

The Marathon Diaries: Twenty-one up

Sometimes one just gets the bit between the teeth. Yesterday was just such a day. The day was not a particularly auspicious one as I toiled with the psychology report I am taxed to do. Administrative problems with the report were driving my blood pressure skyward and I really needed a complete change of pace and activity for the day.

I had promised myself a longer run, all being well, for the day as it had been a few short months since I’d ran more than 11-12 miles in one session. This had nagged at me mentally and in truth was carving chasms in my confidence regarding running a marathon. At one time of day I was mentally strong and assured enough to contemplate any distance placed in front of me – not so these days. For the day I desired 13 miles as a maximum and would have been comparatively happy with that achievement.

The beginning

So, head in something of a whirl with the frustrations of the day, I set off for my regular starting spot in nearby Woodborough and headed off down the lane pictured above at just after quarter past four. A pleasant afternoon was an encouragement as I hit the River, Trent side, at just after five miles and having passed through the pleasant villages of Lowdham and Caythorpe. Skipping through the cherry tree-lined path on the way to Gunthorpe I realised that I was doing pretty well today – feeling comfortable and about to settle into a long run. After six or seven miles I became fixated with the outlandish idea of running…yes, twenty miles.

A Saturday at Lowdham: Afternoon

Time to return to the WI Hall for two more lectures before the festival would end for another year. Ink in the Blood presented by former newspaper editor Barry Williams and introduced by Nottingham Evening Post Features Editor, Jeremy Lewis was an interesting experience to say the least. Mr. Williams, a very accomplished man and former editor of three large local newspapers for many years including the afore-mentioned Nottingham edition was in Lowdham to talk about his recently written autobiography and seemed to have attracted many of his former work colleagues from the local newspaper to see him. I was struck by this at once as one of the old hacks sat next to me with a loud, self-important and booming voice appeared to believe I was a piece of furniture to be leaned on. Perhaps there had been a few gin and tonics over lunch I mused as I pulled my chair away from his weight. It must actually be a common ignorance that some old journalists have as another of his blue-blazered ‘chums’ appeared to consider my shoulder as a convenient leaning post before I physically took his arm and removed it to his surprise.

A Saturday at Lowdham: Morning

Morning

Last week I had the pleasure of attending the local annual Lowdham Book Festival for a Saturday of literary pursuit. Lowdham is a village just a few short miles from my home and has a special significance for this blog site. It was just a year ago that I attended a lecture given by Mike Atkinson, a free-lance writer and author of the excellent troubled diva blog site. That talk gave me the notion to set this site up after formerly experimenting with a homepage for some time.

The final Saturday at Lowdham is always the most popular and usually packed with events enough to interest anyone held in the several different small venues around the village from a marquee, through a Women’s Institute Hall to an old Methodist Chapel. The day also features a book fair full of bargain reads and is now widening into literary craft displays such as bookbinding.

With so many events overlapping and running simultaneously I tend to choose a few before the day and head for those. On this day my first choice talk Victorian Nottingham was to begin at 10.15am and being a little Saturday morning-tardy I decided not to rush breakfast and took a leisurely drive through the attractive village of Woodborough and over to Lowdham instead.

Walking in the footsteps of the Beat Generation

The Lowdham Book Festival is a healthy, bouncing nine years old at the end of this month and whilst looking forward to I was remembering some of my visits there in the past. One such day began with a ticket to see a presentation and book review of Walking in the footsteps of the Beat Generation.

The day had a musical theme with talks about the work of Bob Dylan’s Wicked Messenger, The History of the Guitar in the 20th Century and a feature on Nick Drake.

I arrived in time for talk by author, Sydney Davies revolving around his book, Walking in the footsteps of the Beat Generation, a presentation about the great writers of that idiom such as Jack Kerouac, William Burroughs, Allen Ginsberg and others.

Come Walk the Green Fields of Nottinghamshire

It’s always the wheels that take us there. Wheels that seem incongruous with a stride through the countryside. When the wheels have stopped and our boots are on, the day takes on a different pace and atmosphere. A different meaning. Time slows and becomes somehow more livable, somehow more rational.We carefully cross the quiet winding lane at Lowdham Grange and feel the stones and mud under our boots. The welcome and watery winter sun is bright with little warmth, twinkling down through bows and branches through to the tree-lined lane and down to the old church. We are not alone. Ahead of us lies a large limousine with its young driver leaning against it, quietly, respectfully, passing the time, fingers clasped formally in front of him. His suit tells of a duty he is carrying out. It is a sad day for one family and group of friends as a small, muted service is conducted in the ancient faded yellow stone building.

Tales from the Ark

What a ‘summer’ this has been. Incredibly the rain goes on and on, day after day and people continue to suffer. Many poor souls have had their homes flooded more than once with the filthy water infiltrating their home. Even worse, as one might surmise there have unfortunately been fatalities.

Evacuations continue as main streets are transformed into rivers of muddy water with people wading through chest-deep levels. Some rivers are said to be up to 26 feet above their regular height.

Main Street, Woodborough, Notts. July 2007

As usual someone is sought to blame – even for a natural disaster falling from the sky, there has to be a better way than this though. More knowledgeable people in the land buying profession tell me that short shrift is given to pre-empting what in fairness is an exceptional situation. The building of local ‘sump’ areas is said to be neglected in the search for extra profit. I have no notion whether this is true but wouldn’t find it difficult to believe.

Flooding appears as though it will be a more permanent fixture of life in the UK in the future and it’s apparent that measures will have to be considered to assist in what is nothing but a national calamity repeating itself. One can only feel sympathy for the poor people affected.