From End to End - over £3,000 raised to reduce carbon emissions

So I rode a bicycle from Land's End to John o'Groats between mid-July and mid-August 2007 because I wanted to and also to raise money to reduce carbon emissions.
Thanks to everyone who preferred to sponsor the trip for this mighty cause rather than wring their hands in despair. May the wind not be in your face, the rain not run down your neck, and the sun not burn your skin. Sponsorship as of 16 October 2007: £3,213 (92 sponsors).
The trip blog appears below, most recent posting first (i.e. start at the bottom and work up!).

Where the money has gone

The money raised will help to cut the carbon emissions of the organisation that I worked for and admire – British Quakers. If you’re not a Quaker (nor am I), then please take my word for it that they are worthy recipients of the money.

Simple, contemporary, radical: Quakers were instrumental in setting up Greenpeace, Oxfam, Amnesty, Campaign Against Arms Trade and others, and were also pioneers in the abolition of the slave trade. They've never made oats (that's true). Find out more about Quakers.

The money will help to buy a glamourous new combined heat and power boiler for the Quaker central office, Friends House - these boilers are ecologically responsible, shiny and horribly expensive. Yes, it's a bit boring but it will cut carbon emissions. Find out more about CHP boilers (oh go on!).

31 July 2007

Chivalry and windmills worthy of Don Quixote

If the many people on whom I have depended for water on this trip had refused to help, I would have dessicated into a pile of dust by Barnstaple. As it happens, everyone has been generous, and even gladly so - those who believe human nature is essentially warlike have to explain such generosity to strangers. There was one guy, in Stratford, who shouted at me that I was an arsehole, by which I think he meant that I'd performed a manoeuvre in the road manner of an incompetent. I would have contended that I felt his intervention both unfounded and unreasonable, but he was disinclined to have a conversation. My dad was riding near me at the time, and found one or two stirring words of his own to describe the man in question, although I'm not sure that the world is a better place for it.
Leaving Jedburgh, I had no option but to trundle along the busy A68 heading north. Drivers passed me with lots of room - I wondered whether there had been another government public information campaign, about how car drivers had to recognise cyclists' road safety, since the one with the pigeons in the 1970s - but it was still pretty miserable on the busy road. After a couple of hours, I arrived in laudable Lauder, which is bisected by the main road. One side of the village is good, the other evil. I'd run out of water so I went into the nearest pub (it turned out to be on the evil side) to ask whether they'd be so kind as not to mind awfully if they'd consider filling up my water bottle if it wasn't too much trouble. The landlord hesitated; his face twitched, then screwed up just a little bit, the way it would if you were chewing on a spider. This didn't look good. I thought he might stub me out with one of his ample thumbs, like a cigarette or a university student from England. Instead, he raised his arm slowly and sort of zombie-like without bending it at the elbow, and stared into the middle distance past my shoulder. Perhaps he was trying to warn me of some impending danger behind me, so I turned around. No, he was pointing out the window at Lauder's public toilets. 'You can fill it in there,' he advised, in such a way that I felt our conversation had come to an end. I didn't go to the public toilet; instead, I crossed the street to where the sun was shining and went into another pub, which filled up my water bottle for me, and gladly. I'm not sure what the moral of this story is, but that's the end of it - work it out for yourself if you like.
From Lauder, the A68 climbs into Scotland's Southern Uplands. It was a soulless journey on that unpleasant road - don't do it unless you're trying to punish yourself for something. At the summit, there's a new windfarm. I took a photo of it for you. The windmills are massive, clean and white, and today they moved gracefully and quickly in the high wind (which was another headwind, by the way, from the north-west). I wondered why the nimbies complained about the noise of windfarms because you can hardly hear them at all.
On the way down the hill, I could eventually leave the monstrous road and take minor roads all the way down to Longniddry, to the east of Edinburgh, and the sea. The salty seaweed scent of the sea air was a welcome sensation, reminding me of the Atlantic off Cornwall and Devon two weeks before. The rest of the journey into the city was along the coast road and beach esplanades. It was a beautiful, slow ride in the early evening sun: kids playing in the sand, lovers strolling, friends meeting friends. I arrived in Leith, where I'd be staying with my good friend Jonathan. He cooked a very large and welcome hot meal and in the morning recited some poems to me.
Tuesday was a rest day. I met old friends Heather and Mark for a walk around Edinburgh's especially beautiful and well cared-for botanical gardens, which offer views of the city skyline. It's a refreshing place to be and I used to go there all the time as a student in the city. Mark lent me the national cycle route plans for the rest of the way to John o'Groats. I'm looking forward to getting going again - it's been wonderful to see friends in Edinburgh, although the cityscape feels claustrophobic after the spaciousness of the open road.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

HI Dave

I share your appreciation of windfarms - I love them in fact. They are like towering graceful things - testiment to the power of the weather. They stand on hillsides like giant swans. I would be really happy to live by a wind farm listening to the swoooosh as the sales fly by.
It is odd that some people don't like giving away free water. I have the same trouble when on bike rides and walks too and have had to grovel and flutter my eyelashes shamelessly. Maybe something to do with power - it seems that they would they prefer you to end up like the pile of dust you mention. I am sure that is not the case though!
love sx