July 2008

publication date: Jul 1, 2008

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author/source: Polly Evans

Eage-eyed visitors to this site may well ask, 'What on earth happened to June's book review?' It's a good question, and the answer is, and please whisper this quietly, there wasn't one. I didn't get to it. I'm deeply sorry, and promise it won't happen again. Moving swiftly on to July...

This month I was sent a copy of a fabulous new book, which is almost tailor-made for this site, called 50 Quirky Bike Rides...in England and Wales. Written by Rob Ainsley, who clearly has an eye for the absurd, it's a delightful compendium of bizarre and beautiful rides.

The lovely thing about this book is that it's fun to read even if you're not on your bike but enjoying a cup of tea on the sofa. For those who really are out on the road, the recommendations of pubs, cafes and 'Quirkshops' will come in handy. But even for those who have their own kettle conveniently to hand, it's entertaining reading. Sections are are enticingly entitled with headings such as Wet Rides, that's to say roads you have to ford: 'Turn your bike into a pedalo,' Ainsley recommends. Or there are car-free tunnels, or very steep hills, or ancient Roman roads (I am particularly fond of the chapter head 'How Roman cycling would have been. If they'd had bikes').

The scariest ride has to be not the haunted Tissington Trail but the ride along the aqueduct at Pontcysyllte - which the authorities actually insist that you walk. 'Crossing the aqueduct is more like a tightrope walk than a canalside stroll. In 2005, Thomas Telford's remarkable structure celebrated 200 years of scaring the crap out of people. The exquisite sense of mid-air vertigo comes from being on something so thin (under 3m wide), so long (over 300m, Britain's longest canal aqueduct) and so high above the valley floor (38m), with a guardrail on one side only (the towpath side fortunately),' Ainsley writes. Weirder still, narrowboats too travel along this elevated canal.

Then there are the rides simply named 'Experiences.' Take 'The shivering mountain that beat the road-builders' and 'Just like polo, only without the horses. Somewhat cheaper, too'. I had absolutely no idea you could play bike polo in Hurlingham Park in west London - a terrible confession as I live, oh, about a five-minute bike ride away.