Monday
14th November Fresh SW
Mild
and mostly sunny, a lovely day. 14C
Scanes
of pink-footed geese fly overhead as I pass Montrose Basin, an large
inland estuarine habitat. No time to stop at the superb Visitor's
Centre sadly; I need to push on.
Push
it is as I climb a hill towards Arbroath. The wind at the top is in
my face yet again and becoming rather tiresome. I need a strategy to
stop what I call the demons from dominating my thoughts. At times
like this, when every day is a long cycle ride, negative thoughts
take over the eternal conversation inside my head. Incidents from my
past turn up vividly, especially those involving my late wife, Karen.
Why the sad or bad ones? Recent political events take over.
Disappointment and disgust. Climate change, thoughts of the people
who deny it is happening.
I
pass some large wind turbines.
Happy
thoughts required. After over twenty two months on the road I know
what to do. I choose a holiday destination from the past, Disneyland
Paris. One replete with wonderful moments, as a family of husband and
wife with four children we went there a lot.
In
my mind I can see ever attraction, every pathway, even every toilet!
I choose a circular route, clockwise.
I
start with arrivals. The first time with my own two children, Rebecca
and Joshua. I had driven to Paris from Wolverhampton, taking an
overnight ferry and they being so young at the time, seven and five
years old, had no idea they were near Disneyland.
Their faces as we
came up to the archway entrance brought tears to my eyes then. The
memory of that moment makes me laugh out loud and tear up again. I
remember how poor I was at the time, 1993 and how when my second wife
divorced me, I promised my children that one day I would take them to
Disneyland. Well we may have had to camp instead of enjoy the
expensive luxury of Disneyland Hotels but we had made it there.
Another
memory, Joshua with a twig and a short length of fishing line, a hook
and a worm, caught a small trout! Delicious addition to a meal shared
with a family in the tent next to ours.
Another
arrival, once more the children having no idea where they were. This
time though with four children. I had met and married my late wife
and she had two children, Claire and Sarah. Whilst staying at my
brother Paul's house in Brittany Karen and I took the children to
'the beach', or so they were told. Leaving very early in the morning,
with four children sleeping in the back of the car, their ages now so
perfect at ten, nine, eight and seven, I drove to Paris. Only when
Rebecca and Claire, the two oldest, noticed Disneyland signs on the
motorway about ten miles before the famed destination, did the penny
drop. Their faces captured in a photograph, comes into my mind to
dispel all the negatives.
That's
better, happy moments. Cycle on Pressa!
Through
Arbroath and a wonderful cycle path is adjacent to the busy dual
carriageway practically all the way to Dundee. It has great tarmac
and the almost flat landscape means that the cycling is reasonably
easy despite the wind.
31.41
miles 1131 feet elevation up 1104 down
No comments:
Post a Comment