Just Passing the Time of Day - by Graham Thompson

JUST PASSING THE TIME OF DAY

by Graham Thompson

While my car was being serviced I had a brief cycle ride through the south eastern reaches of my home county of Hertfordshire and renewed acquaintance with some roads familiar on my ride to work in Epping in the old days. The first place of interest was the New River which is fed by springs at Chadwell, near Hertford. I had to take to the pavement to give room to a school coach on the old A10, and I was soon at Great Amwell. Here there is a small lake with a memorial to Sir Hugh Myddelton, the instigator of the New River which was cut to bring water to London. This project caused him financial ruin. The memorial has some lines by John Scott, a poet and a Quaker, and who built a grotto on the hillside overlooking Ware Station.

I was held up by a train full of commuters at St Margaret's and then it was onto Stanstead Abbotts, its distinctive smell now having gone since the closure of the malting works. There are one or two fine houses here as this town was an important centre of commerce in days gone by. Although there was a gale blowing, the wind had blown holes in the clouds and the sun appeared as I faced the first obstacle of the day: a hill which can be avoided by taking the first few yards of the Hadham road to find Kitten Lane which brings one out at the top of the hill, and which on my return home I discovered from the map to be Cat’s Hill. The first hawthorn leaves and the hazel catkins were showing in the hedgerows by the lane to the sewerage works (too windy for any smells today): no through road for other road users due to road works. Next was Rye House and best known for the Plot planned by “Hannibal” Rumbold. The plan was to murder King Charles II and his party, travelling home from the races at Newmarket. He returned early and the plan was thwarted. Many plotters were caught and executed but Rumbold fled to Holland only to meet his end in Scotland a few years later, where he became involved with the Jacobites, was caught and executed.

Having failed to find Blue Sky Cycles despite riding past its front door, I finished up in Hoddesdon at a café for coffee and an iced bun, getting into conversation with a retired gentleman who had owned a Maclean Featherweight many years ago. I turned and retraced to Rye Road and found the shop this time, spending sometwenty minutes with Darren Simpson talking bikes and cycling, coming away with a stock of new inner tubes. I hate mending inner tubes – modern tyres and butyl inner tubes will stand great pressures but there is always the nagging doubt about the patches lasting, however carefully done. Then it was homeward bound, past the pumping station by the New River to St Margaret's, past another pumping station near Amwell, and onto the old A10 for Ware. It was a grovel up the hill to pass under the viaduct which carries the new A10 northwards to collect the car and have another cycling chat with North Roader, Donald Hale. Then it was quickly homeward bound for Stevenage.

This ride made a welcome change from mile on the turbo trainer, which has been in use in this wet weather.
Graham Thompson
Friday morning, January 16, 2004.

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