Things in 3s: German influences

August 10, 2015

At the start of June we had a great holiday in Germany - as you'll know if you're following my cycle tour posts , while there's still a few more to come, this weekend I realised our Bavarian trip had influenced us more than I'd first thought.

This weekend I realised just how much, since we've been home we've:

1. Eaten pretzels for breakfast

Throughout our holiday, everywhere we went the bread was fantastic and breakfast wasn't the same if we didn't have at least one pretzel. They're not like the pretzel crisps we first think of but are more bread-like and most similar to bagels and very tasty. Marks & Spencer's sell some pretzels and pretzel rolls and while they're handy to fill a pretzel-like hole, they're not as good as the real thing.

2. Planted red geraniums in the patio pots

There were red geraniums everywhere we looked, and they looked great in the window boxes against the wood. They're not a plant I usually buy but this year I did. I've planted mine with some white lobelia and the pots along our patio are a cheery reminder of our holiday.

3. Booked tickets for the London Ocktoberfest

Ah yes the beer. And the beer gardens. They were great too. As was the curry wurst. So much so that we've booked tickets for the Ocktoberfest being held in Canary Wharf. I've no idea what it'll be like, but it should be good fun!

I'm keen to hear if there are things from your holidays that influence you, which you continue when you return home. Leave a comment and let me know.

Our Ride London

August 3, 2015

Our day started early with a 4.30am alarm but although neither of us had slept that well we were up and out of bed pretty sharpish. Our early start was different to those get-to-the-airport-to-catch-a-plane-at-silly-o'clock-mornings as this time there was breakfast that would fuel the ride and of course there weren't any suitcases. But there was a flight, of sorts.

By 5.30am we were pushing our bikes out of the house and heading to the cable car in Greenwich. And we weren't the only ones. As we reached the Royal Standard just around the corner we tagged onto a group of cyclists heading the same way. The roads were quiet and the only traffic was either buses or cars transporting bikes and their riders towards North Greenwich.

It was a beautiful morning and before MOH caught his flight on the cable car and cycled to the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park to prepare for the start I got him to pose for a photo, wished him well and reminded him to take some pictures along the way.

As I cycled back home from my earliest starting cycle ever (a record that's unlikely to be broken tbf) MOH was queuing to deposit his bag and then prepare for his 7.36am start time. He even remembered to take some pictures!

Back home and recovering from the early start and the early cycle I suddenly realised I'd better get myself shifted if I was to get to The Strand on time to see MOH cycle past.

I made the 7.22am train from Blackheath with two minutes to spare and so arrived in Charing Cross with plenty of time to spare. The RideLondon app - aka the Husband Tracker - was up and working and showing MOH's progress along the route.

There were plenty of cyclists to cheer while I was waiting for him to arrive. Teams, individuals and a few in more unusual cycling outfits!

Then at 8.15am, this happened.

With MOH spotted and looking comfortable (well as much as you can on a saddle) I set off for Kingston to see him around the 22 mile mark. I had twenty minutes to wait for the next Kingston train. Armed with a second breakfast - well it was 8.45am by now and I'd been up for ages - I got the train, ate breakfast and continued to track MOH.

Just as the train approached Wimbledon I saw that he'd already passed Kingston station, so there really was little point continuing. But that meant I was in Wimbledon much earlier than I'd planned and in fact I was there before the first cyclist too. After a wander around, thinking about a third breakfast and thinking better of it, it was still only 9.18am.

The first cyclists arrived in Wimbledon just gone 10am and shortly afterwards I made myself comfy half-way up Wimbledon Hill on the right. If you know Wimbledon, you'll know there's some grass verges well I was there and let me tell you there's not much grass on them right now. I'd brought a sarong to sit on so I was feeling particularly smug and sat down to enjoy the event while MOH took a planned break at Pyrford, at just before 40 miles.

The Husband Tracker was working well and I could see that MOH had reached Newlands Corner, where he had another planned stop in 3 hours 16 minutes. His average speed had slowed to 21.8 kph from 26.5kph at the first timing point, but it was still good and fast enough to complete the course in the allocated time and avoiding the "Broom Van" which would sweep up people that hadn't reached parts of the route by the cut-off time.

The next time I looked he hadn't moved very far at all. And he didn't move very much for a while. Quite a while in fact.

Then my phone rang and it was MOH to say there'd been a crash and everyone had stopped and was backed up. Sadly as we know now it wasn't caused by a crash but by a fatality, our thoughts are with this rider's family.

After an understandably lengthy stop, MOH was underway again. On Wimbledon Hill there wasn't a break in the riders passing by and we think that's because some of the later cyclists were diverted around this part of the course.

My vantage point was around the 90 mile mark and half-way up the last hill the riders would encounter. Some just breezed by, others put thier head down and pushed themselves to the top. Just up from me was one of the BHF cheering stations, and they really did work giving their riders a much needed lift, as you can see from the photo!

Some though needed a bit of a helping hand up the last hill, and this lady wasn't the only one.

I counted six tandems as I watched the race go by, but didn't manage to catch one on my camera at all!

At around 3.15pm MOH cycled past. With ten miles to go I knew he'd make it as he still looked relatively fresh and was going a good speed.

Now to get to the finish and find him, but first an ice cream - it'd been pretty warm work supporting there for the past five hours or so!

Green Park was busy when I arrived around 4.30pm, with people everywhere. I was glad of the advice from the organisers to pre-arrange a meeting place and set out to find the tree labelled with an S. Around 5.30pm MOH wandered by, so it was some time for some post-event photos with his medal. And there was just enough battery life left in my phone to do a final post of Facebook.

It was great to hear his views on the race and on the course sitting there in Green Park. High points were cycling on car-free roads although it was weird to cycle past work in Docklands so fast; the sun on Westminster Abbey making it look even more stunning as he left London; the view from the top of Box Hill and the pretty village of Abinger Hammer and raising £450 (so far) for Get Kids Going. Lower points were the hold ups along the route which were frustrating, especially at Leith Hill where it took 9 minutes to walk 400 metres and impacted on his time, running out of phone battery after not turning off wifi (something I suffered from too!) and being fed up of bananas!

And the answer to that all important question - would he do it again, is yes because "it's not a difficult ride." The ballot opens next Monday, just in time for the pain and soreness to be a rose-tinted memory!

After relaxing a little - using his fleece from earlier as a impromptu cushion to sit on - it wasn't long before we headed for Charing Cross and a train home to a more comfortable seat with plans for some pizza and perhaps a glass or two of red to toast a great day at Ride London.

Oh, and to watch the TV coverage. It seems though that everyone in Greenwich had the same idea to order pizza and ours didn't arrive until 10.20pm, by which time we were more than a little hungry and more than a couple of glasses had been consumed.

Here's to a successful ballot and to next year's event!

An allotment update

July 23, 2015

It's only been a couple of months since we got our allotment and already so much has changed. And today I thought I'd share some pictures from there which I took earlier this afternoon.

As we cleared some of the beds we discovered a sign which is now back upright.

The artichoke that self-seeded is continuing to grow undisturbed and now has one larger and two small artichokes on it. The plug plants I bought have had mixed success. One has died completely, one is growing well and the other is recovering. I thought I'd lost it but it's a plucky thing and is now growing new leaves, so hopefully it will survive.

The cabbages and purple sprouting broccoli that I planted towards the end of June have flourished (see how small they were here). So much so that I removed the netting this afternoon, I'd spotted a cabbage white butterfly inside the net so if they were getting in there really didn't seem much point. I just hope that the foxes behave with my brassicas.

The red kuri squash is also doing well, there's two fruits doing well and it looks like more could be on the way too. The plant is rampant, it's gone through the broad beans and tomatoes in one direction and is heading for the beans in the opposite direction. I think it's happy!

I've two lots of beans on the go, these on the wigwam were planted direct in May and they're doing well. I've got red and white runner bean flowers and the sweet peas growing alongside them bring some extra colour.

The lavender which I'd taken cuttings from a straggly plant in my garden has come on leaps and bounds since it's been in the allotment. It's not quite lavender bush size yet, but maybe next year. A lot of the plots have lavender and shrubs growing around the edge of their plot which looks good. I suspect it also stops the foxes running through the crops, so it's something I'm keen to emulate.

The apple tree, which we inherited is doing well - and the number of apples on it is giving it a stay of execution. I wanted to move it - and still do - but clearly now isn't the right time. I want to move it as I think it's in the wrong place and if it were to continue to grow where it is then it will cast shade over quite a bit of the plot, which I'm not so keen on.

Although I've got a lot growing, there's still so much to do - but I'm making progress. I was chatting with one of the other plot holders today and discovered she'd got her plot in January - it seems there's quite a few new plot holders, which is nice. When she learnt we got our plot in May she was impressed. And I am too. It's quite nice to pop over there for a couple of hours and dig another row and get it ready to grow some crops.

I've still six more tomatoes and five more squash to plant out, so I need to clear some space for them. I've got some courgettes to plant out too and some rosemary cuttings for my border. The black plastic is down to stop the grass growing and once I've cleared some space on the other side of the beans I'll be starting there,

We still don't have a shed yet, but we do have some storage now in the form of a plastic bench. It's lockable and means that I don't have to carry everything I need on each visit.

We've made a new compost bin and today I started to fill the sides of the pallet with rolled up newspapers. I've quite a few more at home so hope to be able to fill the bottom layer over the weekend. The theory is that the newspaper will stop the soil (and weeds!) escaping and provide insulation. I read it somewhere and it sounded like a good idea - I'll let you know if it works!

The old bench that we inherited has also been repurposed; we used the back of it to extend the height of the pallet and used the slats from the seat as retainers on the inside of the new compost bin. It didn't take much to break up the bench, so it was the right decision!

The existing compost bins are still there, at some point we'll need to tackle these. There doesn't seem much evidence of the foxes in the second more earthy compost bin which is good news, but it's hard to turn over and remove the soil as there's plastic in the soil. Sorting these out remains on the list, but for now it's more important to get some crops growing.

And my last picture is of our crab apples - looks like I might be making some jelly later in the year!

So six weeks in, it's going well. It's hard work, but good fun. And still a bit more to do!