Left home to travel to the airport at 19:10, so that I can get a good night sleep ready for the 08:40 flight to Lyon. Well, at least that was the plan. It is now 12:30am. I figure I need to be up at 5.30am for a 6am taxi to the airport and I am only now sitting down to write this.
It is only when you become one of the cycling mob that you realise just how difficult people make things for us.
The carriage on the train that transports passenger bikes is right at the back and it has to be unlocked for the cyclist to store and strap down their bikes, then the cyclist has to leave that carriage, door gets locked and the bike less passenger gets into a regular carriage. Result, at Stowmarket today, the train left at 19:40 instead of 19:29. Now I know why the trains are always late. Those bloody cyclists at Norwich and Diss!
Arriving at London Liverpool Street, I get off the train and there is no one around to open the bike carriage, so I have to walk all the way up the other end of the platform to ask for help. Ten minutes after the train arrived, I am with bike and walking to the underground, where I get a ticket for Heathrow and head for the Central line. “You can’t go on the central line with that thing. I looked down at my stomach ready to reply “ah but it will be gone in 5 days” when I realise he meant the bike. You will have to go via Embankment, Hammersmith and then Heathrow.
Finally, after leaving home at 19:10, I got to Heathrow at 10.45. Then I took one look at the buses and thought “sod this, its blackberry GPS time”. I found my hotel on the map and plotted my route. Easy I thought, straight ahead, right then right again. Only what I did not realise as I cycled like hell on two wheels through the underpass, was that cyclists are not allowed to go on that road, so already hitting 20 MPH with a rucksack, a laptop bag and a camera bag swinging around my neck, I added another 5mph and put my head down. Ten minutes later, a couple of calls to the hotel reception on my blackberry and I was at Stelios’ new venture easyhotel.com in Brickfield Lane Heathrow (£29 a night). I walk into reception and I swear, the guy on the London underground was there waiting for me. “You can’t bring that in here” to which I replied in my usual ingratiating manner. “What you have got to be kidding”. Anyway, after giving him my ‘I know Stelios personally’ look, he buckled, “Well it’s up to you, you can try if you wish but there won’t be much room. Hmm, you be the judge of that from the photo.
So, now all I have to do is take the wheels off the bike bag and strap it all together and I am ready for 4 of hours sleep.
Next stop Lyon, France, where I hear they like cyclists!
It is only when you become one of the cycling mob that you realise just how difficult people make things for us.
The carriage on the train that transports passenger bikes is right at the back and it has to be unlocked for the cyclist to store and strap down their bikes, then the cyclist has to leave that carriage, door gets locked and the bike less passenger gets into a regular carriage. Result, at Stowmarket today, the train left at 19:40 instead of 19:29. Now I know why the trains are always late. Those bloody cyclists at Norwich and Diss!
Arriving at London Liverpool Street, I get off the train and there is no one around to open the bike carriage, so I have to walk all the way up the other end of the platform to ask for help. Ten minutes after the train arrived, I am with bike and walking to the underground, where I get a ticket for Heathrow and head for the Central line. “You can’t go on the central line with that thing. I looked down at my stomach ready to reply “ah but it will be gone in 5 days” when I realise he meant the bike. You will have to go via Embankment, Hammersmith and then Heathrow.
Finally, after leaving home at 19:10, I got to Heathrow at 10.45. Then I took one look at the buses and thought “sod this, its blackberry GPS time”. I found my hotel on the map and plotted my route. Easy I thought, straight ahead, right then right again. Only what I did not realise as I cycled like hell on two wheels through the underpass, was that cyclists are not allowed to go on that road, so already hitting 20 MPH with a rucksack, a laptop bag and a camera bag swinging around my neck, I added another 5mph and put my head down. Ten minutes later, a couple of calls to the hotel reception on my blackberry and I was at Stelios’ new venture easyhotel.com in Brickfield Lane Heathrow (£29 a night). I walk into reception and I swear, the guy on the London underground was there waiting for me. “You can’t bring that in here” to which I replied in my usual ingratiating manner. “What you have got to be kidding”. Anyway, after giving him my ‘I know Stelios personally’ look, he buckled, “Well it’s up to you, you can try if you wish but there won’t be much room. Hmm, you be the judge of that from the photo.
So, now all I have to do is take the wheels off the bike bag and strap it all together and I am ready for 4 of hours sleep.
Next stop Lyon, France, where I hear they like cyclists!
