June 27, 2022
Washingborough to Lincoln
a loop via Bracebridge Heath
I'm liquidating my assets in the UK. Everything. Basically, this is whatever will sell on eBay, such as my second-hand Canon DSLR and a tripod, Karrimor panniers and Carradice saddlebag, the bike, the small oilskin raincape, a pair of Hope QR skewers, my Cannondale bar-bag, a pair of SPD pedals, and even my cycling sandals.
Who knows when this gear will get used again, if ever, as on my reckonng it'll be at least three or four years before I'm back in the UK. I'll be over 70 then. Time to offload it all. It's not worth carting back to Taiwan.
The bits that have already been sold get packed up and stuffed into my saddlebag and I ride to the local post office, just a five-minute ride away, and send it on its way.
The dark sky makes a veiled threat to give me a dousing before getting back to Dave's and drizzle falls at 9:30, but by 11 o'clock the clouds look to have done their thing and it seems like a good idea to explore a walking route that I spotted on the detailed OS map. It should be rideable and will hopefully take me to Ruby's studio at nearby Bracebridge Heath. She's there today, sorting stuff out, like me. From there I can drop into Lincoln.
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From Dave's house it takes just five minutes or so to ride to where the lane starts. There's a sign at the junction saying it's a dead end, but the map shows it leading to a bridleway - a public path across farmland.
Sure enough, I get to the end of the tarmac and my tyres start bouncing along a rough track towards Cliff Farm. The long, low barn beside the old farmhouse looks to have been converted and no doubt someone spent a fair amount of cash doing it all up. It's certainly out of the way.
I pause and take a self-timed photo after the track bends 90 degrees and climbs. It's gentle and definately not a cliff and I wonder where that could be. There are a few more sharp turns and it's not clear where this track will lead me.
It ends at an unappealing road named the B1188 and the map shows a path contining close by and sure enough it's only a few seconds before I find the turning, one that you'd miss unless you were actually looking for it.
It's a lane that can just accommodate a car and is lined with trimmed conifers that block out any view. After a few minutes it takes me past a grand country house which is hard to get proper sight of, as like many of these estate homes, it's set in grounds and hidden by large trees and mature shrubs, but no doubt it dates back a couple of hundred years. The OS map tells me it's called Ashfield House. With so many rooms, the winter heating bill must be eye-watering.
I start to wonder if the lane will suddenly terminate and it appears to do so at Westfield Farm, but a young farmworker driving a chunky tractor doesn't shout at me to stop as I ride across the concrete yard and after making it round a Z-bend there's the route contnuing ahead to who knows where.
It'd be nice to know where it's actually taking me and a couple of minutes later a woman of about 25-ish walking a spaniel informs me it'll take me to Bracebridge Heath and points to an arched bridge in the distance that I'll need to cross. It looks new and is small enough for just people and cyclists.
Rain starts to fall as I get to the bridge, but it doesn't amount to much and I keep going for 10 minutes and make it to Ruby's studio reasonably dry.
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She's up to her neck in stuff, trying to organise various items that she hires out at weddings. her cousin Sarah, Dave's daughter, is helping out.
The studio is in what used to be a building belonging to a mental health hospital that was originally titled Lincolnshire County Lunatic Asylum when it opened back in 1852. In the early 1960s, it got called St Johns Hospital, but closed nearly 30 years later and is now being transformed into apartments and offices. I hang around until the sky looks a bit kinder.
From Bracebridge Heath a road drops down steeply to the southern end of Lincoln. It's called Cross O'Cliff Hill, but it's a hill not a cliff. When I was very young and had a three-speed bike, it was literally impossible to ride up it. Just making it 50 metres was an achievement. Dropping down today my speed reaches 50km/hr and has me feeling nervous.
In my saddlebag (it's still on eBay) is the team page from a 1950 football programme that I want to frame for my son Roy. My dad is named in the Lincoln City lineup and hopefully I can find a frame in a charity shop and once up the High Street, I call in at one small place, but there's not one the right size. A framing shop is further up and I pop in and get quoted 20-odd quid and bite the bullet. The woman says it'll be done in 15 minutes, so I go across the road for a kebab - the first in many years.
Coffee is required. There's a place near on nearby Sincil Street where the traidional market was - the shops have been spruced up. I sit outside with my bike and watch people come and go for half an hour. By then, the sky has morphed into one that has a decent amount of blue in it and the clouds are fluffy and white.
I decide to see my older brther on teh way home. His house is more or less en route. My phone is dead so I put it on charge in the kitchen when I get there, but forget it when I leave nearly an hour later.
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Dave offers to drive me back to my brother's once I'm in Washingborough and have realized my mistake. To make it worth the while, we have dinner in Pizza Express at the top of the High Street.
Tomorrow my plan is to get a train to York and see my son. This could be the last time for a few years.
Today's ride: 20 km (12 miles)
Total: 1,171 km (727 miles)
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