Southwest Lanes

Bike

27 July 2015

After my London to Paris trip whilst at university, I was hooked on travelling by bike. I subsequently bought a steel frame Condor bike with a rear rack and panniers, and was keen to head off on the road again.

This would be my first self-supported multi-day tour as when riding to Paris my bag was driven to each camp. Now I was living in Bristol with my friend Ian, and we spent many weekend days out riding south of the city towards Cheddar, Chew Valley and the Quantocks. We were both eager to get out on some multi-day rides, so we booked a train home from Truro and planned to casually make our way down there through the rural southwest lanes.

I had a very traditional touring cyclist setup at this time, with two panniers on the back, full of all sorts. I packed a chair, far too many clothes and also the Wild Guide South West book and each evening would line up potential places to visit or stay the next day. Ian was also carrying his fair share of extra kit, as he was trialling a setup for a bigger mission he had planned in Scotland.

We were on the road for eight days, following our noses and making it up as we went along.

Keen to escape busy roads and the same routes we rode out of the city each weekend, we jumped on a train down to Exeter, with a stop at the Exploding Bakery before riding on to The Hairy Barista in Totnes for another coffee stop. We continued down to Kingsbridge where we’d camp and spent the following day in Salcombe with Ian’s mum and family friends. Then on through Plymouth to No Man’s Land and Looe where we stayed on an old farm and drank our fair share of locally brewed cider. We cooked a decent meal on the picnic bench in the photos. We rode to Polruan and had a pint in the sun whilst waiting for the ferry over to Mevagissey. There’s plenty of steep hills down there! On to St Mawes for the third ferry of the trip, to Falmouth. A nice coffee stop at Espressini then continued west over to St Ives.

St Ives was heaving with tourists and the narrow streets were tricky to navigate and enjoy when pushing loaded bikes. We had a coffee and quickly headed out of town, north to St Agnes, via many more steep hills. As we rolled into the town we could see something was going on as there were crowds lining the streets and traffic backed up. We were flagged down by a steward and I asked what was going on and if she could recommend a campsite. It turned out that this weekend was the busiest of the year for this little town and there’d be very little chance of finding a vacancy anywhere as the annual carnival was just about to get going.

We continued on cycling through the town check the carnival out and try our luck at some campsites. We soon hit the coast and cliffs and eventually decided we’d wild camp there, leave all out kit and head to check out the carnival. We pitched the tent and locked our bikes together, leaving all our belongings inside the tent. What a risk! But we were relaxed and thirsty so walked off and headed to the pub. This was young and carefree living! We watched music, bought a ticket to see Natty who was headlining the Blue Moon festival, then roamed the streets with beers, ending up in a house party.

The following day we headed to Weal Kitty Workshop to check out the Finisterre shop, encountering the steepest of all hills! In the afternoon it was time to head back to Bristol, we cycled on to Truro and slept for most of the long train home.

We’d spent the week travelling by bike, human-powered up and down many big hills, self-supported and carrying everything I’d need, this was my kinda trip!

Ian Thayer’s photos