We visited our daughter’s house in Manchester on Tuesday to look after our cutie grandsons. I left behind my magnetic bracelet that helps reduce cramps I get in my hand. “I’ll post it to you,” daughter said. “No, it’s okay, I’ll cycle and get it.” (nearly 100 miles round trip)

Haha. So I did. Well, I need to get some miles into my legs ready to visit a school friend who is performing in the Alchemy musical at the Everyman in Cheltenham next week.

I cycle from Chester to Manchester using the Cheshire Cycle path for the most part. I have it marked on Ordnance Survey Maps (not yet using my Samsung cos the battery wouldn’t last the 4 hour trip if I used GPS) but rely a lot on the little blue signs and other clues. For example phone boxes are marked on OS maps. Alas, many of those boxes have been removed because the use of mobile phones and the need to protect the boxes from vandals and thieves make them expensive. And yet what do you do if you need to make an emergency call in the wilds where there is no mobile phone signal? At least in the pretty village of Great Budworth in Cheshire they’ve kept the phone box but filled it with books! I note that Cheshire Life for this August is in there. There’s a small piece about me and my ARIA science fiction book in that edition. So my smile grew.

Besides the removal of phone boxes to make navigation hazardous, someone has been removing the little blue Cheshire Cycle Path signs, or moving them to confuse us. Whether the vandals are disgruntled non-cyclists I can’t tell. Most drivers around these parts are friendly and I had a big grin and wave when I left the road and mounted a grass bank to allow a huge combine harvester grumble past with its wide tyres taking up more than the tarmac!

I picked up a few text messages from family during my ride, including my wife who only knew that I was out somewhere until I’d decided I really would go all the way – so to speak. One message was from Tracey my daughter-in-law. She was ill in Notthingham hospital but reading ARIA: Left Luggage. Her doc asked what the book was and Tracey said it was written by her father-in-law. Oh, said the doc, is he coming today? I want to meet a real live author! Haha. I’ll have to cycle to Nottingham soon then. I wonder if that doctor knows much about amnesia and what would happen to the world if it became infectious? Tracey knows now…

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