Sometimes minor irritations occur, especially when under pressure (like cycle touring in shitty weather and are not always handled with equanimity.
It was a bit like that on this day.
Finding a campsite was the issue - someone was not pulling their weight.
We'd almost reached our target distance for the day, around 60 k's when I saw a man closing the road gate to a house, possibly a farm - it was the only house around and surrounded by crops - I sped up, but he was walking away by the time I teached the gate. A woman was cutting grass on a noisy ride-on mower
“Hi there, Excuse me” I called loudly,
“Oh, Hello”
“We're from New Zealand, doing a three month long cycle tour of UK and wondering if there is somewhere around here that we may be able to camp for the night”
“Uh, I don't know, what do you do? Do you camp in people's gardens?”
“Well sometimes, if they are comfortable with that, but in a farmer's paddock, or in a barn once or twice”
“So in the corner there would be ok?” he indicated a nice flat area with a nice "bike leaner" tree and spongy grass.
“Yes that would be ideal,” He flagged the mower down and talked to the driver who turned out to be his sister.
She came over, the four of us chatted briefly; she was relaxed about the idea, he opened the gate and we began setting up for the night.
A cosy spot in a friendly garden.
He was Rupert and his sister Victoria. They were having a couple of days getting the house and surrounds tidied up following their father's death last year.
Rupert took our water bottles away and filled them up. When he returned we chatted and found out he was an artist, living in Paris.
Rupert took our water bottles away and filled them up. When he returned we chatted and found out he was an artist, living in Paris.
Next morning he came down for a further chat, found out that Val was an artist too and they exchanged web addresses etc.
I got in on the act and presented him with my sketch of the situation.
