Afternoon with a stranger

wafflycat said:

There was me, driving back from Chalk Farm on the other side of
Swaffham, car full of plants, and I spy a cyclist on the A47 pushing a
heavily laden bike along, looking a bit, well, dejected. I happened to
have a track pump and a puncture repair kit in the car with me (as one
does), so I pulled up a bit in front of him, off the main carriageway,
to enquire if he was in need of assistance.

Turns out he was having a rest from cycling. No puncture, but a few
irritating things wrong with the bike. Strange accent -
Canadian/Danish... and basically this guy is working his way around the
globe with his bike as his transport & all worldly goods on it.

So it being Easter Monday, no bike shops for a long way - so I gave him
the address of Chateau Unfit Family and said that if he was heading in
that direction (he was) to call in and we'd see if we could help out
with his bike as Vernon has a garage full of bits and today he was doing
bike maintenance.

Anyhow - I'm back at Chateau Unfit Family (potting plants while Vernon
does the bike maintenance) and a while later, a globe-trotting
Danish/Canadian cyclist shows up.

His steed is an ancient German thing that has seen better days, as has
his luggage, containing his worldly possessions, as he tours around like
this, looking for work in various parts of the world.

Anyhow, we provide tea, cake and Vernon cleans his bike for him, does a
bit of maintenance work on the mudguard, headset & drum brakes - cleans
the bike too. We supply him with spares of Useful Stuff such as
batteries, cable ties, LED headtorch, rear LED, reflective stuff, bottle
carrier for waist belt, detailed maps of the area. Vernon is given a
rather nice Leatherman multi-tool as a thank you, and I'm given a
stopwatch. We didn't want to accept but did not want to offend.

He's now headed off in the direction of Fakenham, with Nathan going part
of the way to show him the route up the back roads, to avoid the busy
roads.

It was a thoroughly interesting afternoon. Seeing a cyclist looking as
if he was struggling along the mad A47, I had to stop, as I would not
want to be in that position myself, and be stranded on a day when
there's not that many places open and in a strange place. As it turns
out, Vernon & I had an interesting afternoon chatting with a cycling
stranger.

Nice one. I'm sure what you've done will go a long way.

--
Hywel

well done to you, what a nice family of caring people, i am still seething
at the [censored] who shouted the obsenities at me on Friday morning in
Helmshore!!!!!!
So much so that I am thinking of going up there qgain (to see my dad) and
hope that this foul mouthed cyclist passes me again, he won't stay on his
[censored] old racer for long, thats for sure!!!!
Your story has given me re-assurances that some of us cyclists are decent
folk!

"wafflycat" <w*a*ff£y£cat*@£btco*nn£ect.com> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

There was me, driving back from Chalk Farm on the other side of Swaffham,
car full of plants, and I spy a cyclist on the A47 pushing a heavily laden
bike along, looking a bit, well, dejected. I happened to have a track pump
and a puncture repair kit in the car with me (as one does), so I pulled up
a bit in front of him, off the main carriageway, to enquire if he was in
need of assistance.

Turns out he was having a rest from cycling. No puncture, but a few
irritating things wrong with the bike. Strange accent - Canadian/Danish...
and basically this guy is working his way around the globe with his bike
as his transport & all worldly goods on it.

So it being Easter Monday, no bike shops for a long way - so I gave him
the address of Chateau Unfit Family and said that if he was heading in
that direction (he was) to call in and we'd see if we could help out with
his bike as Vernon has a garage full of bits and today he was doing bike
maintenance.

Anyhow - I'm back at Chateau Unfit Family (potting plants while Vernon
does the bike maintenance) and a while later, a globe-trotting
Danish/Canadian cyclist shows up.

His steed is an ancient German thing that has seen better days, as has his
luggage, containing his worldly possessions, as he tours around like this,
looking for work in various parts of the world.

Anyhow, we provide tea, cake and Vernon cleans his bike for him, does a
bit of maintenance work on the mudguard, headset & drum brakes - cleans
the bike too. We supply him with spares of Useful Stuff such as batteries,
cable ties, LED headtorch, rear LED, reflective stuff, bottle carrier for
waist belt, detailed maps of the area. Vernon is given a rather nice
Leatherman multi-tool as a thank you, and I'm given a stopwatch. We didn't
want to accept but did not want to offend.

He's now headed off in the direction of Fakenham, with Nathan going part
of the way to show him the route up the back roads, to avoid the busy
roads.

It was a thoroughly interesting afternoon. Seeing a cyclist looking as if
he was struggling along the mad A47, I had to stop, as I would not want to
be in that position myself, and be stranded on a day when there's not that
many places open and in a strange place. As it turns out, Vernon & I had
an interesting afternoon chatting with a cycling stranger.

Cheers, helen s

--

~~
you may need to remove dependence
on fame & fortune from organisation
to get correct email address
~Noodliness is Good~

"Hywel Jenkins" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

Nice one. I'm sure what you've done will go a long way.

--
Hywel

Ta. The Unfit Family had kindness from total strangers when we needed it in
France a couple of summers ago. It's good to be able to pass kindness along
in turn.

Cheers, helen s

"jss" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

well done to you, what a nice family of caring people, i am still seething
at the [censored] who shouted the obsenities at me on Friday morning in
Helmshore!!!!!!
So much so that I am thinking of going up there qgain (to see my dad) and
hope that this foul mouthed cyclist passes me again, he won't stay on his
[censored] old racer for long, thats for sure!!!!
Your story has given me re-assurances that some of us cyclists are decent
folk!

Sadly your past and current postings do little to reassure that there's much
that decent cyclists can identify with you.....

jss said:

Your story has given me re-assurances that some of us cyclists are decent
folk!

ITYM "you cyclists"

--
Tony

"The best way I know of to win an argument is to start by being in the
right."
- Lord Hailsham

jss said:

well done to you, what a nice family of caring people, i am still
seething at the [censored] who shouted the obsenities at me on Friday
morning in Helmshore!!!!!! So much so that I am thinking of going up
there qgain (to see my dad) and hope that this foul mouthed cyclist
passes me again, he won't stay on his [censored] old racer for long,
thats for sure!!!! Your story has given me re-assurances that some
of us cyclists are decent folk!

You ought to calm down a bit. That was one person out of thousands.

--
Mike

"Hywel Jenkins" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

Nice one. I'm sure what you've done will go a long way.

Very true. Its the people that you meet touring that makes it such a blast.
Cyclists the world over seem friendly and helpful.

T

jss said:

well done to you, what a nice family of caring people, i am still seething
at the [censored] who shouted the obsenities at me on Friday morning in
Helmshore!!!!!!

Why, for goodness sake? Some idiot shouted at you, maybe as a
deliberate wind-up, or possibly he mistook you for someone else he'd
had a run-in with earlier. Who knows? He almost certainly forgot about
the incident completely within the next 60 seconds. You, on the other
hand have been carrying the psychological baggage around for days. Why
would you let someone you don't even know affect you like that? These
things happen in life. Let it go.

--
Dave...