Half term always flys by, but with loosing the first part of it to that dreaded caronavirus, this one felt particularly short. What better time to start a new challenge.
Stage 1 - Head down to local station - Check.
2. Find the correct carriage on your train.
Now if this had been my train, that would have been very easy.
But this was mine. I couldn’t spot it at all.
Thankfully, I did spot a cyclist getting off and was already following one heading on. This chap was obviously a seasoned pro - Asking when I was getting off and loading his bike accordingly. He grabbed his pannier and wandered off to find a seat, leaving me to faff for the next five mins of the journey. Bike safely stashed - check!
3. Jump off at the correct station.
I always worry that I’m not going to get my bike off. But it really couldn’t have been easier. I found a quiet spot on the platform, and waited for the next train to arrive.
I didn’t have to wait long. And was soon joined by my travel companions for the day.
Babs and Jo had made their way from Winchester to meet me at Fareham station. We had all ridden parts of this route in one direction of another, but none of us had ridden this particular version in its entirety. This and the beautiful blue skys (the first we had seen after a week of poor weather) filled our chatter as we found our way out of the station.
The joy of paperless tickets and nothing more than a barcode triggering the gate to open was not lost on me, making the guard chuckle as we passed through. I’m guessing the technology is pretty new there too.
Today, We were mostly following National Cycle Network routes, which has been carefully curated by Sustrans and maintained by their lovely volunteers. These guys had obviously been busy as even though we had just had 4 named storms blow through over the weekend, there was little evidence of tree fall on the route at all. And we, well Jo to be precise, found it really easy to follow the little blue signs that marked the way. I have been reassured that this gets easier with practice. I’ll let you know when/if it does. .
We quickly found our way onto the 236 from the station, following it to get onto the 224. This was a beautifully straight and wide route shared only with the Eclipse busses that run between Fareham and Gosport avoiding all the traffic. It was so fast and direct, we didn’t even stop to take a photo.
The 224 continued following the original military train line right to the centre of town, but it became quite leafy once it parted company with the Eclipse bus route. We soon found ourselves at the waters edge waiting for the ferry to Portsmouth.
The ferry ride is short but fun and gives a great view of the brand new aircraft carriers and the much older HMS Warrior. We paused for a while on the other side to enjoy the view and make our plans.
Next stop, one of my favourite places, Old Portsmouth. We carefully rode through the Camber docks - the oldest in the city and famed for receiving the first delivery of tobacco and potato to the country. We cycled on round the small harbour to inspect the mural on the side of the Bridge Tavern. We pedalled past the Still and West pub, again famed for drunken conscription into the Navy. We nodded to the statue of Nelson, who appears much smaller than his history suggests. We discussed the history of the roofless Garrison church, then rode on towards Southsea seafront in search of a coffee.
We couldn’t resist the smell of the chips from the little shop on the front, so after a swift change of plan we found ourselves sat next to Southsea Castle enjoying the blue sea, blue sky and the famous ‘Deep Blue’ chips
Many a time I have waved away Naval ships from the front, but today we watched with a slightly heavy heart as HMS Diamond sailed away heading to take her place alongside NATO allies in the Mediterranean. I wished the crew safe travels and hoped that we would be seeing their safe return in the not to distant future.
Following the recommendation of Babs’ daughter, we went in search of the Tennis club for our coffee and basked in the sun trap by the entrance.
Eventually we pulled ourselves away from the comfort of our table and headed of towards the main reason for our travel.
We quickly returned to cycle route 22 and rode through areas of Portsmouth I have never been before. Turning a corner just after the Rudmore roundabout, we spotted our quest.
The first of many (I hope) millennium mileposts. There are approx 1000 dotted across the country so I have a quite a few to find before I’ve bagged them all.
I will write a separate post about them, their history and any other information I can find. So if this interests you too, go take a look.
It seems quite fitting to find my first one in Portsmouth, and I marvelled that I have never come across it before despite it being here over 20 years.
Once we had finished documenting our visit (Jo and Babs are very patient!), we returned to our route around the harbour. It’s been quite a while since I rode round Portsmouth island and the city council have obviously been busy upgrading their shoreline. We took full advantage of the new seating arrangement to enjoy the sun for a little while longer. And who could blame us after the recent foul weather we’ve had to endure.
Babs chilling…
Jo chilling…
Hmmm!!!
Lovely day!
Lovely day!
The nicest thing about travelling by bike is that it is very easy to change direction. This is especially useful when you miss a blue sign and misread the route. It is also really good when you decide to make a detour to another local attraction.
Portchester castle was too much of a magnet to resist, and though the extortionate prices put us off sampling the grounds, we took the path round the perimeter and reviewed our route on the horizon.
Babs embarked on a touch of enforced bike maintenance in front of the primitive toilets. Returning to our journey once the chain had been returned to its cogs. We headed on back towards Fareham.
We stopped once more at a nearby Lidl to use the facilities and ended up in a conversation with a lovely lady asking advice on frame sizes as she was hoping to start cycling. We left her with a card after extolling the virtues of Breeze and wished her well with her cycling venture.
Our route back to Fareham station was fairly quick and pretty unremarkable. But the sense of satisfaction having completed our task was huge.
Having once more swiped ourselves through the barriers with our newfound digital technology, we checked in with the definitely non digital guard as to which platform we needed. We headed towards the first lift and across the bridge to the second as we watched a train pull in. The lovely guard waited for us to arrive, confirmed the destination of the train and directed Jo and Babs to the correct carriage.
I didn’t have to wait long either before I too was on my way home.
My train was small and did not have an obvious bike section. But keen not to miss it, I popped my bike in through the double doors. I was expecting to be told off any minute, but no one came through, and I wasn’t blocking anywhere or anyone. Two stops later and I was back in Southampton and heading home after enjoying another great trip out with friends and my bike.
