One of the things I was looking forward to about coming to Cirencester was just down the road on Bird lip hill, do birds have lips ? was a bike park, a playground for me to go off and play on my bike, giving Nikki some peace and quiet. But Boris said no Mike the bike park has to close. Thanks Boris. I argued the case pointing out that when on the trails you don’t see anyone and if you do keeping two metres apart is easy. But the answer was still no.

So I was forced to go out in my bike on the road. I love being out in my bike but not on the road. For me it’s boring and don’t get me started on the traffic. I think everyone who takes driving lessons now should ride a bike for a day or two around towns etc and then they would realise just how much room they should give peaple on bikes etc.

Luckily when I go out from the site I can avoid most traffic and try and use all the small back roads, that way I rarely see cars just the odd tractor. That was until the other day when out in my bike just making a route up as I went along I came across a main road the A429. When I say main road it’s not like a major busy road but bigger than a rural lane. We drive along it when leaving here heading for the M4. No I never ended up on the M4 on my bike.

I knew where I was when I came onto this road and knew just down the road was a place called Kemble which has an airfield now called Cotswold Airport. When we have driven down this road last year you can see over the other side of the airfield old planes, some complete others in parts. But now parked up right next to the road are a line of 747’s. You can almost touch them.

It’s not everyday you see these big planes up so close especially when your out for a bike ride. Plenty of room for me to park the bike up and take some pictures. There is a company that use the airport called ASI Air salvage international. Basically a scrapyard for planes but a posh one. This company strip parts and store them, they do refits where they will strip a part off and transport it anywhere in the world and refit to another plane. Refits on the interior for training etc, film shoots and they will store your old planes here for you. A scrapyard on a grand scale, not like your old car scrapyard you used to see years ago. So if you need a part for your 747 etc these guys just might have what your looking for.

After taking some photos I got back on my bike and headed for Cirencester to complete my 22 mile bike ride. And I didn’t see one tractor that day just a load of 747 jumbo jets. You try making people believe that when you tell them.

Another photo opportunity I wanted to try was to put some lights on my bike and take photos of it in the dark. No not Xmas lights just normal bike lights. Well not quite normal but very good bike lights. Bike lights have come a long way since my childhood days on my paper round. Replacing the battery’s every couple of weeks and even then it was just like having a candle in front of you. Then you left them off for the summer and when you went to put them back on next winter they were all corroded and had to be thrown out so you had to spend your paper round money on new lights. Vicious circle really.

My bike lights now are led lights and you recharge them through a USB port and they are very bright with main beam, low beam, flashing, strobing etc. Yes they are expensive for good ones. These were £100 but you can get better ones. I will rarely use these but I do quite fancy doing a night ride down the trails at the bike park in Wales.

As you can see they are very bright and peaple should be able to see me if I go out at night. Probably not a good idea around here though as the planes coming into the cotswold airfield might mistake my lights for the runway lights being so bright.

Tonight we are treating ourselves to a Chinese takeaway, it may contain nuts but no Covid. Stay safe everybody.

It’s nice to be back at Cirencester, it would have been nicer if it wasn’t under these circumstances. Good to catch up with friends that are here also. The weather has been kind to us so far which is always a bonus.

We went for a walk into town the other day just to get a bit of shopping and stretch the legs. Cirencester is a loverly old town and in my opinion better now because all the shops are closed, although not very good for the owners having to lockdown again this year. We walked past the pubs we used to go in last year. It’s strange how you really want to go in the pub when it’s closed but if it was open you would just walk on by. Well maybe with a bit of effort you could.

Our walk took us through the Bathurst estate and we had a pleasant surprise. We came across some elephants. No I did not go in the pub and then imagine it. There on the grass were four elephants. Not real ones but beautiful full size sculptures.

The elephants are made from dried Lantana camara stalks, a weed when dried behaves like willow. Next summer 125 of these elephants will transform London’s three royal parks. Green park, St James park and Berkeley square park into an Asian jungle. It’s all about bringing the awareness of elephants living in harmony with humans. You can find out more by going to Coexistance.org. It’s a fantastic thing to be done. Let’s hope it protects and saves this wonderful species forever. Elephants are really fascinating animals.

A couple of days later I went for another walk up through the Bathurst estate again but a different way. The whole area is vast and so many ways you can go and to think it’s somebody’s garden. It’s only open from 8am until 5pm. Being such a large area you are never going to be bumping into peaple which is nice. I came across this monument. It’s called the popes seat. Stood looking at it I wondered how many peaple had sat on the bench inside, how many peaple over the years had walked through that archway and where were they going.

After taking some photos and no one answering my questions I wandered off further up the estate still wondering. On the way back I approached the popes seat from a different angle and that got me wondering all over again. It would be great if you could turn back time just to have a look around.

I walked a total of nearly five miles and there are still plenty of miles still to walk in the estate with all the different ways you can go. Nikki came with me on one day, I showed her the popes seat. We saw a muntjac deer, buzzards, kestrel but only walked about two miles that day. Nikki’s legs are only small. The colours are beautiful with all the autumn leaves and that’s where I will leave this post for today with a picture of some leaves. Stay safe everybody.

With the site gates closed and all the shut down work done and one last visit to the pub, we could sit back and relax. Now we had to decide what to do after the news that England was going to go into lockdown. And to make it more complicated Wales would come out of lockdown on the 9th November and England go into lockdown on the 5th of November.

We need to get down to Devon, with a stop on the way ideally. Luckily the club we work for open some sites for peaple like us, no fixed abode and peaple who are moving house etc. Cirencester was one of these sites This was one we were going to stop at on the way to Devon anyway. So the decision was made, book into Cirencester and leave Wales. But when do we leave with the cross over lockdowns in place.

We decided we have good reason to be moving about, having finished our contract in wales and then going to a safe place. The club have all our details and are happy for us to do this. we decided to leave wales on the 5th November. All packed up and we left the site yesterday morning at 9.15 am. Me driving the camper and Nikki following on in the car. Nikki has made sandwiches and we planned to pull over somewhere for a comfort break and lunch, all in the comfort of the camper. So from start to finish of our journey we would be totally independent.

We had joked about being stopped, or me being stopped driving the camper in Wales while in lockdown and again in England as that was the day they went into lockdown. I had visions of getting pulled over as Nikki drove on by in the car.

Leaving wales on a beautiful sunny day was hard. We had a lot of wind and rain the last few days but yesterday was beautiful. The mountains looked fantastic and the morning mist laying low in the valleys all reminded me why I love this area so much. It was a long drive, 177 miles and just over four hours with a comfort stop and another stop to refuel. And you know what, we only saw one police camera van and that was about 15 miles after we left site.

The sun was out in Cirencester and as we pulled onto the pitch to get set up, a voice called out, good to see you back and there was Malcolm one of the seasonals who we knew from last year when we worked on this site. He said he had got word of us coming back. The trouble with being famous. LOL Our friends from Cornwall also turned up as they are on the way up north, so it’s good to catch up with them.

So that’s us here at Cirencester. Lockdown in England ends on 2nd December but we have an mot on the camper booked on the 1st. We have a campsite down in Devon which we hope will take us just before this date so we can keep our appointment. If not it will be a night on the garage forecourt ready for the mot next day. Living in a tin can is great, never a dull moment. Oh and one last thing I need some more sofas to look behind and I think we could be living on beans on toast for a long time because I’m sure the clutch is going on the camper. Stay safe everybody.