2023 United Kingdom, Day 5: Poole

Bike Route: Southampton to Poole via NR23 and NR2 40mi 1500ft climb. Mile 2: Hythe Ferry across estuary.

Accommodation: Small private room near Sandbanks (Airbnb); hosts Gillian and Geoff. A small room with private bath in the penthouse of a small block of six apartments. It's often described as living in a tree house. Very light Italian style.

Dinner: Baffi woodfire pizza restaurant. We shared a fennel sausage pizza, large salad, and cheesecake. It was just as good as it sounds.

Our host was still away cycling when we packed up in the morning. We got a fairly early start after a light breakfast of yogurt, granola, and fruit. The biking was fairly easy, the weather was beautiful, and the day went fast.

The last stretch of our route was along the beach road in Poole, with the ocean on our left and beach huts and restaurants on our right. At the end of the beach, we climbed up through a carnival entertainment area and wound our way through huge beach houses, apartment complexes, and estates to a quiet area developed in the early to mid-1900s near the village of Canfield Cliffs.

Our room for the night was inside Compton Acres, an exclusive community with award-winning gardens, hotels, and restaurants that is often a wedding and events venue. Our hosts were Geoff and Gillian, incredibly kind and helpful people with a huge family who have lived in the penthouse for six years. Gill owns a local estate agency that is now run by their two sons. We felt instantly at home. After a pizza dinner a few hundred yards away in Canford Cliffs and warm showers back in the room, we got an excellent night's sleep.

At mile 2, we boarded the Hythe Ferry for a 10-minute trip across the estuary. This saved us about 8 miles of riding on a busy highway up and around the water.

Ken has more fun talking to the animals. The first half of our journey was through the New Forest, where herds of wild horses roam freely.

The gorse was in full bloom in the forest.

Horses grazing peacefully beside the bike trail.

Horses ignoring Ken as he rides by.

Bike path along the beach into Poole. Despite the heatwave, few people were braving the cold sea.

Sunday is photo day at the kennel, and Izzie posed expectantly on her walk. We are guessing there is a treat just in front of the camera. We really enjoy the videos and photos that her kennel posts on Facebook while we are away.

2023 United Kingdom, Day 4: Southampton

Bike Route: Chawton to Southampton via Winchester 33mi 1700ft climb. Mile 20: Winchester lunch and cathedral stop

Accommodation: Great Double Room, Free Parking (Airbnb); host Lee. Shared bathroom, kitchen, washer/dryer, wifi.

Dinner: Soleto Bistro. Italian-inspired meals made from fresh, local ingredients. I had seafood risotto and Ken had mussels in cream sauce. We shared a large salad. Well, actually, as usual, we shared everything.

Kate cooked a delicious full English breakfast while we chatted with Mark, petted the dogs, and learned more about the history of the cottage, village, and farm. Then we were off, down the gravel drive, back through the village, and on our way to the coast.

The first 5 miles or so were on a gravel path through parkland and woods. Then we wound our way through farms, hamlets, and small villages like Bighton. About the time we were getting hungry, the sun was out and we were making our way through city streets to the Cathedral at Winchester. It was market day on a bank holiday weekend, the city was bustling, and the front lawn of the cathedral was filled with families picnicking and soaking in the sun. Ken bought olives and Turkish delight candies to add to our cheddar cheese and crackers, and we found our own spot on the grass.

I peeked inside the cathedral and caught a glimpse of the gothic arches before a ticket seller approached. We could only get inside if we purchased expensive one-year tickets, and there was no secure place to lock the bikes, so we decided to just walk around the grounds. It was a beautiful day and the gardens were beginning to bloom, so we were not sorry to stay outside--though it would have been memorable to stand inside that great nave.

The rest of the ride took us down through ever-larger villages into the suburbs of Southampton. The Brits were staggering under an unexpected heatwave (22 degrees Celsius, or 72 degrees Fahrenheit). We stopped a couple of times to remove a layer, switch out long-fingered gloves for short, and drink water.

We arrived in Southampton early and were able to check in early. Our host was away, cycling on the Isle of Wight, so we had the house to ourselves. After showers we started a load of laundry and went in search of food. Our room was in the middle of a college community full of kebab, pizza, and beer restaurants, noisy, and crowded. Ken found an Italian restaurant a half mile away, where we escaped to a quieter, adult atmosphere and enjoyed an amazing meal. The owner/chef overheard us talking about France and stopped by to ask if we were French. It turned out that he was from Greece. When he immigrated to England and opened his restaurant, he named it after Soleto (in Puglia, Italy) and set a menu of Italian-inspired foods using fresh, local ingredients. 

Usually we walk around after dinner, but it was cold and we wanted to check on our laundry, so we just went on back to our room and settled in for the night.

Riding through the bluebells.

Tulips and daffodils in bloom around the base of Winchester Cathedral.

We toured the outside of the cathedral to avoid leaving our bikes locked to the gate out front. They probably would have been okay, but we seldom take a chance when they are fully loaded.

It was Saturday, market day in Winchester, and the front lawn of the cathedral was filled with people enjoying the sun. I was reminded of a glorious sunny day 19 years ago when Meghan and I visited the Wells Cathedral and found a similar crowded front lawn. I don't recall ever seeing people stroll through and picnic at cathedrals in the US. It seems like a very British thing to do. It's lovely.

Ken and I joined the picnickers.

2023 United Kingdom, Day 3: Chawton

Bike Route: Shepperton toChawton 42mi 2100ft climb

Accommodation: The Garden House (Airbnb); hosts Markand Kate. Double bedroom with king bed, private bath, large drawing room with open fireplace, wifi. Breakfast in dining room, in the old part of the cottage once owned by Jane Austen's brother.

Dinner: Greyfriar Pub. Traditional British pub food with a modern twist, natural local ingredients. I had roasted pepper hummus and a ratatouille tart, Ken had BBQ ribs, chips (fries), and roasted peppers. Excellent.

We could not have had a more quintessentially English day. The weather started out cool and drizzly and gray. As we expected, much of our riding the first part of the day was beside (sometimes on) A- and B-roads, which are chaotic highways with tangled intersections. We quickly fell back into the pattern of following RWGPS and Wahoo guidance through it all.

Coming up through the edge of a forest near Ockham, we saw a handwritten sign advertising Britain's Best Butties! Well, who could resist. We pulled into the parking lot and placed our order for one to share.

Back on the road, we began to lose a little of the London suburb road wrangle, and started to wind our way through open fields, small villages, hamlets, and parklands.

We had tickets to the Jane Austen Museum in her former home in Chawton at 15:40. Although the biking went well, it also went slowly, and we missed that deadline. We also had reservations at the Greyfriar Pub across the street from her house at 18:00. That deadline we made--just barely.

Our accommodation in the gardener's cottage at the top of the farm on the edge of town was perfect. Mark answered the door and helped us store our bikes in their open garage. We quickly cleaned up a little and ran back down the hill to the pub, where we had an excellent dinner.

On our way back to the cottage, we walked around the outside of the house where Jane Austen spent  the last six years of her life and wrote her novels, across the street from the pub. We strolled down the road past Chawton House and Home Farm, and around the church just beyond the house.

As we came in the door back at the cottage, Mark again met us and chatted for a few minutes. We found out that he had sold advertising for a newspaper in London, Kate had just returned from skiing in France, and they had four grown children. We shared stories of our children and grandchildren, and petted the dogs.

After warm showers, we crawled into our feather bed in our quiet room with its view over the village and its set of Jane Austen novels on the dresser. We felt very happy and safe and steeped in history.

Yes, the Bacon Buttie is exactly what its name suggests. No, we don't need to have another one. But we could not pass up a local specialty on the side of the trail.

There will be lots of steep hills on this tour of England.

No comment needed.

At least half of our route took us through parks and forests with stunning views.

Ken can't seem to stop himself from petting the animals. This little guy was wandering the fence line crying for his mother--who was calmly chewing grass just a hundred feet away.

Thatched roofs often have animals perched atop them. The animals are actually finials made of straw. We spotted this one on the edge of Chawton as we came into the village.

The Greyfriar Pub was a short walk down the hill from our cottage.

We missed our reservations at the Jane Austen Museum, but we were able to get a view of the garden.

The Jane Austen Museum is across the road from the Greyfriar Pub.

Jane Austen's mother and sister are buried in the cemetery behind this little church at the edge of the Home Farm.

The Gardener's House, where we stayed, has had only two owners since Jane Austen's brother owned it. Our hosts built the addition on the right, and the former owners built the one on the left. Our room was on the second story on the left. We ate breakfast in the dining room at the back of the house, in the original part of the cottage. The surrounding gardens and stone walls are exactly as they were when the Austens lived in the village.

A field of daffodils behind the Chawton Home Farm.

2023 United Kingdom, Day 2: Shepperton

Transfer from LHR to Shepperton: Large taxi van, friendly and talkative driver with four kids, wife is a yoga and mindfulness teacher.

Bike Route: Shepperton to Walton-on-Thames and back, 5 miles

Accommodation: The New Barn (Airbnb), host Jason. A small barn converted to a studio apartment. Basic but comfortable, just what we needed for our first night in England.

We landed exactly on time in London, at 7:15 a.m., after a really smooth and easy flight. Because of the early arrival, we had set ourselves a little challenge.

Plan A (the challenge) was to assemble the bikes at the airport and ride them the 9 miles to our Airbnb in Shepperton. We had planned a route that took us out of the airport through a tunnel, and onto a dedicated cycle path. Simple. We collected the boxes from Oversized Luggage, found a quiet corner near the Exit door, and had just pulled out the bikes and started putting them together when a security guard interrupted us and asked it we knew we could not ride the bikes out of the airport. The tunnel is strictly for motorized vehicles--no pedestrians or cycles. The only way to get assembled bikes out was to take them through the Underground.

We had not done any research on taking the Underground out of the airport, and maneuvering loaded bikes through the Underground sounded way too complicated. Our Plan B was to take the bikes in their boxes outside and hail a big taxi. We stuffed the bikes back in their boxes and headed out to the taxi stand, and I found an ATM and got some British pounds sterling. We had to wait just a bit for a taxi large enough, but by 8:30, we were on the road, and by 9:00, we were at our Airbnb. Just four hours too early to check in.

Plan B, part 2, was to assemble the bikes in a grassy area just outside the gates to our Airbnb, saddle them up, and ride to Walton-on-Thames, about 2.5 miles away, to get prepaid UK phone cards and groceries, and then find a quiet place where we could secure the bikes, drink coffee, and wait until our apartment opened up. We had just opened the boxes when a van pulled up and our host, Jason, invited us into the courtyard. We got the bikes together, Jason stored our bags and drew us a map to the Vodafone store in Walton, and we were on our way. How easy was that!

On our way back to our apartment, we passed a pub advertising a curry lunch special that smelled amazing. After a quick clean-up at the apartment, we walked back to the pub and enjoyed our first meal of this trip in England. Back at the apartment, we took a shower, laid down for a nap, got up for a snack, and went back to bed for a full night's sleep.

Really? We can't go through the tunnel? Oh, darn.

2023 United Kingdom, Preparing and Day 1: Packing, Errands, and Flying

Transfer from MSP to LHR: City Gal Transport. Ginny got us to the airport on time and with a pleasant ride. We enjoyed meeting and getting to know her--and look forward to hearing about her upcoming trip when we return.

Sunday, April 23, was bike boxing day. We are always a little tense before the bikes are ready to fly. It takes a while to get them apart, fit them into their boxes, and protect the important bits, but we always manage in the end. It's just that the bikes add a layer of complexity to our travel, and getting them to our destination safely is a challenge.

Monday, April 24, was errands, laundry, and bag packing day.

Tuesday, April 25, Ken took Izzie to the kennel.

Wednesday, April 26, was fly day. Ginny at City Gal Transport arrived exactly on time, just as we finished our last loads of laundry and dishes and were locking the door behind us. And we were off!

It was a little too chilly and wet to box the bikes in the garage, so we brought them into the living room. 

My bike is ready to drop into the box. For the first time, we had boxes big enough that we didn't need to remove the rear wheel and rack. That really simplified disassembly--and reassembly.