Steep declines and uphill struggles

 Undoubtedly the scenery hereabouts is breath-taking, both metaphorically and literally. 

Our days of extreme cycling have long gone, struggling up Wrynose with camping gear strapped to the panniers is fine for twentysomethings, now a sedate exploration of Europe's via verde is more our style.  We like abandoned railways, especially when their gentle gradients are flattened completely by pedelec assistance. That being said, over recent months Gill has lost confidence in cycling. For the past few years she has struggled with an issue affecting the peripheral vision in her left eye. It makes  judging distances to her left, difficult so much so that she no longer feels able to drive. When we were in Tuscany last autumn cycling began to be problematic too. Last month, after a couple of years where the medical profession seemed completely nonplussed by the condition, a specialist at Manchester Royal Eye Hospital diagnosed the problem as stemming from an un-treated squint that should have been sorted out when she was a child. Early in June she is booked-in for a procedure that might help - injecting botox into the eye muscle, sound horrible!

So far as cycling is concerned she wondered if the problem cycling was exacerbated by the design of her e-bike. We bought them in 2012 when there was far less choice. Gill's Wisper 705 was a step-though Dutch-style 'sit-up-and beg' design. It has the same frame size as mine and 26"wheels.Maybe it has always been too big, she wondered. So in February she replaced it with a smaller version, the newer model has a more compact frame, smaller wheels and a 'cadence' drive, which means the motor kicks-in as soon as you press the pedal, rather than the 'delayed reaction' you get  the older 'torque' drive. The upshot of this means that Gill's new bike rides much more like an ordinary pedal cycle and so should present less of a problem. It's a lovely electric blue colour, in comparison my somewhat rusty slate grey monster looks a bit sad and unlovely now.

The  Willingcott Caravan and Motorhome Club Site is a tad windswept and bleak, why we booked it in preference to some of the more picturesque club sites in Devon was due to it's proximity to the bike trail that runs from here to Ilfracombe. It follows the route of a disused railway line so ticks all the boxes so far as sedate cycling goes. The four mile route wends it way along the shoulder of the downs, you get occasional glimpses of the sea before reaching a wooded section. Spring was in full swing down here compared to home, the embankments covered in primroses, a truly uplifting sight.

The ruins of  the old railway buildings are graffiti covered, I stopped to take a photo of one of the more pleasing efforts. How common is it, I wonder, to find clumps of flowers and graffiti daubed walls equally gratifying?  After all human expression is part of the natural world, language as much the result of evolution as birdsong, so why not celebrate them both?

A mile or so before we reached the outskirts of Ilfracombe we passed two small reservoirs, then a nature reserve with footpaths leading to a cairn with extensive views across the Bristol Channel to the Welsh coast. Perkier, pre-lockdown versions of us would have stopped and explored both, but somehow we are still lacking 'umph' so we rode past them. What will it take to lift our spirits?  Some warm sunny days would not come amiss, that might help.

The railway from Barnstable to Ilfracombe operated for almost a century, opening in 1874 until 1970. It must have been quite an engineering challenge, the terrain between Woolacombe and Ilfracombe in particular is very hilly, so much so that Ilfracombe station was built on the outskirts of the town, a mile from the centre, high above the seafront.

The traffic free cycle track stops near the site of the old Ilfracombe terminus. To reach the seafront involved a mile long hazardous ride down steep streets with parked cars lining each side, exactly the situation that Gill was keen to avoid. After 100 metres, our progress halted twice by oncoming vans heading for the small industrial estate built on the site of the old station, we gave-up, admired a distant prospect of the sea viewed across the rooftops of Ilfracombe's Edwardian outskirts, then headed back along the trail for a late lunch back at the van.

Like yesterday, it was too blustery and cold to relax outside. Gill busied herself knitting while I became increasingly bored. I decided to pedal towards the nearby village of Morthoe situated in the clifftops east of Woolacombe. 

It is a much older settlement than Woolacombe, a straggling  street of stone cottages clustered around a stubby towered church and a few pubs. I stopped to take a couple of photos outside the Chichester Arms wondering why a pub in Devon would be named after a city in West Sussex.

It's a steep drop from the village to Woolacombe. The view is spectacular, perhaps we should have walked along the clifftops yesterday, I wondered, instead of sitting on a bench eating a pasties, observing the absurdities of the human zoo.

Given its spectacular location Woolacombe is surprisingly unlovely. As I pedalled along the seafront it struck me that part of the problem is to do with car parking. The beach is separated from the town by two enormous car parks, both operated by a mysterious organisation called the Parkin Estates. Judging from the beach signage it seemed they managed the village's beaches too.

It struck me that it was quite unusual for the beach at a British resort to be owned and operated by a private company, most private beaches in Britain are in more remote places owned by A list celebrities or aristocrats keen to keep the great unwashed away from their coastal hideaways. Intrigued, I found myself a bench googling 'Parkin Estates'. The result not only explained their apparent monopoly on public amenities in Woolacombe but also why the pub in nearby Morthoe was called the Chichester Arms. The Chichesters were a local aristocratic family whose ancestors were granted control of a large part of North Devon by Henry 1st in 1133. That continued until 1948 when the last of the Chichesters died, most of their holdings were gifted to the National Trust, but a family friend called Mr. Parkin bought the parts of the estate around Woolacombe. It's quite funny really that Mr. Parkin's heirs derive much of their income from parking.

Time to head back. Yesterday's failed attempt to make it up the hill at the western end of the village narked me. Once I decide to do something I find it very difficult to give in. I call it determination, the rest of the family obstinacy.  Challacombe Hill is a narrow lane that connects the west end of Woolacombe to the coast road to Braunton. It rises 600' in less than a mile, when I tried to ride up it yesterday I managed about  150 metres before the electric's decided I was pedalling too slowly and the motor cut out. This time I was more determined and maybe managed 50 metres further before the same thing happened. I refused to be beaten (see - obstinate). I decided I would push the bike up by using the hand thottle, trotting alongside as the bike powered itself  up the vertiginous slope.

The views were stupendous. Every so often I would pause to take a picture and catch my breathe. The problem with using the throttle is its minimum speed is 3 -  4mph, so I ascended at an alarmingly brisk pace. When I reached the top I noticed the sign that warned of a 24% slope - almost 1:4! Maybe I am not quite so unfit as I think, the fitness app on my phone keeps informing me I am thee stones overweight, moreover, I have a heart murmur and high blood pressure and in two weeks time I officially become an OAP. I consoled myself with the thought that I cannot be a complete physical wreck if I can jog up a mile long 1:4 slope.

'How was that?' Gill enquired when I got back to the van. 'Fabulous', I replied, because it was. Great to be out and about, I presume at some point I will stop noticing how weird England is, learn to overlook its peculiarities and celebrate its beauty, or maybe not.

The Woolacombe Pussy Riot

One of the great things about travel is its unpredictability, or perhaps more precisely, that it involves a conscious choice to pursue the unexpected. Admittedly, these may be somewhat grandiose terms for a three night break in a Caravan and Motorhome Club site near Woolacombe. It's never going to trend on Guardian Travel like an account of crossing the Atacama by motorised skateboard, guerilla base jumping in Guangzhou or the pursuit of mindfulness in some ruined bothy in Ubhist A Tuath. Still, after months of being locked -up the prospect of a short break in North Devon acquired expedition status, with all the associated rituals of over preparation, list-making and Cassandra-like catastrophising.

Sorting the van out for the quick trip proved unexpectedly taxing, I think doing anything even mildly out of the ordinary has become a challenge after months of under stimulation and facile domesticity. I read an interesting article about Covid related 'brain fog', not the mysterious symptoms affecting a significant minority of people recovering from the virus, but cases of  mild cognitive disfunction reported by people generally. Certainly my memory has become more unreliable, I have been prone to mysterious mood swings, concentrating on a book or film is impossible and I keep finding myself in the kitchen wondering what I came in to do. Brain fog describes the the sensation perfectly.

The first section written by a neuroscientist about how we are hard-wired to notice change and animated by novel experiences, - a question of survival for our hunter gatherer forebears I suppose - explains why imposed under stimulation has prompted a collective cerebral miasma during lockdown.

It's a normal reaction, reflected if you think about it in idiomatic speech, we speak of things being mind crunchingly tedious or dead boring. It also accounts for why I seem much perkier while travelling, more enthusiastic and energetic, less assailed by dark rumination and irrational anxieties. It is not seeking bucket list hotspots or hoped for cherished memories that make travel good for the soul but the daily mundane uncertainties and the small unexpected delights, even minor glitches can raise your spirits. Somewhere new can never be humdrum.

Take today, we headed south from Cirencester towards the M4. This part of south Gloucestershire lies outside the Cotswolds area of outstanding beauty, a more lowland area, the upper valley of the Thames, with straggling villages and neat farms. A quieter landscape than the Cotswolds, but not unattractive, nor without its surprises. We rounded a corner and were confronted by a small flock of jumbo jets put out to pasture in a nearby field.

The Cotswold Airport is a commercial venture based in the disused RAF Kemble airbase. One of its specialities is dismantling retired airliners. Along with facemask manufacturers, Amazon, and Deliveroo, the pandemic must have heralded boom times for aircraft dismantlers as major airlines opt to retire their ageing fleets of Boeing 747s whose future looked increasingly doubtful due to environmental concerns even before Covid emptied the skies.

The vision of a line of BA liveried engineless Jumbos was a sad one, at least for someone who grew up in the 1970s. I understand that the imperative to reduce carbon emissions has sealed the aircraft's fate, but it has to rank as one of the icons of the latter part of the twentieth century. The Jumbo's first flight was in February 1969, about a month before Concorde's. Two visions of the aviation future, one supersonic for the elite, the other less technologically advanced but pitched towards the masses. The sales figures reveal which aircraft better anticipated the future, eventually after years of delay 20 Concorde's were built , to date Boeing have sold 1573 Jumbos. I have a soft spot for them, over the years they have whisked the Turpies to Florida, California, Tokyo and back from Brisbane. Despite all the environmental concerns, for people hooked on travel 747s are a symbol of escape. Joni Mitchell captures this perfectly in the final verse of 'Amelia',

I pulled into the Cactus Tree Motel

To shower off the dust

And I slept on the strange pillows of my wanderlust

I dreamed of 747s

Over geometric farms

Dreams Amelia, dreams and false alarms

After this the remaining 140 miles or so to our destination felt humdrum, but not unpleasant, the landscape of Somerset and Devon does persuade you that England truly is a 'green and pleasant land'.

However on this particular Monday in mid-April, though bright and sunny, it was, as a native might describe it, a bit 'fresh'. We are not big fans of 'bracing' hence our propensity to head for the Med as much as we can, Right now we can't, so the choice is vegetate at home or be content to be invigorated in Devon. It transpired we had chosen a particularly invigorating spot,  

The Willingcott Caravan and Motorhome Club Site is less than two miles from the beach at Woolacombe, but the pitches spread across an exposed hillside 600 feet above the sea. An ideal moment to experiment with the dual fuel Truma heating system we decided (verdict, using the ehu supply might save LPG, but if you want to be cosy splash the gas). We decided against taking an evening stroll and watched an episode of 'The Young Montalbano' instead. Tomorrow we'll pedal down to Woolacombe we decided.

It is no accident that Woolacombe beach has been voted the UK's best om numerous occasions. Three miles of  pristine sand stretch between the Morthoe and Baggy Sands headlands. It is popular with families and surfers alike, though it is fair to say the latter far outnumbered the former this early in the season.

You have to admire the pluck of the seaside stalwarts hunched behind their stripy windbreaks, wrapped-up in cagouls, festooned with scarves.

I wrote in a post back in 2014 that although I love the sea I am not a fan of 'the seaside'. Nowhere over the intervening seven years has persuaded me to change my mind,, at least about the British version of it. What I said about Benlech in Anglesey back then remains equally true of Woolacombe today. What changed between then and now is the the tens of thousands of miles we have travelled, exploring the coasts of Europe following the shores of the Baltic, the Mediterranean and the Atlantic both this side and the eastern seaboard of America,; the Pacific too, on our trip around New Zealand in 2018. It seems to be a universal human impulse to find solace by the ocean, yet each iteration of this need is expressed differently depending where you are. Whether strolling a faded broad walk in Atlantic City or the palm fringed  sands of St. Pete's Beach, Americans don't tend to laze about but walk briskly to and fro. In St  Tropez or Biarittz posing languorously is de rigueur, staring soulfully at the sea less important than being seen, Away from the Costas or the Algarve, Iberian beach culture is orientated around family and food, a long Sunday lunch in a shady Chiringuito prefered to sunbathing. Sweden's quiet sands are more outdoorsy, beach sports are the thing, family fun played with minimum fuss and clothing. 

However, in all our wanderings nowhere has displayed a seaside sociology as complex and intriguing as our home country.. This is because ambivalence lies at the core of our being, praise is given faintly, approval half-hearted -  things are 'not bad' rarely 'great',  we specialise in back handed  compliments and take our pleasures guiltily. The lodestone of Englishness is awkwardness born of embarrassment. It may be the barely noticed muzak of our everyday lives, but at the seaside its volume ramps up, like the intrusive soundtrack to a bad comedy. In big resorts like Blackpool or Bournemouth their essential naffness is ameliorated by a certain faded grandeur, small resorts like Woolacombe achieve grandeur through  the setting, the coastline here is unquestionably sublime. The contrast between the two, beautiful coastline and tawdry little resort was striking., Woolacombe felt bathetic, similar to the impression we got of Robimhood's Bay when we visited North Yorkshire a couple of years ago. 

In the mid-twentieth century I suppose tt was the saucy postcard or risible end of the pier show that captured the essential 'you are awful but I like you' aspect of the British seaside. At least in their heyday our resorts, great and small, exuded a raw plebeian energy, now they can seem melancholy places, out of kilter with the values and mores of the Tiktok generation. You would expect them to be full pensioners on coach trips, maybe in normal times they would be, but at the moment wth Covid restrictions on household mixing still in place, in fact it was mainly twenty somethings wandering about, not just surf dudes, but couples and young families. I reflected on this, maybe I am misreading the runes and failing to appreciated Woolacombe's appeal to a generation who expresses solidarity though posting ironically captioned selfies or a self-deprecating video clip on Instagram, media savvy and prone to undermine convention through parody.

A Tiktok moment drifted by as we played out our own trope of two pensioners sitting together on a bench eating pasties. The passers-by consisted of a young couple in their mid-twenties, their two kids, aged about five and seven and an older women in her fifties, grandma, I guess. Everything about them was perfectly ordinary apart from the arresting caption on the younger woman's tee-shirt - 'Big Thighs but Beautiful Eyes'. It was at least partially true, she was quite plump and wearing figure hugging lycra, However the veracity of the latter part of the statement proved impossible to ascertain as her eyes were hidden behind big sun-glasses. The caption was designed to be provocative and in that moment seemed to me to project a message about 'body-positivity - Lizzo at the seaside, I did not expect that. The context was perfect, 'fat woman at the beach' is one of the classic tropes of the British 'saucy postcard'.

The tee-shirt slogan drew on that conceit, then undermined it, a gentle admonishment of the deep seated misogyny couched within within traditional British humour, not just postcards, but the of the comedy of my youth -  Benny Hill, Carry-on films, Les Dawson and Bernard Manning. OK, the tee-shirt's assertion was hardly an outburst of feminist radicalism - Pussy Riot in Woolacombe - yet simply displaying the slogan took  a certain bravado like a #metoo generation riposte to Half Man Half Biscuit's  'Totnes Bickering Fair' .

After months of lockdown when our take on the world has been mediated through a screen, experiencing life in the raw took some adjustment. It is quite easy to succumb to the misapprehension  that  what comes at you through the TV or social media resembles life in the flesh,.it doesn't. Our particular confusion of the virtual with the real has concerned food mainly. So far 2021 has been very gastro orientated. My daughter and her partner have been staying with us for the past six months. Unlike me, Gill, Sarah and Rob are all accomplished cooks, they take food seriously and with little else to do gastronomy has loomed large in our lives. We have watched hours of Anthony Bourdain on Netflix; and Rick Stein's summery food pilgrimage through Cornwall brightened the dark days of January. There have been earnest discussions concerning Felicity Cloake's in-depth investigation into what makes the perfect fish pie, we have reflected on Jay Rayner's 'last supper' and our mundane existence has been brightened by a weekly dose of Grace Dent. Her fame as a regular guest critic on Masterchef overshadows the genius of  her writing,  real literary heft hides in plain sight in her weekly food  column for the Guardian, a thought provoking cultural commentator as much as a a food writer. 

What all these writers have done is widen our appreciation of good food beyond the elite niche of fine dining, not only celebrating the UK's willingness to embrace world food but also championing great British produce and cookery. So when we needed to find somewhere to have lunch in Woolacombe, even though social distancing meant eating outdoors, we were hopeful we might find something delicious on offer. After reading the on-line reviews we decided 'Fudgies Bakery' might be the place, 'Incredible and delicious range of pasties' enthused one reviewer', another, 'The best vegan pasty I have ever eaten in my many years of being a vegan surfer from Devon.' The bakery had 46 reviews, all but three of them gave it five stars. I anticipated the delight of a genuine West Country pasty, simple but delicious like something Rick Stein might have bought from a food truck parked on some quaint quayside in  Cornwall.

They weren't. We both opted for the beef with stilton ones, sadly they were barely heated through and were  bland, under-seasoned and utterly tasteless. Gill managed about three bites before commenting 'my mouth deserves better than this'. I ate half of mine, then decided I'd had enough too. Is this what coming out of lockdown is going to be like? Adjusting our expectations downwards until they match the mundanity of everyday life; is it the case that optimists are simply people who manage their disappointment more effectively than most? On that downbeat note we headed back to the van back the same way we came after failing to make it up the impossibly steep slope to the south of the town waymarked as National Cycle route 27. Back at the site, though it was bright and sunny, it was too cold to sit out. We did a bit of spring cleaning in the van, then Gill knitted for a bit and I made some notes on my phone's note app. Normality resumed unobtrusively, maybe the world will return in the same way T. S. Eliot thought it would  end -  'not with a bang but a whimper'.

Foreigners at home

Lunch in Stafford services, Birmingham, then down the M5, Cotswolds on the left, the misty Malvern's to the right, early spring greening the hedgerows of the Avon valley. After months of staying local Gloucestershire felt foreign and slightly exotic. 

We settled into the Camping and Motorhome site on the outskirts of Cirencester. Never one for changing habits, I immediately performed my usual arrival ceremony which involves an extended harangue loosely based on the Maori 'haka' involving the words 'bungaloid', 'jobs-worths' and 'effing Tories', but whispered darkly though clenched teeth. Very English!  Arrival rituals completed, we attempted to take a walk. Cirencester Park adjacent to the campsite looked inviting, a meticulous picturesque landscape belonging to the noble pile on the western edge of the town. It's called The Bathtub Estate or something. It was not to be, Lord and Lady Hoo-ha only allow the great unwashed to wander through their rolling acres between 8am and 5pm, it was now 4.50pm and the wrought iron gates were already wrapped with a chunky chain and firmly padlocked. I channelled my irritation by taking a picture of an inadvertently funny sign fastened to the nearby railings.

I speculated that as medical science and genetic engineering reduce the risks of dying from some horrible disease, in some reforested future the biggest risk to humanity will come from being accidentally brained by a hefty bough. You have to admire the vision of the British aristocracy, The 9th Earl Bathtub is quite clearly well ahead of the game and like all members of his class you can be sure the well-being of the common folk is always uppermost in his mind.

The town's cricket and tennis clubs are next to Bathtub Park (well, they would be wouldn't they!).  The junior team's cricket match was entering its latter stages, I suspect it was the first of the season. I am not sure how the parents looking-on were conforming to social distancing, there must have been about forty spectators. They were gaggled rather than distanced. I think most of us are becoming more flexible regarding such matters, we've all had enough. I watched a lanky boy in his mid-teens run-up to bowl, medium paced, well placed, but the shorter, younger batsman had his measure, leaning back he clipped the ball through the covers and ran for two. A small appreciative ripple of applause drifted through the chilly late afternoon air. It was a quintessentially English moment, ok,  a posh English moment when someone might exclaim, 'Good show!' or slightly built, effette youths refer to one another as chaps.

I reflected that my youthful relationship with the game had been somewhat chequered. During the summer months three concrete steps next to a patch of green in the middle of the council estate became an impromptu wicket, and a small gang of us kept ourselves out of mischief for weeks with nothing but a toy cricket bat and a balding tennis ball.

However, at Grammar school when faced with the real thing I proved to be spectacularly inept at cricket. With the ball I could easily bowl an entire over of 'wides'; in the field I missed every catch that came my way; at the crease I never overcame the natural instinct to duck or jump out of the way when something solid, the size of a small rock, is hurled towards you at 70mph.

Nevertheless, as boy I watched a lot of cricket . My Dad's weekday job was as a cane fishing rod builder at Hardy Bros., Alnwick's biggest employer. However, pre-war he had trained as a greenkeeper at a Scottish golf club. All his working life, indeed right up into his eighties, he worked part-time as a groundsman, first with the cricket club, then later looking after the greens at the golf course, and finally, when that became too physically demanding, he kept the town's bowling club greens beautifully manicured. Sometimes I used to tag along at the weekend to give him a hand, then watch the cricket. The sight and sounds of Cirencester youth squad in full swing sparked the memory of something I have not recalled for years. By the time I reached my mid-teens I had better things to do at the weekend than to watch the cricket while my Dad waited to roll the pitch at teatime. However, the news that Rohan Kanhai, the renowned West Indian international batsman, would be playing was enough for me suspend my adolescent bookishness for an afternoon  to watch the match. 

The match between Ashington and Alnwick was always bitterly contested, pitmen versus young farmers, talk about skin in the game! I can't actually remember who won, but recall that Kanhai batted well, but did not quite reach a half century, so a respectable outcome for the home side I suppose. What I do recall is meeting the famous batsman briefly in the pavilion at tea. It was the first time I had met anyone non-white. Unimaginable now and a testament to how the world has become more interconnected and the country far more diveplace during my lifetime. The thing about Cirencester however, is that it strikes you that that is not the case everywhere. No wonder the place reminded me of my youth, because here it felt England had hardly changed at all.

Having failed to go for a walk in the park we decided to take a stroll into town. If you read reviews about Cirencester on Google maps people seem to love it. I suppose it does conform to the version of England portrayed in Downton Abbey or a TV adaptation of Agatha Christie. 

Over the past decade there has been an ever increasing tendency to mythologise a whitewashed version of our past, obsessed about WW2, seizing the opportunity to memorialise the centenaries of the major battles of the first world war not as a disaster for all concerned, but an assertion of the virtues of patriotic sacrifice. Yesterday Prince Phillip's funeral proffered another opportunity for an outpouring of pantomine sentimentality and covert jingoism. I can't be doing with it, it's not just Brexit that has made me feel estranged from England, a foreigner in my home country, but the up-swelling of a trite, uncontested version of British history that mythologises our questionable past and imagines that we remain some sort of world power. Last week Polly Toynbee wrote an interesting reflection on the 'second Elizabethan age' which is drawing to a close; the piece summarises my feelings about it more eloquently than I ever could.

The over-riding impression you get of Cirencester is that it exudes wealth, it is not simply slightly posh or 'well to do', but the people here are loaded, like in Monaco or Marbella, but with a more bracing climate. Admittedly, you might argue it has ever been thus. It is one of a string of ancient market town's on the edge of England's southern uplands that grew rich during the late Middle Ages on the back of the wool trade with Flanders. You can see that reflected in the architecture of the magnificent church next to the market place and the timber framed cottages dotted around the town centre. 

However, unlike some other Cotswold settlements, Georgian architecture predominates, medieval mercantile wealth superseded by eighteenth century gentrification fostered by the development of the Bathurst Estate on the edge of town.

However, no matter how wealthy the town was in the past it would always have had a mixed population, shop-keepers, tradesmen, servants and farmworkers as well as gentry. These days it is difficult to see how anyone with an average income could live here at all. There were lots of estate agents of the 'Homes and Gardens' variety, most property was over £1,000,000. A tiny one bedroomed terraced cottage in a local village - £320,000. The result is the town centre has the look of somewhere that had been perfected, photoshopped to become a parody of itself, full of up-scale casual wear chains and an Aga cooker shop. I suppose this is not uncommon in the up-market country towns of southern England. What leads you to conclude that Cirencester's is exceptional in this regard is the quietly understated modern office block adjacent to Waitrose and the leisure centre happens to be the headquarters of St. James's Wealth Management, a company founded by a member of the Rothschild family in the 1990s. This not something you are ever going to stumble upon in Carnforth, Sleaford or Chester-le-Street..

Gill needed a garlic and some herbs. The only place open in the early evening was a small Tesco's  Express in the outskirts of town, next to what looked like a former council estate. Whereas the rest of the town felt moribund the small store was busy, cars parked randomly on the pavement outside, people queueing dutifully in masks by the door, all kept in order by a fearsome looking young woman wearing hi-res. In the event she turned out to be perfectly lovely, unprompted she offered to help Gill find the herbs. In fact it felt like the first normal encounter of the day. 

In keeping with correct Covid etiquette I opted to stay outside, it was just nice to observe normal people doing ordinary things - the Polish woman who had popped out for a bottle wine wearing a startling zebra striped onesie, the sporty looking pair who screeched to a halt in their hot hatch. He looked chunky, a weight trainer probably, but a bit flabby after months of gym closures and a diet of pies. His partner was more svelte in a lycra one piece. Her nails looked like turquoise talons liberally decorated with silver sparkles. It was obvious what her post lockdown celebration had been. For some reason it cheered me up. My advise to a visitor from abroad in search of authentic Englishness - avoid venerable market towns, head for Tesco's.