Once Upon A Time in the West . . . Country (24 page)

Shortly after pressing on from Bideford, the southerly wind became so strong, and the rain so constant, that two songs from my past kept buzzing around my head – ‘Things Can Only Get Better’ and ‘The Only Way Is Up’. By singing them, I assumed that they would become self-fulfilling prophecies. However, reality had other ideas and ten minutes later, disaster struck when the battery on my bike ran out of juice. Suddenly the full weight of this bike and its cargo had to be propelled by the dwindling power that remained in my legs. The songs had given me false succour, and had turned out to be flawed. The writer of ‘Things Can Only Get Better’ had omitted to reveal something else that things could actually get – which was
a bit worse
. The writer of ‘The Only Way Is Up’ chose to turn a blind eye to one of the other ‘ways’ that was also a possibility –
a bit further down.

After the statutory whinge and curse, I did what I always do in these situations, and I tried to look for the positive. This extra-hard cycling, I told myself, would be good for my fitness. I estimated that Great Torrington was about five miles away. A trifling distance for the cyclist with a light bike and no baggage, but for a cyclist with an already heavy bike, laden still further with a dead battery and baggage for both man and pig, five miles represented an hour’s hard cycle. Make that more, if you’re cycling into a wind that has warranted a ‘severe weather warning’.

After ten minutes of this new and far more ‘honest’ approach to cycling (let’s face it, there was an element of cheating in having the electric bike), my thighs were burning. Another cyclist came flying past me – the first I’d seen today (well, this was hardly cycling weather) – as if to mock me and to emphasise the gradual nature of my progress. At the entrance to one of the many old railway tunnels that peppered the trail, a sign for the train drivers still remained in place.

SLOW.

Hmm. Like I had any choice.

And still the wind began to blow harder and harder.

‘Why does it have to be against us, Titch?’ I called out.

A wind of this strength behind us would have simply whisked us along. A perfect use of a renewable energy. Wind power without the unsightly turbines.

Doing earnest ‘let’s look for the positives in this’ work, I identified that the rain had eased slightly, and that this new speed – snail’s pace – was giving me the opportunity to take in the beautiful countryside that now surrounded me. I was cycling along the riverbank close to the spot that Henry Williamson described as Tarka the Otter’s birthplace. Rolling green hills, with sparkling streams dashing down into the waiting river below, were dotted with pretty hamlets where stone, thatch, and church spires combined to create a feeling of timelessness. Devon at its best. One day I would come back here, so that I could enjoy the feeling of beauty and peace. Currently the gale-force wind in the face was just taking the edge off it.

The scarce December light was fading by the time my tired body hauled the bike alongside the remnants of Torrington’s former railway station. It was now a pub, called the Puffing Billy, but it appeared to be out of puff today and was distinctly closed. So, too, was Torrington Cycle Hire, the only adjacent building. If this was Torrington, it was far from Great.

A hardy man, walking his dog, approached me. I decided to engage in my first human contact since lunch.

‘Excuse me,’ I asked him, as he drew within range, ‘but where is Great Torrington?’

He turned and pointed behind us.

‘At the top of that bloody great hill,’ he said, unceremoniously.

He looked at me, then down at the bike.

‘Rather you than me.’

And with those rather unhelpful words, he continued on his way. His dog glanced back at me with an apologetic look in its eye, almost as if it was wanting to say:

‘He
does
this. He’s lovely really, but he has this unfortunate direct manner that comes across as unsympathetic. I’m sorry.’

Nice dog.

Unfortunately for me, Great Torrington had originally been built by the Saxons on a steep ridge overlooking the valley of the River Torridge, so that potential conquerors would be knackered by the time they arrived. Years on, regardless of whether conquering was on the mind or not, the same applied for a traveller with a heavy bike and a pig.

Pushing a bike up a hill is not good for the dignity. It says to those around you that you lack both fitness and determination. Admittedly, on a day like this, the only people who were around me were speeding past in cars. I was saved the humiliation of being overtaken by pedestrians. Five minutes into the gruelling climb, I passed a sign welcoming motorists.

GREAT TORRINGTON – A Cavalier Town.

This, I assumed, was a reference to the town’s civil war connections, rather than to its general attitude. Town and city administrators are keen to find adjectives that they believe will set them apart from the others. They are always too complimentary. Names have varied from the modest, ‘THE FRIENDLY CITY’, right the way through to the downright arrogant, ‘THE GREATEST CITY IN THE WORLD’. For my own part, I don’t want to visit somewhere that is bigheaded enough to describe itself thus. I’d have more respect for somewhere that had the honesty to admit that it’s overpopulated, heavily polluted, and generally lacking in any attractive qualities. Here’s a suggestion that simply rolls off the tongue.

SHANGHAI – The Shitty City.
3

Great Torrington likes to boast about its connection to the English Civil War and in 1646 the parliamentarians defeated the royalists in the aptly titled Battle of Torrington. This marked the end of royalist resistance in the West Country, and was a significant milestone on the road to the British being bold enough to get rid of the iniquitous and undemocratic system of monarchy, for a full
eleven
years. You’ve got to hand it to us Brits – when we do something, we do it half-heartedly.

Finally, tired and sodden, I made it into the town’s long main street, and went straight into the first pub I reached, The Torrington Arms. I was hugely relieved to have made it to somewhere warm, dry, and un-blustery. The pub was simple and unpretentious and reminded me of many of the Irish pubs that I’d come to know on previous travels. A scattering of mature gentlemen were slowly wiling away their afternoon, supping on pints and putting the world to rights. In a dimly lit adjoining room, another bunch of mature gentlemen were in the last throes of a Christmas lunch. They were engaged in what appeared to be measured and even-tempered discourse, even though all views set forth were being completely undermined by the fact that they were all wearing silly Christmas party hats.

Keeping Titch concealed, I wandered to the bar and ordered a soft drink, knowing that I would still have to find my digs for the night and that more cycling would be required. I asked nicely if I could put my bike battery on charge. The lady behind the bar said that she would love to help, but that the pub didn’t belong to her, and that the owner wasn’t around for her to ask. This wouldn’t have been too much of a problem, had my overnight accommodation been as close to this pub as I’d been expecting. After showing the address to the barmaid and the solo drinker next to me, we established the rather alarming fact that the accommodation on offer was six miles out of Great Torrington. At the top of a hill.

My heart sank. This was calamitous. Extreme measures were called for. I had to come up with something to get my way. How could I persuade this barmaid to relax her grip on her responsibilities and let me plug a battery in for half an hour? Then I had an idea.

I stood back, cleared my throat volubly, waited till I’d got everybody’s attention as if I was going to make an important announcement, and then I began. A slow unzipping of my anorak. I did it in an alluring way, much like a glamour model might unzip clothing in a TV advertisement. The men looked on, but with far less interest than if I had actually been a babe disrobing. The barmaid just looked confused. I continued unzipping. Finally, I reached the point where Titch’s head was popping out of the top of the sling.

‘Oh my God! It’s a pig!’ exclaimed the barmaid. ‘It’s gorgeous!’

Five minutes later, the battery was on charge, and I found myself surrounded by all the pub’s drinkers and several of the gentlemen from the Christmas party. All wanted to know the story, and to stroke and fuss Titch. One of the low-key seasonal revellers introduced himself as Derek and immediately thrust a twenty pound note into my hand.

‘Take this for your cause,’ he said. ‘You have a delightful pig.’

Derek told me that his luncheon party was a group of former teachers and headmasters, who got together every year to catch up on each other’s lives and to moan about the incumbent education secretary, whoever that happened to be.

‘I’m afraid we’re currently stuck with Mr Gove,’ Derek said, rolling his eyes. ‘By the way, where are you staying tonight?’

‘A kind Radio Devon listener has offered me a bed for the night. It’s about six miles up the road.’

‘You can stay with me and my wife, if you like. We live just around the corner.’

Boy, was it tempting. I really couldn’t face another session of cycling, even if the battery was sufficiently charged. The passage of time meant that the hostile weather was now unhelpfully supplemented by darkness.

‘That’s so kind. The trouble is, I’ve promised this lady, and she’s cooking a meal especially.’

Derek then applied his analytical educator’s brain to the dilemma and came up with an excellent solution. On my bike, I was to follow him and his wife in their car – she was picking him up shortly – to their house. There we would deposit my bike in their garage and put it on overnight charge. Then his wife would give me a lift up the road to where I was staying. Either my host could give me a lift back to pick the bike up in the morning, or they would come and collect me.

‘That would be amazing – but will your wife mind?’

‘She’ll be fine. Especially when I explain about the pig.’

As it turned out, not for the first time in a pub, a man was being a little overoptimistic about the goodwill of his wife. After I’d unplugged my battery, thanked the barmaid and said my goodbyes to the remaining drinkers, I emerged onto the dark street to find Derek involved in a very uncomfortable conversation with a woman in a car, whom I assumed was his wife.

‘A
what
?’ the woman said.

‘A pig,’ replied Derek.

‘How much have you drunk?’

‘Not very much at all. It’s a pig. A small pig.’

‘You want me to take a small pig in the car?’

‘Not in the car. It’ll follow on a bike.’

‘You’re pissed.’

‘I’m not. It’s very straightforward—’

At this point, I did the decent thing and walked up to the car, unzipped my anorak and revealed Titch to the distressed driver.

Immediately her countenance was transformed. Irritation to adoration in 0.1 of a second. Words were replaced by the joyful sounds usually heard only around cute babies.

‘Aaaaah . . .’ she said, reaching out to stroke Titch.

My little friend had done it again. In a moment, Titch had instilled serenity into a tense situation. Perhaps I was onto something here. Maybe after this trip, Titch and I could lend our services to the negotiators in the Middle East peace process. Just as things reached a very heated point, I could produce Titch and restore a sense of equilibrium.
4

I’ll set up the website shortly:

www.porkpeace.com.

***

‘Enjoy your stay, and see you in the morning.’

People are nice. For a long time I’ve held the belief that human beings are inherently good. In spite of all the bad things that are done in the world – and these are usually the ones that make the news bulletins – millions of daily acts of kindness go unreported, sometimes even unnoticed.

Take this situation, for example. Derek’s wife had disrupted her afternoon and driven me fifteen minutes up the road to deliver me to another lady, who in turn was offering an evening meal and accommodation to a stranger and a pig. What the world needs is for ladies like this to be in charge. I’d like to see them running countries like Syria and Iran. More tea, less war.

As the car pulled up outside at a nice rural, thatched cottage and I was passed from one kind middle-aged lady to another, I couldn’t help wonder why they were doing it. There was absolutely nothing in it for these people. They weren’t giving for reward, or out of guilt, shame or a sense of duty. It seemed to be natural giving. What a nice thing, and yet such a rare commodity. How did we get off-target from natural giving? It probably started thousands of years ago, when we began to adopt the wild thinking that human beings are innately evil. Penitence was required, and people were taught to hate themselves for what they were doing. Violent thinking ensued and then, naturally enough, violence itself. Domination cultures flourished, resulting in an extraordinary statistic about American TV from just a few years back. Between 7 p.m. and 9 p.m. in the evening, at the times when most families were watching TV together, in 75 per cent of programmes, someone either kills somebody or beats them up – usually at the climax of the programme. To use the vernacular of the Americans who produced this stuff: ‘Go figure’.