Biking, Brigadoon and Barthes.

Decided to ride from home to Uni today as I needed a book from the library, the plan was to ride there and back, but it didn't quite work out. I have yet to find a satisfactory route through Preston, part of the difficulty is that the River Ribble seems to only be crossed by huge road bridges of speeding bad drivers resulting in terror. The maps seem to indicate the existence of an Old Tramway that crosses with niceness into Avenham Park but I can't find it, it's like the Brigadoon of bike routes! So there was just some random weaving about in central Lancashire until I crossed the river on the A59. 

Finally I made it to Uni, got my book, discovered I had mistakenly checked out the French version so had to take it back, then convince the librarian that a 3 day loan restriction on the English translation wasn't really necessary who else wants to read Barthes Mythologies, she agreed and with double good luck used the wrong date stamp and couldn't be bother re-checking me in and out again let me have the book for 3 weeks! Was on the way back out of the building when I got stopped by my tutor who went all misty eyed about that days he used to ride, much fawning over the Pompino, discussion of riding fixed, suitable bikes for his 7 year old so he can start riding again with the family, the benefits of cross training and carb loading, why peanut butter and banana is such a good combination.... etc. etc. 

By this point I had abandoned all idea of riding the 35 miles home again, rang Glyn who drove up to Lytham to meet me, bike in back of car, dog on the beach and a trip to the best chippy ever, made for the perfect end to a good day. Just over 45 miles riding, the longest ever on the Pompino. Some attempt will be made to upload a map from my Garmin to here, but don't hold your breathe waiting for it!