Mileage: 6 miles – to Ampthill and back
Why: It was sunny, we had time to kill and a cake to eat
Food: Figgy custard tart
When I first arrived in England, a few things soon established themselves as complete mysteries; mince pies (do the English not like to enjoy good food at Christmas?), baked beans, that ‘how are you?’ is in fact not a question anyone would like an answer to, and why the weather is such a conversation topic. And cricket.
Just to prove I'm not lying
I will probably never understand mince pies, but I do get cricket now. It’s about lazy Sunday afternoons with picnics and polite gentlemen dressed in white, tweeting birds and perhaps a bit of Buck’s Fizz. I have in fact become so clued up that I now understand that 5 runs for 5 wickets, which is what Ampthill’s 2nd team had achieved by the time we arrived, represents a spectacularly bad score. With that in mind, a grand total of 64 runs must have seemed fairly respectable by the end, but it meant that our entertainment was cut woefully short, even if we got to see an impressive array of maidens and ducks (don’t ask me to explain, I’m not that clued up…).
Cycling the day after an England match turned out to be inspired, however, with everyone apart from us, the cricketers (or at least the visiting team) and a few spectators nursing their hang-overs. It was downright strange cycling down roads almost devoid of cars or people, but we got to own the roads for the day, and that was nice.
Meanwhile, we enjoyed a sunny Sunday afternoon in the best possible way, eating custard tart in Ampthill park, whilst watching 13 men do something or other with two bats and a ball. Isn’t funny that something that’s so difficult to get your head around can be so calming and relaxing once you get it?
