England 2009 - Part IV

Saturday, May 23, 2009
Salisbury

We have been at the Hudson’s field campground since our return from the canal. It is a very pleasant, clean campground, but quite crowed as it will be a bank holiday on Monday which makes for a three day weekend. We ride into town for breakfast at the Pub then Mark will go to the Fairy Tale venue for the festival, and I’ll hang outside one of the coffee shops and walk around the town market which is one of my favorite things. We agree to meet after his event is over at the coffee shop. I sit for a bit and write, then walk for a bit and find myself at TK Maxx, buy a few things I don’t need then walk some more.

I run into Mark and we go to have a Cream Tea another of my favorite thing. While there Mark uses my phone to call his mother, they chat for a bit, he hangs up and walks out into the court yard. Upon his return I could tell he’d been veklemped by the experience. Prior to his call I had just gotten off the phone with my daughter and could understand his emotions. Lately I find myself wanting to spend more and more time with my kids and grandkids. When I can’t get down to Phoenix I do miss them a great deal. I spoke to my mother also, who returned to Florida safely, and was able to Skype my sister which is a great deal of fun.

I suggest we that the bus tour over to Stonehenge which we do. The ride is crowed, the road to the site is backed up and the walks around the stones filled with people. We pick up our headsets listening to the narrator as we circle the Stones. Around the Stones are “Boroughs” that are burial chambers of the people who lived here long ago. I was told that you can look into them as I did the Long Borough I visited last year. So I tell Mark that I want to walk out to them, he does not. So I’ll catch the next bus and meet him at the coffee shop, then we’ll have dinner. I walk out to find all the Boroughs are fenced off from the public; I was lied to. On the trip back we ride down a road that I attempted to ride up last year. I did not make it having to walk up almost the whole “Snake” road.

While waiting for the return bus at Stonehenge I’m sitting on a wall along the entrance walkway. I family is there in discussion which I’m trying to make out, but can’t. A child of this family who is about 3 is on his scooter getting in the way of people. I’m watching people pass and then notice that this child has rolled up to me and is offering me a leaf. He has the huge smile on his face one happy little boy as he places the leaf in my out stretched hand. He then proceeds to point to my leg his smile disappearing for just a moment he looks me in the eye and says something I don’t understand. Looking at my leg I see he is pointing to a small cut. “Ouchy” I say. He nods his head and we both smile, we have communicated. His parents notice pull him away apologizing that he has bothered me. No trouble at all but by their plastic smile they did not understand me.

Mark wants to go for one last ride around town since he is leaving tomorrow. I take him on a ride through some pastures alongside one of the five rivers that run through Salisbury. It is a beautiful evening we have dinner outside enjoying the view. We watch a group of people on the bridge across from us, we are eating next to the water at an old mill, sing the English National Anthem. It is time to head back to the campground after picking up supplies for breakfast. Mark does a wash as we chat and make plans for getting him to Crawley the next day. I decide I’ll take the train with him hang around for a while have and early Sunday Roast then head back to Salisbury. But first I have to move my campsite to the Y, so we have a plan of sorts.

Sunday, May 24, 2009
Salisbury to Crawley

We are up early and packing the bags, Mark to head home, me to head to the Y and camp. We cook breakfast, clean up, and then since my bike is packed I’m off to the Y and will meet Mark at the train station. When I arrive his bike is already chained and his bag is packed, we had purchased our tickets the day before so knowing Mark already asked which track we need to go to. In order to get to the correct track we need to go down to a tunnel that runs under the railways. We arrive at the platform which is for track 2 and 3, our train will be on track 2. As we wait there is an announcement of the next train coming into the station. Mark says that our train, but we’re on the wrong platform.

I follow Mark back to the main platform which turns out to be track 1, not 2 so we go down to the tunnel again and back to platform we started at where the train is sitting about to leave. We are in luck getting on just as the whistle blows. Once the conductor blows his whistle there is no more getting on the train, and it is off. I find a seat, one of the few left, Mark joins me. Way to confining in addition I’d be riding backwards for the whole trip nope can’t do that. I move to a seat that is facing forward, mark moves also, but is still riding backwards. I begin chatting with the fellow next to me whose name is Roy and is heading to London to see is five day old granddaughter.

As we talk about grandchildren, children, and what not a young lady sits in the seat across from me. I begin talking to her and find out that she has lived in Salisbury for eight months where she is practice, is from Burgundy, France. The four of us have a pleasant chat during the one hour trip to Clapham Junction were Mark and I will change trains heading toward Crawley. At Claphan Junctions we say good bye exchange cards and promise to keep in touch. Now Mark schleps his bag up the steps and down to catch the train to Gatwick. One hour later we arrive, no one to chat with on this train, and take a cab to Mark’s hotel.

After checking in we walk about Crawley for a bit, it is 3:30pm to early for dinner. We sit in a Pub for awhile sipping a Coke people watching. Around 4:00pm we talk about what time I want to get back to Salisbury, then deicide he’s not going to be hungry for awhile so I’ll head back. We part at his hotel with a hug as headed to the rail station arriving just in time to catch the next train back to Salisbury. As I sit alone I’m over come with a feeling I’d not experienced in a very long time. Long ago, when I was a child, we’d have a larger family dinner for Christmas at my grandmothers. In the morning I’d feel such a loneliness and missing of all the people that had been there the night before. I’d visualize each person where had been seated around the table. That feeling grabbed my gut now as the train moved away. Tears came to my eyes as I was already missing Marks Company.

It had been a long time coming, this trip, and over far too soon. I feared that I’d pushed him to hard, or there he’d wanted to do, something he missed. Mostly it was a fear of his being mad at me and not talking to me anymore because I’d not made the trip enjoyable enough. But, mostly I just missed him and hanging out something we’d not done in a very long time. Riding alone the rest of the time here seems barren, without reason. The past three years riding alone was a time to sort myself out, and I’d hope Mark would get some of that magic. Now I’m thinking what’s to be sorted out now? In the past I’d be online with him or Gary when things came up that needed taking about. Old fears of rejection and loss had come out in force so that by the time Salisbury was reached I was Verklempt to the max.

Having dinner alone at the pub I turned on my computer and Skyped him, there he was. We talked, laughed and talked about the next trip. When that will happen I don’t know, but one thing I decided is we’d do the trip his way. I’m ready to go to ride the flat land of Holland, see Amsterdam move away from the hard rides to see what comes from the easier one’s rather them judge them a useless. See you when I get back buddy. I get a call on Skype from my daughter. How fun is that to see her, Mike and the boys who are thousands of miles away. If they are missed so much already, how much more will they be missed by the end of June. After the computer it was time to check in with my son.

He was having a busy day with his friend Sean, from Texas, who has been visiting for two weeks. It is amazing how different these men are from the boys they were. As they tell tales of their past I’m hoping that their lives will give the great one’s for their grandkids. All is well at home so I head off to sleep with the pitter patter of rain on the tent. Thanks Mark for taking the sun with you.