I left home just after 10 pm with a forecast that wasn’t brilliant, however when I started despite being grey there was no evidence how bad it was going to get. I did immediately have one problem, I stopped for fuel in Tadley and straightaway realised I had left a couple of things at Home 40 mins later I was back under way.
I had seen a forecast on Breakfast News, that suggested it would start to rain by the time I got to Oxford despite it getting more oppressive by the minute, is stayed dry, what I couldn’t understand however was the weight of traffic on the A34, the sheer volume was compounded by selfish idiots that didn’t see the need to pull out of the outside lane, it therefore meant the run to the M40 which usually takes me about an hour to an hour and a quarter took me almost 2 hours.
Then the M40 didn’t turn out much better another hour later and I was approaching Warwick when to heavens opened and I mean opened, I immediately stopped on the hard shoulder underneath a bridge to put on my Waterproofs and in the couple of minutes that it took, I found one, I was soaked, it had gone through my jacket and was going through my trousers. I got going again but the traffic was now crawling at 10-20mph and the slower it went the wetter I got.
I then stopped a few miles further up the road, under another bridge, this time to try and clear my visor as it was getting soaked inside and out, which meant everytime I put it down to stop my face being pummelled by the heavy rain, it would immediately mist up again.
I did this twice more before I cleared Birmingham and got through the worst of the rain, it was now closing on 3 pm and I decided I needed to have a warm drink, and at the same time take my waterproof jacket off, as I was now starting to sweat up as the sun had come out near Stafford, so it was into Stafford Services and refuel both myself and the bike, at the same take my gloves and wring them out before attaching them to one of the dry bags on top of my panniers so they could dry in the sun and wind.
Back on the M6 it was still dreadfully slow with traffic crawling along, so I gave up and pulled off as soon as I saw the sign for queuing traffic after junction 17, so I headed off through Sandbach, Middlewich and picked up the A54 near Kelsall Hill, running down the hill I was greeted with the sight I didn’t want to see again this day, Black Clouds, big ones at that. I was hoping I would get through Chester before they opened up again. Back down on to The Groves again to pick up where I left off, I was greeted with the surprising sight of the River Dee in full flood on the summer tide, it happens two or three times a year and the guy that ran one of the Ice Cream kiosks, that it was expected to be even worse the Saturday, if that was the case then it certainly would have been over the steps and pontoons, which is a real pain for the guys running the running boats etc, as they are not allowed to hire them out in case someone goes over the weir, as in full flood, the river easily clears it by a good 3-4ft, that and it also brings with it fallen trees and debris it has been waiting to wash down for months.
With the black clouds gathering I didn’t wait around for too long, a quick cup of tea and a chat and I was on my way again, back out through Sealand, towards what used to be RAF Sealand (26) and is now a big industrial estate, It was originally a civilian airfield and was taken over by the military in 1916 for training. Two twin hangars, which were built in 1917, were used by the newly-formed Royal Flying Corps.
No 30 Maintenance unit was formed there in 1939. In 1951 the base was taken over by the United States Air Force, and handed back to the RAF in 1957. Sealand was a communications support base for RAF operations around the world. It functioned as a third line repair base for avionics equipment for all three services. No 631 Volunteer Gliding Squadron operated at Sealand between 1963 and 2006, most recently flying the Viking TMk1 conventional winch-launched glider. In March 2006, 631 VGS relocated to RAF Woodvale to operate the Grob109b 'Vigilant' self-launched motorglider.
After passing through the estate it was off up to Two Mills cross roads before heading West , through, Puddington, Burton, Little Ness and the World Famous Ness Gardens, run as an off shoot of Liverpool University. Then Neston itself, before heading out to Parkgate, I mentioned previously that it used to be a port and sailing ships used to tie up and load various cargoes, Parkgate was an important port from the start of the eighteenth century, in particular as an embarkation point for Ireland. The River Dee, which served as a shipping lane to the city of Chester, had silted up, creating a need for a port further downstream. A quay was built near the small town of Neston but further silting required yet another re-siting slightly further downstream near the gate of Neston's hunting park. Hence the settlement of Parkgate was born. However the inevitable happened, the Dee silted up even further, and Parkgate became unusable as a port, to be superseded by the Port of Liverpool.
One famous visitor was Lord Nelson's mistress, (Lady) Emma Hamilton, who was born in nearby Ness and who used to bathe at Parkgate, apparently as a cure for a skin complaint. The other was Handel who stayed in Parkgate before sailing to Dublin in April 1742 for the first performance of Messiah. He had finished Messiah in the summer of 1741 and at most he could only have added minor touches to the work in Parkgate.
Towards the end of the eighteenth century Parkgate was popular as a seaside resort with baths. But this diminished as the sands of the estuary were consumed with grass. With no beach and no direct access to the sea, Parkgate could manage only small subsistence from fishing.
Still popular with tourists, it boasts world-class bird watching. During seasonal high tides the water reaches the sea wall, and visitors arrive at the village to witness the unusual sight.
As I pulled off I passed by a restaurant that used to be a haunt of mine, Mr Chow’s I took my ex-wife there a couple times when we were dating and prior to that myself and a few mates used to end up in there on a Sunday night after we had been to on of the local pubs, whilst it wasn’t a club or disco as such, it did have one of the first video jukeboxes, which they always had linked up to special effects lighting on a Sunday night as an extra draw. Whilst the pub has long since closed, like so many others, Mr Chow’s seems to be thriving still.
It was now a case of heading on further, through Gayton and Heswall before entering West Kirby were I took a quick photo of Hilbre Island, the last time I was down here a couple of years ago, there were gangs of Cockle Pickers out on the sand, however they were not allowed to sell them in this country I was told due to the outfall from both Waste Treatment works at little up the estuary but also the various discharges from the Steel and Paper mills at Deeside.
West Kirby also has a fairly sizeable boating lake and it was there that I both learned to swim and Wind Surf the first was when I was five and messing around with my cousin and fell in, in that classic sink or swim episode. It also overlooks Hilbre Island.
Hilbre Island is approximately 47,000 square metres in area, and lies about 1.6 km from Red Rocks, the nearest part of the mainland of the Wirral Peninsula. The other two islands are called Middle Eye (or in older sources Middle Island), which is about 12,000 m² in size and Little Eye, which is considerably smaller. All three islands are formed of red Bunter sandstone. The main island and Middle Eye are several hundred yards apart with Little Eye being nearly 1 mile away from the main island.
The islands are tidal and can be reached on foot from the mainland at low tide. This is a popular activity with tourists, especially during the summer months. Until the end of the 1970s, there was a route from Red Rocks in Hoylake, but this has now been closed because of the danger of being caught by the tide and visitors are advised to set out from the town of West Kirby. Little Eye and Middle Eye are both unpopulated, but Hilbre Island has a few houses, some of which are privately owned, and some where the warden of the islands lives.
Coming out of West Kirby and Hoylake and pushing on to towards, Moreton and Wallasey, the darker and more foreboding it became, right up to the point, where I thought I’m not getting soaked again and shot off through Bidston and Oxton, back to my father’s house but not before another good soaking.
After spending some time with him a quick sandwich and cup of tea as well as confirming the details of his trip down to me next week, it was a all too short visit and I was back on my way, this time through Birkenhead, which sadly hasn’t changed much. I wonder if this may start to change now the docks are coming back into use and more importantly this once famous ship building town is now back making and repairing ships.
I checked in for my voyage to Belfast, with plenty of time to spare, met up with a couple going over for a weekend on his impulse buy, a Kawasaki GP900Z from the early 1990’s but with very low mileage it looked and sounded spot on. At the other end of the chart was a guy and his young son, travelling out to deliver a number of bikes, in fact 11 of them, all Honda 50,70 and 90 Cubs, 5 for one customer and 6 to another. For those of you that don’t know these bikes, they are a cross between a Scooter and a Bike, James May rode one around Vietnam on Top Gear and they are without doubt the biggest selling and copied machine anywhere in the world. He was taking them out to two guys who rebuild and sell them on, with the mileage and condition of them, it would be a bit of a task.
We finally were allowed to take our bikes down at about 9.15pm, these boats are a bit unusual for ferries, as I watched the single cars where being driven up on to the top deck, outside next to the funnel and the lorries and trailers were being put down below with caravans, vans and bikes.
We were directed to one side and where we were given the option of strapping our bikes down ourselves however the crew seemed to know what they were doing, so I left it to them, I took off what I needed and was on my way up the ‘Escalator’ to Reception, where I exchanged my boarding card for a key to a cabin. I got slightly lost finding it but then worked out the system.
After peeling off my ‘stinking’ gear, it is good that I am not writing this in Smell-o-Vision. You would switch off right now if it was. My boots had been wet since Warwick and my socks and my leggings had become dis-coloured by the dye from the boots as well as bringing out all the odours, shall we say from the last 4,000 miles. I immediately headed for the shower and also washed my socks and leggings before hanging them up in the cabin, thankfully I was on my own in a 4 berth cabin.
Then into the bar for a quick drink and then before an evening meal, headed back to my cabin to collect my camera as we were just pulling away from the quay. 12 Quays in Birkenhead is now a floating pontoon, to allow the ships and ferries to load and unload without any concern of the tide. So it is not one of the old docks however it does mean I could get a great photo just as the ferry sailed.
Take care and as Mick says ‘You don’t stop riding when you get old; you stop to dry out!.
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