In the second part of a series about cycling in Britain, a sodden Charles Starmer-Smith seeks shelter after his bike chain snaps in Kent – but finds a welcome about as warm as the bitter weather. Shivering uncontrollably, I wheeled my bike, with its cursed broken chain, up the winding hill to Weald in search of shelter. The driving rain had made a mockery of the all-weather label on my jacket as water seemed to permeate every pore. Cowden, Camden, Godden – all day I had seen signs to “dens” (the shelters built by farmers to keep warm as they watched over their pigs) and yet now neither Piers, a friend and fellow cyclist from Wandsworth, nor I, could find any refuge from the elements. Village lanes were deserted, shops were shut, church doors closed. |
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