Cyclists are friendly afterall!

One of today’s sights: a crop of Rape Seed growing near Soulbury

I had a fantastic ride today, about 52 miles all in beautiful clear sunshine.

Following on from the blog post earlier today about cyclists and runners not always being very friendly, I decided to make a mental note of the reactions I had.  While I encountered just a handful of fellow cyclists today, I am proud to report that everyone was very friendly and there are a couple of noteworthy folk to tell you about.

The first was in the National Trust Ashridge Estate, always a nice place to cycle.  I passed a lady riding gently along on a 3 speed bike.  Both the bike and it’s rider seemed to be getting on a bit but extremely friendly.  As I passed I said my usual “Morning” in a cheery voice.  I was rather outdone with a “Good morning” that was so tuneful it was as if she was singing it to me.  It certainly made me smile.

The second cheery cyclist was a man called Mike, who I encountered at Soulbury.  At first I overtook him and said hello, or something like that as I went passed him.  He was friendly enough in his reply and again I smiled to myself.  Just a little further along the road he caught me up and we started chatting.  We exchanged a brief outline of where we’d been, how much we like riding and so on.  He was so pleasant and easy going I remarked on how he’d restored my faith in other cyclists.  Obviously he was a little puzzled with this and so I explained my previous blog gripe and he could identify with that and added he always would greet another cyclist – I believe him.  So, Mike, thank you for restoring my faith in other cyclists and thank you for those all-too-short few miles we rode along with each other.

Lunch break near Wendover Woods