Category: Creative Projects

I look around at the unfolding landscape; low undulations divided carefully into a patchwork of fields; deep blue overhead with a few wisps of white, the air pleasantly warm against my skin; well-kept tarmac beneath my wheels. Trees sprout between fields, and small streams make their way amongst the lulls and rises of the earth. It’s so quiet, but for the birdsong. And it’s obvious why I feel so bizarrely at home here. I could almost be riding in the back-roads of Derbyshire on an unseasonably warm Sunday in March. But the low undulations are part of a plateau nearly a… Continue reading →

I stood by the road. It was cold. Old, crunchy snow lingered here, at the crux of the pass that went down into one of the series of yawning valleys along the mountain road that led to Iran. I leaned my bike against the concrete barrier at the edge of the mountain-top lay-by. Beyond the barrier, a sheer wall of ice-clad rock dropped off into an invisible gorge, hundreds of metres below. I fished my feather jacket from the enormous dry-bag that was strapped to the back of my bike, containing everything I’d need to survive the rest of the winter… Continue reading →

Now I’m on my own I should probably start doing a few more video diaries. And talk a bit about what’s been going on the last few days. Where to start … erm …  So today was a very long and eventful day. This morning, after I got up, I had an email from the embassy – from the British Embassy – saying that my sleeping-bag was available for collection from the airport, and would I like to go with the driver to the airport? So I arranged to do that. And I thought in the meantime I’d go and buy myself… Continue reading →

In Yerevan, Artur and I walked down the long, sloping boulevard, three lanes wide in each direction, the pavements lined with brittle, empty trees. Frozen slush crunched beneath my feet, a grey mess of footprints captured by the plummeting temperatures of night. I was talking to Artur about Andy, who I’d heard had gone back to Tbilisi from Yerevan. ‘I just don’t understand it,’ I said. ‘Why, when he’s got this … just this ultimate freedom – he could do whatever he wants, go off, cycle wherever, travel exactly how – in exactly the way that suited him …’ Artur listened. He… Continue reading →

I rediscover the glory of fresh fruit juice, abundant in Egypt but missing in the parched deserts of Sudan. Mango, orange and pale green avocado puree are the staple beverages here. I happen upon the quite heavenly combination of mango and avocado together in the same glass, and, with my new friend and fellow hotel resident Mike, we brave a twice-daily road-crossing to this little eatery, where we gobble endless plates of spicy spaghetti Bolognese, washed down with freshly blended fruit. Mike is not a scavenger; he’s a well-educated and ambitious private-school teacher from Addis Ababa. He’s waiting for a… Continue reading →

I promise you this camera is on its way out. I give it another … I give it another three weeks. Having now cycled in temperatures approaching fifty degrees Celsius, and comparing it to cycling in temperatures of around minus thirty degrees Celsius two winters ago, I have to say – it’s definitely better to be too hot than to be too cold. I suffered a lot more that winter than I have done here.  Yes, it is very hot, and it is uncomfortable, but in the extreme cold it’s a real … I dunno … you’re aware of your mortality, and… Continue reading →

The north-east coast of Turkey was famous for its unique take on the national cuisine; also for its tea and hazelnut plantations. Huge cheese-filled pizzas swimming with molten butter and chunks of spicy sausage; great platters of grilled meat with rice; stews of aubergine and tomato and green peppers and chickpeas: these delights sat tantalisingly behind big glass windows in restaurants that we were too sodden and grubby and poor to enter. We celebrated the shortest day of the year by cranking out the longest day’s ride of the journey so far, but the internal disorder which had afflicted me… Continue reading →

The riding continued, slowly and methodically, but the days ended too early: December had arrived. Turkey wasn’t quite as warm or exotic as I’d imagined, and the available daylight hours were shrinking fast. One night, setting up a makeshift bed beneath a table in an abandoned summertime beach complex, my ailing head-torch finally broke from its mounting and the temptation to continue into the night in order to cover more distance was extinguished. We would now have to share Andy’s equally puny head-torch between us for the fourteen or fifteen hours of nightly darkness. I made do by holding the… Continue reading →

I followed Andy north along the Asian bank of the Bosphorus Straits, then – when the city started to recede – we headed east on the smallest through-road we could find. My dormant leg muscles brought the world into movement once again; the simple pleasures of fresh air and perpetual motion mine once more. Soon we were climbing a quiet lane through the wooded hills, all orange and brown with the passing of autumn, just like home; the world suddenly damp and cool and clean-smelling after the month of city life. I can barely remember such a pleasant shock to… Continue reading →

I rose at sunrise, packed my makeshift bivouac on the quayside and began to cycle behind Andy along the hard shoulder of the enormous coastal highway towards Istanbul. The road signs indicated that it was still over seventy miles distant. Today would be a long and gruelling day. Sometime after midday, the signs for Istanbul vanished. They were replaced by signs indicating our passage through new settlements, but we could not really distinguish between one and the next. And, as the afternoon wore on and the suburbs showed no sign of diminishing, we realised that we were already in Istanbul.… Continue reading →