Tuesday 11 August 2011: Cycling to Leith Hill

This was the beginning of a longer plan to get to Gairloch in Scotland. The plan was this: 11 Aug: bike from Lewes to Leith Hill, 12 August: bike from Leith Hill to Thame, 13 August: attend Ed and Faith’s wedding, 14 August: bike to Milton Keynes, catch a train to Glasgow, bike to Loch Lomond, 15 August: bike ~100 miles to past For William, 16 August bike as far as possible towards Gairloch, 17 August meet family in Gairloch. In the morning I packed up, and waited for some rain to arrive and pass over. It never arrived. After lunch biked to Coldean and dropped off my wedding gear at Ben’s place. We had tea and discussed the relative merits of fig rolls. Ben said that the fig was important in the development of human civilization. Left around 2 pm and biked over and down the steep hill of Ditchling Beacon giving my loaded bike its first downhill test. Followed minor roads, country lanes etc through nice country to Hailsham. Had not been there before, quite a nice town with pedestrian area. Continuing north the going got more hilly and forested as the North Downs approached. I caught a first glimpse of Leith Hill in the distance clearly the largest hill in the region. The view of this, only 300 metre high hill, still managed to induce a sense of excitement. Something about the mystique of the North Downs, the advance planning, the anticipation of completing the first stage in my plan. Off the OS maps now, route finding relied on inadequate Google Maps printouts. I changed route to follow a single track road heading up the west flank of the hill. It climbed steeply through damp, mossy and surprisingly wild forest. Walked the bike up most of it. Eventually after some uncertain turns in the darkening forest I arrived at a car park that had a 15 minute trail to the summit. It was easy to walk the bike along, and soon the tower appeared, a beautiful single castle tower that peaks the hill a smidgen over 300 m.

There was a view north to London in the distance with sparkling buildings reflecting the lowering sun, but too the south was a more beautiful view across The Wield to the just visible distant South Downs.

A strange cloud had formed to the south that took an uncanny resemblance to the silhouette of Mauna Kea:

It was as if to remind me of the greatness of that mountain (14 times higher than Leith Hill) and of the extraordinary Big Island. There were one or two mountain bikers finishing off evening rides but as sun set I became alone and set up a modest camp next to a tree and large log. The hill was in drifting mist, above cloud base the clouds gently drifted through the conifers. I slept well.