Joy riding

I may have said this before but it is hugely gratifying that, over the course of the lockdown, Dan has gone from disliking driving to enjoying it as much as I ever did. And I enjoyed it a lot.

I spent my teenage years in Worcester Park, in Surrey, just a few miles from Kingston and Hampton Court. Whilst one might think London is riddled with public transport routes, my direct experience was somewhat more limited. In fact there was just one bus, the 213A, and that ran from near our house and that went into Kingston. Which was lucky, as that was where I went to school*.

This meant that if I wanted to visit my friends, I had to get the bus into Kingston - which, actually and thankfully, was a bit of a hub - and then out to wherever I wanted to go, be that Ham, Richmond, Walton, or East Molesey. I would, in my defence, willingly cycle as far as Surbiton.

Consequently, passing my driving test was an absolute liberation, especially as I had saved my money over the summer such that I could buy myself a car. (The car was a Simca: both during the time I owned it and the ensuing thirty odd years, I have never seen another one.)

Obviously, I drove to get from A to B, but I rarely took a direct route anywhere. The mile's drive from my nan's house could take up to an hour as I explored Morden, Mitcham, Croydon, and Sutton, much to my mum's frustration. She came to refer to this as 'joy riding", which was not the technically correct use of the term but actually spot on.

Today, Dan and I drove up through Sedbergh and out towards Kirkby Stephen, before turning off the through Ravenstondale, which is where I took this photo of the partially frozen river.

*I mean, this was forty years ago and yet I still had to stop myself just then from writing about the appalling quality of the service.

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Reading: 'A Treachery Of Spies' by Manda Scott