Birmingham

Around this time I leave my village for the bright lights of the big city or at least the green suburb of Edgbaston in Birmingham where I am at university. First year I’m living close to the campus and walkable into town so my need for a bike was limited and I only cycled when returning home to Bath. In Bath, not back to Bath. Thinking about it I probably cycled to Westbury White Horse and had my bike stolen the summer I was back in Bath as that’s when I hitched to Morocco but the story fits better in that section of my memories. Back in Birmingham in the Autumn me and my friends rented a house in Kings Heath so a few miles from the university. Three of us cycled into the campus together as we did the same Economics course so Ramsay, Jon and myself made a regular peloton although probably not realising it at the time. Our other housemate Olly  (excluding the recluse cider drinker who seemed to come as a fixture of the house and mysteriously left after a few months) refused to cycle presumably as it messed up his highly crimped purple hair. I bought a new, well, brand new second hand as Peter Tosh would have it and there be other references there that are another story altogether, bike which had five gears, yes five, so my first derailleur bike which I didn’t really need as Birmingham is so flat but helped in the winds. Still on straight handlebars as I didn’t see the need for drops. And I mostly I used the bike for simply getting from one place to another and not all the time as in Bath as the buses were good and other distances were walkable. However, outside of the term times my housemates tended to go back home whereas I would stay in Birmingham and I then started venturing out more on my own just for the fun of it. I did a couple of excursions into the surrounding countryside and in retrospect I should have done a lot more but I was mostly exploring the inner city and little gems like Aston Manor which was pretty run down and vandalised back in the early 80s whereas I believe it’s now been done up. There weren’t that many keen cyclists, as in long distances, that I knew although I did know a guy who cycled back home to Bristol rather than take the bus or hitch (the usual methods of transport back then) which I was amazed at the distance. Looking back I guess it’s about 100 miles so whilst being a fair way not as impossible as I thought at the time. My Birmingham years cycling were fairly uneventful with no tumbles or mishaps. Nearest I came was when cycling fast down the Moseley Road from my house in Balsall Heath into town with my arms folded rather than on the handlebars and a couple of workmen in the road jumped up and shouted in my ear as I shot past “Show Off” and “Wanker”. I did have a slight wobble with the surprise but sailed on without anything worse. I can’t remember whether I used my free hands to gesticulate to the two blokes and if I did I’m sure they would have taken it as a bit of banter. So cycling in Britain’s second city was a halcyon time and little prepared me for the capital.

A photo of what we had to contend with in Birmingham...