Handlebards Blog
We’re a quarter of the way through our tour, hurray! We’ve had some beautiful rides and had very positive feedback, and couldn’t be more chuffed with how it’s all going; thank you to everyone who has supported us so far!
So to pick up exactly where we left off, we performed at Bowhill house with beautiful sweeping fields as our backdrop and with some lovely Balkan folk music curtesy of The Beggar Girls. We ask local musicians to perform with us at each of our shows. We also ask the musicians to perform at certain points in each of the shows (the masquerade ball in Romeo and Juliet, and “If music be the food of love” in Twelfth Night being two examples). As we have different musicians and different styles of music at each venue it make each show unique.
Whilst on this tour we have been met by nothing but niceness along the way, and random acts of kindness that have helped get us through the long days. At the heart of this is the caretaker of Bowhill house, Calum. Calum has worked (and lived) at the museum for over 20 years. He has 3 dogs, a wife and 2 children, and is the most selfless and caring person I have ever met. Making us feel so at home during our stay, he helped us from the moment we got there, handing out flyers, setting up a barbeque and giving us burgers, beers, fruit and donuts after the show, helping plan our next our route, bringing us coffee and toast for breakfast and giving me a pair of his cycling sunglasses because mine had broke! As we kept thanking him for all the lovely stuff he was doing for us, he made a point of saying that helping people and making others happy is just something at we should all try to do. Calum, we want you to know that your thoughtfulness and generosity was truly inspirational and we hope we have the chance to meet you again.
Our next ride was from Selkirk to Etal which was to be 40 miles straight into a show… It was a big one and at 8.30am as we prepared to leave Selkirk spirits were high. Five minutes into the journey at the top of our first hill we were hit by our first puncture. We’ve had broken hangers, sheared dérailleurs, snapped wheel spokes and ripped tyres but this was our first puncture.
Later that day Tillyvally (our trailer of doom) got her first puncture. This was a lot more difficult to fix, but due to the beautiful weather and a musical sing-a-long session (including hits from Les Mis, West Side Story and Matilda) nothing could get us down. We stopped for lunch in the lovely Kelso, replaced Tillyvally’s inner tube (puncture number three) and bumped into a lovely lady who told us she was seeing the show that night in Etal (we felt like celebrities!). She the popped back five minutes later to say: “Just thought I’d let you know that if you see me rushing off half way through the show, it’s not you, but my son’s just called me and I’m going to be a grandma very soon! He thinks I should come to the hospital straight away; I don’t think he quite understands how long it’s going to take! Besides I’m taking a party of seven people to your show and I’m bringing the picnic table!!” She managed to see the whole show – just goes to show how good maternal foresight is. We all hope your grand child is happy, healthy and cute!
Arriving at Etal Manor at 5pm for our first charity-led show we met Lady Joicey and Hospice Care Northumberland and set up the stage immediately. Our biggest show yet, we performed Twelfth Night to 300 people (including the local butcher, most of Etal and about 30 French school children) with music provided by Antic Hay, we helped raise loads of money for Hospice Care Northumberland (exact figures will be released at a later date) in what proved to be a sunny and jovial evening.
At the end of the show we sometimes ask our audiences for any leftovers from their picnics as we can usually find a time to polish them off! Little did we realise how much food we would recieve this time – olives, cheeses, pork pies, dips and four jars of pâté! We also got invited over to a huge picnic table by a lovely party of people who filled us up with more food and drink including a cheese board and banana chocolate cake (my favourite). We were also invited to the local cafe The Lavender Tea Rooms’ for a free breakfast, and later that evening we had a tasty supper with Lord and Lady Joicey and Richard Joicey (needless to say we were the most full we have ever been and had enough food to last us the whole of the next day!).
The next morning we were on our way to meet Keith from the Wooler Wheels Bike Club who had planned our route. Five minutes in (as seems to be the recurring theme) Tilly got her third (and our grand total fourth) puncture. We continued through Alnwick and on to Warkworth where the bike club had sourced us a campsite.
Next morning, about five miles in, disaster struck: Tillyvally hit a bump in the road and went soaring, dragging Callum’s bike with it and destroying his back wheel. He continued riding for another five miles but in the end had to get a taxi to take him to Morpeth where he had to have his whole back wheel replaced. The rest of us carried on and carefully pulled the monster that is Tillyvally.
20 miles, and we reached the stunning Whalton manor. That evening we had a lovely show and some great food. Friday morning we took our time to pack up and continued for what should have been a short and easy 17 miles to Newcastle. Tillyvally did her best to ruin the day again: with three miles to go we heard an almighty bang and Tilly came to an immediate stop. This time her treads had completely worn out and there was a huge gaping hole in her tyre. Some handy work helped take us another two miles but then the noise was heard again. Tilly had rolled her last leg of our journey. Thanks to fantastic help from the Cycle Hub, she was taken by car for the last mile of the journey whilst we continued cycling without her.
The Cycle Hub staff were amazing, over Friday and Saturday they let us use the space to do admin and costume and generally just slob out and get in the way. They gave us free coffee and gave us all a bike maintenance check for free, meaning those loose brakes and jolting gears all but disappeared. We also took time to wander around Ouseburn, which you should definitely do if you’re ever in Newcastle. Saturday evening’s performance outside the Cycle Hub was really successful, with the Gladstone Trio providing some fantastic music (our highlight being when we got to perform the masquerade ball to Blondie’s Call Me being performed on a £10,000 cello).
On Sunday morning we managed to source a new trailer! With bigger wheels, more structural support and less rust, she’s a beauty, and we’ve named her Penthesilea. A cool 16 miles down the road got us to Durham, Crook Hall. As we didn’t have any musicians for the show yet, we asked two buskers, who turned out to be a massive hit with the audience. After a very successful Twelfth Night we went back to the home of our friend Seif, who provided warm beds, a (much needed) shower and a huge meal of pasta and salad (cooked by his amazing mum, who was visiting from Egypt.)
We were going to try to keep these updates short, but it seems we just have too much to tell you about! Anyway, until the next free WiFi connection, farewell dear hearts since I must needs be gone and on lusty gentlemen!