"A new delight was in his eyes, quite over and above the pleasure of rushing through the keen, sweet, morning air. He reached out his thumb and twanged his bell out of sheer happiness."
- From: The Wheels of Chance: A Bicycling Idyll by H.C. Wells
Remy is full of surprises... I wanted to write the first newsletter for our cycling holiday in England, but I don't actually have time this week. I said to him: "Look, I could just use the first newsletter of 2017, quite an interesting piece". It's about the first bicycle invented in England and the first cycling holiday whose founder was also a Brit. Says Remy: "but do you know that the first bicycle holiday described, was also by a Brit? That was The Wheels of Chance: A Bicycling Idyll by H.C. Wells".
I was very surprised. I knew the title, and it's on my list (somewhere at the bottom of my very long reading wish list), but I didn't know it was about a cycling holiday! "It's about a tailor," Remy told me, "he had saved up ten days off to go on a cycling holiday".
I discover on the internet that it was even made into a silent film in 1913. Anyway, I have now started reading!
Back to the cycling holiday. We will cycle starting Friday May 3rd to Hook of Holland (6 km) and take the overnight ferry to Harwich. We'll then cycle via London and Bristol to Cornwall and back to Harwich via the south coast, along the English Channel. Or the other way round, we'll decide when we get there. And we probably won't even make it to Cornwall, as we only have three weeks.
Best regards, Remy & Gea
Excerpt from The Wheels of Chance: A Bicycling Idyll:
At supper that night, holiday talk held undisputed sway. Mr. Pritchard spoke of “Scotland,” Miss Isaacs clamoured of Bettws-y-Coed, Mr. Judson displayed a proprietary interest in the Norfolk Broads. “I?” said Hoopdriver when the question came to him. “Why, cycling, of course.”
“You’re never going to ride that dreadful machine of yours, day after day?” said Miss Howe of the Costume Department.
“I am,” said Hoopdriver as calmly as possible, pulling at the insufficient moustache. “I’m going for a Cycling Tour. Along the South Coast.”
“Well, all I hope, Mr. Hoopdriver, is that you’ll get fine weather,” said Miss Howe. “And not come any nasty croppers.”
For those who find it interesting, here is the story I wrote in 2017. And should you want to read the book, it can be found in the Gutenberg library: Gutenberg-biblitoheek.
Illustratie: J. Ayton Symington
https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/The_Wheels_of_Chance:_A_Bicycling_Idyll