HARDLY A CAR ABOUT.

BIKES AT THE NEXT PURPLE TOWERS?

This time of year is one of my favourite times for getting out for those nice long rides on the bike. Now that the summer (what summer? I hear you say) really is a distant memory, the roads are quieter on my regular riding loops with hardly a car about.

A few days ago JD and I decided to do a loop that we hadn't ridden for some time.....a good six months in fact. 
This particular loop takes in lots of good old fashioned English country lanes and apart from the town of Wimborne where we started the ride, we hardly saw a motorized vehicle apart from the odd farm vehicle or riders on horseback, not that a horse can really be described as motorized!! 

We stopped for a short break outside a nice country mansion which JD told me that I should buy as the next Purple Towers. 
He even pointed out the various buildings in the grounds that could be used to store bikes. Unfortunately the only thing standing in the way of such a purchase is a huge wedge of cash, but that's just a minor point.

DEFINITELY AUTUMN - LOTS OF FALLEN LEAVES

 As we rested the bikes against the Mansions front wall, we couldn't help but notice the fallen leaves that had been blown up against it, proving as if proof was needed, that autumn was certainly upon us. 

Cycling along some of these country lanes you can't help but be transported back in time, to what it must have been like cycling the English countryside before the car became king...before owning a car became a must have requirement for almost everyone. 

I can still remember a time before my Father owned a car when we would all go out for a ride and a picnic on our bikes. 
Mum and Dad with one of my two sisters each perched in a seat on the back of their bikes. 
I would ride between them on my beloved BSA with it's two tone blue paintwork......... 

Obviously cars were around but not every one could afford one then and it was certainly long before the days of the cycle path. 
We used to ride on the road and I cannot remember ever feeling vulnerable as I rode along the main roads near to my home. 

Those early cycling days came back to me as I rode along the Dorset lanes with JD the other day.

CHETTLE VILLAGE SHOP AND POST OFFICE

As if to complete the cycle ride of nostalgia we stopped for a coffee and a cake at the little shop in the village of Chettle. 
The building is quite interesting being made of a wooden frame and corrugated iron. 

The lady in the shop told us that the building had originally been an old army hut up at the Blandford Army camp. 
Following the war the MOD sold off a number of these types of buildings as being surplus to their requirements. 
This particular hut was purchased from them in the early sixties...dismantled and then re-erected on it's present site and used to house both the shop and the post office. 

I love these buildings with  all the history that surrounds them. 
It has stood on this spot for fifty years and I don't know how many years previously at the army camp.  
I wonder for how many more years it will stand here.... acting as it does as a reminder of a time when there was hardly a car about.......