What do people get done in Ditherington?

I mentioned the other day that I’ve seen a few things on the side of the road, which you’d probably miss if you were in a car.  Today I was thinking that I’ve seen a few names of places and signs that have made me laugh, such as this house that I saw on Saturday.

On Friday I cycled through Exeter past a pub with the excellent name ‘Sorry Head’ which I took as a great apology to one’s head after a big night out.  The same day I cycled past a pub with a sign outside ‘Fresh fish on Thursday’.  You can understand the sentiment behind such a sign, but personally I’d stay away from eating fish at that pub between Saturday and Wednesday!

Today I went through this village in Herefordshire…

… which clearly is a centre of IVF research for plants and bushes.   And in the same village I cycled past a house called ‘The brick house’ which I laughed at – maybe because I have two small boys, but to me it was the third pig telling the wolf not to even bother!  I then went through Mortimer’s Cross, a village I have been through a few times.  This was the setting of an important battle where almost 4,000 soldiers died in the 14^th century – yet every time I go through there I think ‘why is Mortimer so angry?’.

Later in the day, in Shropshire I passed a sign written by the same people, which said ‘Abattoir’ and underneath it ‘Camping’.  I’ll give that a miss.  When I entered Shrewsbury it had a sign underneath saying ‘Birthplace of Charles Darwin’.  Fair enough.  But yesterday I went through Monmouth, it announced itself as ‘World’s First Wikipedia Town’.  Eh? 

And finally, outside my B&B this evening I came across this sign…

I would love to go to Ditherington – it conjures up images of all the townsfolk just dithering around not getting anything done (Jo, I don’t live there, ok?).

I’ll keep an eye out for more signs that make me smile.

It was a relatively short day, 65 miles from Hereford to Shrewsbury, so a later start than normal after The Breakfast of Champions (as my friend James calls it):

Then it was off on the bike, cycling through some beautiful countryside. 

Eventually out of Herefordshire and into Shropshire…

Through the village of Bucknell that had a train station that looked like it hadn’t changed since the 1950s…

...and then through the Shropshire hills.

... including a very big climb where even some walkers and a farmer said separately ‘good luck’!  As I was climbing, a lamb jumped out into the track in front of me, and kept running ahead before dashing back through the hedgerow.

And finally the summit.  Views like this don’t come without a lot of pain!

Then into the village of Clun, which has a little footbridge…

..for those who didn’t want to ford the river (it was 1ft deep).

The afternoon was spent on a really nice fast spin towards Shrewsbury, with speeds typically 18-20mph.  It makes such a difference compared with grinding up hills at 4mph!

And finally I got to Shrewsbury…

… and ended up on some cobbled roads doing my own impression of the Paris-Roubaix through Flanders…

And to an excellent B&B called Ferndale.  This is my room – very nice.

Tomorrow I’m off to Runcorn in Cheshire.  I looked at places to stay there and it looked like a pretty grim industrial area, so have found what I hope to be a nice place to stay in Frodsham, which is a bit more ‘countryfied’ shall we say.

Here’s the route of the day.

And finally, yesterday’s blog was about Rule 5 – ‘Harden the f**k up’.  A few months ago Jo showed me some really funny videos from an Australian sketch show about an Ozzie character called Chopper Reid.  I came across this one here which seemed pretty apt and makes me laugh!