360 Degrees Longitude (4 page)

September takes some of our bicycle panniers about twenty yards from point A toward a distant point B. I then carry two of the tandem cases the same distance while Katrina and Jordan stay behind to guard the remaining pile of tandem cases and panniers. I then leave the two tandem cases with September while I go back for another load. After ferrying stuff back and forth between September's base and the kids' base, I do it all over again and move another twenty yards toward our destination.

In this fashion we made our way out of Heathrow International Airport to the London Underground, onto the train, through the long corridors of a connecting station, onto the train again, and then finally up to street level and to our hostel several blocks away. Getting four tandem cases, eight panniers, and a family of four off the London Underground during a twenty-second stop while a wall of human flesh is trying to carry all of you in opposing directions is a lot like being a goldfish in a blender.

September had been to London before, but this was the first time the rest of the family had been outside of Heathrow, so we arranged to see the sights of London for a few days before making our way to David and Carolyn's in Leighton Buzzard. On our first morning in London, Katrina was using the computer in the hostel lobby to e-mail her friends back home. I sat in a lounge chair waiting, reading a current
Time
magazine. At least that's what it looked like to the casual observer. September walked over and asked, “Anything happen in the world in the last week?”

“Well, we haven't invaded Canada yet, if that's what you mean,” I replied, hoping she would not investigate my reading material any further.

As part of the plan for the kids' education, we had brought with us a bunch of children's books on British history. Mind you, it isn't as though prepubescent literature targeted for double-X chromosomes is normally on my reading list, but the book I was reading was more interesting than current world events. I had Katrina's copy of
Beware, Princess Elizabeth
stuffed inside the
Time
magazine, as I wasn't about to be caught in public reading a book about a princess.

The names “Bloody Mary” and “Elizabeth I” were familiar to me, but it wasn't until I started reading Katrina's preteen princess books that I learned that they were sisters, albeit in an “are-you-sure-what-you're-eating-isn't-poisoned” sort of way. All the underhanded cloak and dagger stuff caught my imagination.

We went to Westminster Abbey full of anticipation. I wanted to see where archrivals Mary and Elizabeth were buried, side by side, no less. Plus, I had learned that Sir Isaac Newton's final resting place was in Westminster Abbey and wanted to pay my respects to Mr. Gravity. If it weren't for him, I'd be out of a job.

As I stood in line at the abbey, I noted September's eyes were fixed on a sign adjacent to a counter. “It's almost a hundred dollars to get the four of us inside,” she said.

“To visit a
church?
What if I have the urge to absolve myself of some naughtiness, and I'm short of funds? Do they have some sort of frequent sinner program, so we could use the same pass here and at some of the other sites we want to visit?”

“No,” September replied. “For example, if we want to see where Anne Boleyn took her last steps on the way to the chopping block at the Tower of London, it will be another hundred.”

Planning a yearlong trip around the world isn't like planning a two-week vacation, where every activity for every day can be planned and budgeted well in advance. In the months before we left, we made plans only in the general sense. For example, we knew what regions of the world we wanted to see and in what season, so most of our intercontinental airfare was prepurchased. Conversely, all overland transportation and day-to-day activities were left completely open. As one person wisely summed up long-term travel, “Why plan anything? The first day something could happen which changes everything.” We were committed to our budget, but when standing outside Westminster Abbey the budget suddenly seemed just plain rude. It was immediately clear that if our funds were to last the entire fifty-two weeks of our trip, we couldn't do everything we wanted to do.

“According to our guidebook, the British museums are completely free,” September commented hopefully. “Even for Americans.”

So that is where we spent our time in London. These vaunted institutions are fascinating resources to explore if you ever doubted the breadth and depth of how the British looted their colonies.

• • •

When I was a kid, the litmus test of whether or not your town had arrived in the Major Leagues was if there was a McDonald's. When a McDonald's opened in my hometown, it was quite an event. We boasted with pride, “Logan, Utah now has a McDonald's!” Kids on the school playground would discuss in awed tones the fact that the sign in front of the McDonald's had changed from “100 Million Served” to “200 Million” and ultimately “Billions and Billions.” It was big news.

We hadn't been in the U.K. very long before we learned they have a not-too-dissimilar litmus test. A city isn't a city unless it has a university. We also learned that there are specific qualifications for whether a village is a town or a town is a village, but we could never remember what those qualifications were. I don't know how many times we were corrected by a well-meaning local that the next town was actually a
village
, or the village we were in was in fact a
town
, thank you very much.

After a few days in London it was time to make our way to David and Carolyn's in the town of Leighton Buzzard. The towns (pardon me, did I say towns? I meant villages) in England have these terribly funny names. Leighton Buzzard is one of the more prosaic. How about Piccadilly Circus? Or there is Spital Tongues. Somewhere there must be a Toenail Fungus, England. I looked on a map but couldn't find it. Someone a very long time ago had a great sense of humor.

Leighton Buzzard is about 40 kilometers north of London, and its calm neighborhoods and well-trimmed hedges contrasted dramatically against the insanity of London. I was grateful to have quiet streets to start pedaling on. David and Carolyn were gracious hosts and accomplished cooks. They served superb meals for September, Katrina, and me, and humored Jordan with a mac and cheese food substitute from a box. We were going to have to work on Jordan's picky eating habits, but that was a battle for another day.

I assembled the tandems and we tested our ability to ride on the left-hand side of the road. David offered to keep the tandem cases at his house until such time and place that we sent for them. The night before we departed we stayed up much later than we should have, discussing world affairs, where we would find campgrounds in southern England, and most importantly, the merits and drawbacks of various types of fenders on touring bicycles.

 

Katrina's Journal, June 10

Today was the day! After packing up everything, we loaded the panniers on the bikes and left. David rode with us on his own bike for a distance, and then headed back home. England seems very hilly
.

Not too far from our starting point in Leighton Buzzard is the tiny village of Eydon where my fifth great-grandfather was born. I don't think Eydon has changed since he left in 1855 and probably not even since 1555. Houses are made of stone and have thatched roofs. The paths are impossibly narrow for cars and perfect for cyclists. We found a church with a graveyard that contained several Higham graves, but none that were familiar to us. As a bonus, and a complete surprise, our map showed us that a short hop from Eydon was Cold Higham, an even tinier village.

After a full day of cycling, we approached the town (village?) of Islip, where David had told us we'd find a campground.

After arriving at the campground, I went into the office to secure a site, but quickly learned the awful truth—they were full. The Fickle Finger of Fate had brought us to Islip on the very day of the one thousandth birthday of Islip's most famous son, Edward the Confessor. Of course I knew who he was. In addition to reading Katrina's teen-princess series of books, I had also been reading Jordan's
Horrible Histories
—
England
.

Horrible Histories
is a series of books for reluctant readers ages eight through twelve published in the U.K., mixing history with the details that kids might actually find interesting, such as methods of torture, gory diseases, bloody battles, rodent infestations, and even medieval bathroom logistics.

Edward the Confessor was the guy who lost to William the Conqueror, who invaded England in 1066, united the disparate fiefdoms in the land, and became England's first king.

Hello!

Why were these people celebrating the one thousandth birthday of the loser? I have a hard time visualizing a celebration in New Rumley, Ohio on December 5, 2839, for George Armstrong Custer, loser of the battle of Little Bighorn. Then again, I can't see the British getting all cheery over William the Conqueror's birthday, either. He was
French
. Let's imagine for a moment that the United States lost the Revolutionary War in 1783. Would we celebrate King George's birthday? I think not.

I went back to September and the kids to break the news. “They're full—someone turned a thousand years old today.” Jordan had spied the pool and was virtually wet already; he looked pained at this news. “Oxford is only a few miles down the road. We should get going.”

“We aren't giving up so easily, are we?” September asked. “Can you go back and ask again?”

“You know I'm no good interfacing with people in these situations.”

“That's because, dear,” September said patting me on the shoulder,
“people
don't interface. Only engineers do that. We're ready to camp here. Jordan, come with me. Try to look pathetic.” And with that September roughed up Jordan's hair so it looked like the kid had been dragged behind the bikes rather than propelling them.

A few minutes later September came back. “We're in pitch number three—I had to promise one night only.”

“One is enough. What did you say to make them decide the place wasn't so full?”

“I just told them how fabulously beautiful the countryside was and how we couldn't believe our good luck to have arrived in town on such a historic day, what with us unfortunate Americans having no king of our own whose birthday we can celebrate. Having Jordan as a visual aid didn't hurt, either.”

Later we pitched our tent and crawled into it. We had, of course, camped in our tent before, but that night I slept with Katrina's elbow in my back all night, thinking,
“What have we done?!.”
Camping was the only way we could stay on budget in Europe. We had roughly 18 weeks and 2,500 miles ahead of us to Istanbul. It was looking as if it would be a long road.

By morning, September's key-chain thermometer sported a reading of 34°F. We weren't ready for that—we had brought thin, tropical-weight sleeping bags. I checked the date; it was still mid-June.

Jordan woke up sporting a 101.4° fever. We weren't ready for that, either. Since we were welcome in our campground for exactly one night, we guiltily pumped Jordan full of Tylenol, worked with the kids on their homework, broke camp, and rode into Oxford.

Oxford, located on the Thames River, is home to England's oldest and arguably most prestigious university. Americans know it as the place where Bill didn't inhale.

Speaking of Bill, there isn't a day that goes by that I don't thank his dear friend Al for inventing the Internet. Such a wonderful thing. But lately I had been wishing Al had invented Wi-Fi, too.

The particular e.brain I had chosen to accompany me on our yearlong journey was a kind of electronic Swiss Army knife, as it did just about everything, including connecting to the Internet wirelessly via Wi-Fi. Ever since 9/11 I'd had a compulsion to get the news, and found myself going online and reading the latest headlines frequently. With full connectivity my e.brain was my lifeline to the outside world. I
loved
it.

As with all things loved, it occasionally made me crazy. I had been certain that I would be able to take it with me on our trip and find a Wi-Fi network just about anywhere. This proved to be a much more frustrating task than I'd originally anticipated. That isn't to say that I couldn't find Wi-Fi networks, I just couldn't get into them. For example, while in Oxford, I ended up wandering all over the university campus looking for a department that left its network unguarded so I could check e-mail and get a quick news fix.

Despite its being overly informed about network security, Oxford became our favorite city in England (I can say “city” here because, you guessed it: Oxford has a university). The Oxford city council has chosen to keep its city pedestrian and cyclist friendly. Lacking the frenzied pace of London, Oxford can be easily managed on foot, or more importantly to us, by bicycle. For example, the Museum of the History of Science, Gutenberg's Bible, Martyr's Memorial, and many of Oxford's colleges are all easily accessible on foot from the market square.

One of the most popular pastimes in Oxford is punting, which has nothing to do with kicking a pigskin on fourth down. A punt is not too dissimilar from a canoe, but with its flat bottom, it's much more stable, and it's propelled by using a pole to push off of the bottom of the river. Our punting experience had us starting just past Christ Church Meadow in the Botanical Gardens, where we looked for hobbits near Tolkien's Tree named for the famed author who received much of his inspiration there. Despite its popularity, once past the immediate vicinity of the pier and rental shop, punting is a quiet, rural experience.

We also found Oxford almost impossible to leave. Cycling out of town, every time we turned around to see a sign posting how many miles back, it read the same thing.