Apparently there was some obscure event yesterday where a royal personage gave a speech to some legislative body or other. Never crossed my mind to check. Up here we don't usually pay much attention to goings on in London 
I'll know for next time.
Where I was going for the meeting couldn't possibly have been a more inconvenient destination on that day. It was a fun game of try to find the roads not blocked off by police. To the chap who suggested it might be a pleasant ride through Green Park, well that wasn't happening!
I set off in good spirits and everything was fine until half a mile to go. I'm nearly there, I'll have 25 minutes to get a coffee and unwind ready for the meeting. Nope! Barriers and police. Little did I know this was to be a common sight in my next 40 minutes.
I overhear another cyclist talking to police, realise what was going on, and think well surely if I push my bike through the crowds I can walk past the houses of parliament and Parliament Square then just turn south and I'll be able to find a route. In hindsight that wasn't the best plan. I had to retrace my steps then though the path down the side of New Scotland Yard, onto Parliament St. There I spoke to a dibble, very pleasant (probably happy about all the overtime, the place was crawling with them) but he wasn't much help as a route advisor! "Back up to Trafalgar Square then right round". Factually correct but not very helpful. Had to walk all the way up to Trafalgar Square. From there the Mall was obviously closed off so it was onto Pall Mall. Now I'm fine with filtering through heavy traffic, I do it on most commutes, but this was ridiculous. There was often no room to squeeze past even scooting the bike and vehicles blocking every junction.
The Edge Explore showed its limitations in that environment. It's been fantastic on normal rides, (or rides in normal places), but rerouting wasn't fast enough and the map screen was just too busy to make head or tail of. I could have zoomed in but then I'd have lost the general sense of where I was heading to. And I couldn't look down too much in that scenario.
On Pall Mall traffic wasn't moving and no room to filter so I got off and walked it a bit. Spoke to one of the police at the end of Marlborough Road as I could see people riding bikes through out of the park, but they were being allowed to ride out, not in. I didn't think to ask how they'd got in in the first place though.
No choice but to continue up to some road called Piccalilli, or something like that, a right pickle anyway! Then round Hyde Park Corner and now heading in vaguely the right direction for the first time in half an hour. There's a lot of this type of thing...
Deep joy.
Did a bit of pavement cycling because f*** it. Not great but not as bad as this spanner.
Got (more) confused by the Garmin suggesting seemingly illegal right turns. Stopped to check the phone as I'm now late for my meeting and saw a message from a colleague replying to my earlier message saying I'm a bit lost. She suggested putting the destination into google maps, as if I never though of that. It wasn't up to date with all the closures though and every route it had been suggesting was bollix.
A bit more walking the bike trying to get my bearings. Then after a bit more of this...
...and a left turning I realise the street looks familiar from previous perusal of street view. I'm on Victoria Street! So a few blocks and traffic lights later I'm there. Phew.
On the day the tube would be vastly preferable. My colleague on the same train was there 25 minute before me!
But would I do it again? On the intended route yes possibly. But I've started a list of roads to avoid when cycling in London consisting of most of the above!
I'll know for next time.Where I was going for the meeting couldn't possibly have been a more inconvenient destination on that day. It was a fun game of try to find the roads not blocked off by police. To the chap who suggested it might be a pleasant ride through Green Park, well that wasn't happening!
I set off in good spirits and everything was fine until half a mile to go. I'm nearly there, I'll have 25 minutes to get a coffee and unwind ready for the meeting. Nope! Barriers and police. Little did I know this was to be a common sight in my next 40 minutes.
I overhear another cyclist talking to police, realise what was going on, and think well surely if I push my bike through the crowds I can walk past the houses of parliament and Parliament Square then just turn south and I'll be able to find a route. In hindsight that wasn't the best plan. I had to retrace my steps then though the path down the side of New Scotland Yard, onto Parliament St. There I spoke to a dibble, very pleasant (probably happy about all the overtime, the place was crawling with them) but he wasn't much help as a route advisor! "Back up to Trafalgar Square then right round". Factually correct but not very helpful. Had to walk all the way up to Trafalgar Square. From there the Mall was obviously closed off so it was onto Pall Mall. Now I'm fine with filtering through heavy traffic, I do it on most commutes, but this was ridiculous. There was often no room to squeeze past even scooting the bike and vehicles blocking every junction.
The Edge Explore showed its limitations in that environment. It's been fantastic on normal rides, (or rides in normal places), but rerouting wasn't fast enough and the map screen was just too busy to make head or tail of. I could have zoomed in but then I'd have lost the general sense of where I was heading to. And I couldn't look down too much in that scenario.
On Pall Mall traffic wasn't moving and no room to filter so I got off and walked it a bit. Spoke to one of the police at the end of Marlborough Road as I could see people riding bikes through out of the park, but they were being allowed to ride out, not in. I didn't think to ask how they'd got in in the first place though.
No choice but to continue up to some road called Piccalilli, or something like that, a right pickle anyway! Then round Hyde Park Corner and now heading in vaguely the right direction for the first time in half an hour. There's a lot of this type of thing...
Deep joy.
Did a bit of pavement cycling because f*** it. Not great but not as bad as this spanner.
Got (more) confused by the Garmin suggesting seemingly illegal right turns. Stopped to check the phone as I'm now late for my meeting and saw a message from a colleague replying to my earlier message saying I'm a bit lost. She suggested putting the destination into google maps, as if I never though of that. It wasn't up to date with all the closures though and every route it had been suggesting was bollix.
A bit more walking the bike trying to get my bearings. Then after a bit more of this...
...and a left turning I realise the street looks familiar from previous perusal of street view. I'm on Victoria Street! So a few blocks and traffic lights later I'm there. Phew.
On the day the tube would be vastly preferable. My colleague on the same train was there 25 minute before me!
But would I do it again? On the intended route yes possibly. But I've started a list of roads to avoid when cycling in London consisting of most of the above!
