Tales from today's commute....

[HLaB]

It wasnt todays commute, but one from Monday this week.

I'd just finished the climb out of suburbia in to the rural bit of my commute, got the pace up to about 18mph when I heard a rustle in the hedgerow, saw something moving in my peripheral left, got hard on the brakes as what turned out to be a deer jumped the hedge, just in front of me. Caught it a glancing blow on the rear leg which just nerfed the front wheel. Luckily it was going at a good pace and was gone over the road before I piled into it so I was able to just carry on. New underpants needed.

My extra close deer encounters were just after the last lockdown (I think they had got tamer); they weren't commutes though.

I was cycling along a fairly busy in village terms main road that connects a couple of villages. When a deer jumped over my face, when I was going at speed and missed me by inches. Phew, I thought. But I never realised they were the leader of a herd and a bigger one followed and barrelled straight into my mate who was draughting me. My mate was out for a bit with a broken collar bone.

A week later I was going along a narrow rut that passes for a gravel track here at speed again, when a huge black stag came running straight at me. Fortunately the rut was deep enough he managed to jump directly over my bike. But I was in his territory!