Day 0 - Whitley Bay - Chester-Le-Street.

I pieced the rig together at my sisters place in Whitley Bay, right on the North East coast. I thought I would use this time to visit some family since my fathers side all hailed from there. An Auntie, Uncle and Cousins. My Granddad. They lived slightly out of the way but not much only about twenty miles, three hours tops I thought even allowing for getting lost and the odd mechanical malfunction.
The day was nearly catastrophic. Hudson was immediately uncomfortable and kept leaping out of the trailer, which since he was tied in entirely capsized us at one point. There were several serious mechanical failures, mostly based around the clamp that attaches the trailer to the rear chainstay of the bike frame. I eventually had to dismantle and reassemble the entire clamp after the protruding bolts got snagged and bent some of the spokes in my rear wheel. I swapped them all so they pointed outward rather than into my wheel, who built this thing anyway? I then rode on for miles not realising that the clamp had slipped backwards on the frame and was rubbing against the hub of the back wheel, acting as a brake. Nearly seven hours later I arrived in Chester-Le-Street exhausted from frustration and a long day in the sun. I was relieved when my family there convinced me to take the next day off and work out the kinks in the bike.
Maybe it's that I'm on the brink of taking everything for granted. Time to take stock or this life is over and every year I live takes a year of my life already.
I took the time in Chester-le-street to bind my trailer with a couple of ratchet straps and pad the trailer clamp with some squares of foam rubber. I filled up on good Northeastern food and took the twenty quid generously offered up by my Auntie. I realised that this household had been through so much over the years but there is a love and communication in this house that was never in mine growing up.

Thursday 16th June - 9:50pm.

To be on the brink is a strange feeling and it's something I've had a sense of for some time now, like I'm casting a shadow over so many unknowns. It's possibly the weight of expectation coming down with age. I end up down a cul-de-sac surrounded by vague generalisations and cliches whenever I try to dissect it. Success? Implosion? Becoming a man? I think that most of all, I'm on the brink of being a 27-year old man who can't think of a single achievement he's proud of. Maybe that's part of the reason I'm here, camped on the edge of a farmers field in the North east of England. I'm apparently following the path of Hadrians wall. A wall the Romans built presumably to give lost souls a bearing when wandering aimlessly.
Ten days ago I arrived in England, back in my home country after three years away. An old friends wedding doubled as an opportunity to see so many of the familiar faces I had missed. That familiarity I had craved for months. The last year had been long and humbling and to be amongst people that know me helped me remember who I was. Which is mostly who I still am, though there have been some irreversible changes.
I had an hour to wait for my train transfer in Birmingham and wondered into the night with my dog Hudson, doing a circuit around The Bullring. It was Friday evening and the apes were out, chanting moronically in their alcoholic stupor. There were no people on the streets, just these animals. Hudson appreciated the abundance of discarded deep fried food on the pavement. I didn't expect to be shocked by my own country. Or disappointed.
I spent the next ten days piecing together the rig I had promised myself. I found an old steel framed touring bike. An English Raleigh 'Classic' in Burgundy Reynolds 531 tubing and dated it back to 1983, the year I was born. I put some new tyres on it, made by a German company Schwalbe. The geordie mechanic helping me insisted on referring to them as "Them Shwobbles" over and over. I picked up a rear rack and panniers, a tent, sleeping bag and handlebar bag. Finally I found a used trailer for sale and picked it up in Shrewsbury. The kind of cycle trailer designed for your small kids to ride in, made of aluminium and bright blue and orange nylon fabric. The lady I bought it from said to her young daughter,
"This man's going to put his children in it now"
Oh no, thank god I thought before I smiled and left. I couldn't be bothered explaining it was for my dog.