Free Country: A Penniless Adventure the Length of Britain

by George Mahood

  He led the way back to his house which was a 15 minute walk from the pub. He was staggering all over the pavement and occasionally had to hold onto a wall or lamppost to regain his balance. Despite his age, and poor dress sense, he looked fairly fit and had a powerful athletic build.

  ‘Are you sure this is a good idea?’ whispered Ben.

  ‘Yeah, we’ll be fine,’ I said, not entirely convinced.

  ‘I’m absolutely shitting myself. We’re going back to sleep on the floor at a trained killer’s house, who is absolutely shitfaced. Are we insane?’

  ‘When you put it that way, it does sound a bit stupid, but he seems like a genuinely nice bloke who just wants to help us out. What’s the worst that can happen?’

  ‘Errr, that we get bummed or killed, or both,’ said Ben.

  Mick lived in a small council flat on the edge of Carlisle. It had not been decorated since the 1960s. Either that or Mick was into retro-styling in a big way. A few meagre possessions dotted his front room; library books, a radio, an overflowing ashtray, and, somewhat surprisingly, a windowsill full of seedlings.

  ‘If ye move those chairs outta th’way ye can sleep on the floor,’ he said. He disappeared into the kitchen and emerged with a bottle of whisky and three glasses. ‘Time for a wee dram before bed?’

  This was more of a statement than a question, as despite our polite declines we were both given a huge neat whisky. Ben sipped at his like a connoisseur, and I downed mine in the hope that it would make me sleep better. Mick slumped into his armchair and seconds later he was asleep.

  ‘Shit! What do we do now?’ asked Ben.

  ‘I don’t know. We can’t just go to sleep with him sat there can we?’

  ‘No. But I’m not going to try and wake him and put him into bed. Are you?’

  ‘No way.’

  ‘I’m so glad I’ve got the sleeping bag. At least if he wakes up you’ll be the easier one to attack,’ said Ben.

  ‘Stop boasting about your bloody sleeping bag. Besides, if he wakes up in the night and tries to rape or murder us at least I’ll be able to make a quick getaway whereas you’ll be hopping round the room like you’re in a sack race.’

  We both started laughing at the thought, but then stopped quickly when Mick started fidgeting. Mick asleep was far less terrifying than Mick awake.

  Ben climbed into his sleeping bag and I covered my legs with my towel and we lay on the floor longing for the morning.

  We had been quiet for about ten minutes when I decided to release a fart. Now, I’m a fairly prolific farter – I would even go as far as saying that I’m a master – but this was like nothing I had ever done before. It lasted for about ten seconds and the vibrations of it rumbled through the floorboards, echoing round the entire room. We looked over towards Mick who shuffled in his chair, sat forward, opened his eyes briefly, and then went back to sleep.

  Ben almost wet himself with laughter and I had to put my fist in my mouth to stop myself shrieking. It was just what we needed to break the tension.

  ‘Holy shit,’ said Ben, ‘we’re sleeping next to a drunken killer and you go and let out something like that. I’ve never heard anything like that before.’

  ‘It was definitely one of my best. I think it’s a combination of the Guinness, the burger and the fear.’

  It’s fair to say it was not one of my best night’s sleep.

  I drifted in and out of consciousness, kept awake by the presence of Mick slumped in his chair a few feet away. He would swear loudly at himself at regular intervals throughout the night – seemingly in his sleep.

  At some point in the early hours of the morning, Mick heaved himself up from the chair and staggered down the corridor to what we presumed was his bedroom. Ben then pushed the sitting room door closed behind him, so that we would at least get some sort of warning when he returned.

  The temperature dropped considerably and the wind and rain battered the flimsy council flat windows. I put on my suit trousers but they did little to keep me warm. Ben lay smugly next to me in his sleeping bag.

  Day 13 - Welcome to Scotland

  Carlisle to Dumfries - 39 miles

  ‘Guid mornin’, campers,’ said Mick as he burst through the door. He stood in the doorway bouncing around on his toes shadow boxing. He was full of energy and enthusiasm, and was clearly not feeling any after effects from the previous day’s drinking.

  ‘Ah heard voices comin' frae in here an' it took me a wee while tae remember ah hud brooght ye home.’

  ‘Yeah, it took us a while to remember where we were, too,’ I said.

  ‘What did ah tell ye mah name was?’ he asked.

  ‘Mick,’ said Ben.

  ‘Ach, noo. Ah say 'at tae fowk ah dunnae kinn. Mah real name is Ronnie.’

  Ronnie offered us breakfast but then discovered he didn’t have any food in the house. Instead he made us a coffee and topped them up with the remainder of the whisky. He then sat back in his arm chair and spent an hour retelling most of the stories about his life that he had told us the night before. Neither Ronnie nor his flat seemed quite so daunting in the daytime.

  From his sitting room window, you could see into the back garden which was shared with a row of six other flats. Ronnie, it transpired, was the designated head gardener.

  ‘Nobody else aroond here gi'es a jobby abit plants,’ he said.

  He had done a brilliant job. It wasn’t going to win any awards at Chelsea, but you could tell he had put a lot of time and effort into the garden. It was fascinating to witness the two extreme sides to Ronnie’s personality. Part of him was an angry, bitter, cynical, former killer. The other part was a generous, thoughtful, kind, nature-loving old man.

  Shortly after completing the trip (damn it, I’ve spoilt the ending again), he sent me a lovely long letter saying how much he had enjoyed us both staying with him, and to thank me for some audio books that I had sent him. He enclosed a couple of poems – including a new one, which he said he wrote about me.

  Out of your eyes

  The love of life appears

  Seeking liberty to feel

  The actual, the real.

  Your solitude absorbs

  So gladly…

  Knowing and yet unknowing me

  I’ve no need to explain

  The want of wanting

  The haunting of you shall be me

  And love completely

  But teardrops on the windowpane

  Of experience this is youth.

  And I passing through your life

  Hope to stain that glass… with truth.

  And leave it with you.

  When I tell people of our experience with Ronnie, I admit that his stories do sound far-fetched. Out of all the people in Carlisle, we happened to end up with a drunken hitman, who was in his final weeks of life. Most people laugh and say that it sounds like a load of bullshit. Ronnie’s story, that is, not my version of events.

  I don’t consider myself a very gullible person. In fact, I tend to be very suspicious of people. Especially those that I don’t know. But in Ronnie’s case I never doubted anything he said. Looking back, this seems a little naïve.

  I have been told on a couple of occasions since, that it is a classic sign of senility, that people will have delusions about a fabricated heroic past. In a way, I hope that Ronnie was just a delusional old man and that none of his shocking past life actually happened. I would be comforted, to some extent, if it turned out he had spent most of his years holed up in that council flat tending to plants and listening to the radio.

  Minutes after leaving Ronnie’s we were caught out by a torrential downpour. The raindrops battered the road surface like machinegun fire, and within seconds the gutters were full. The torrent of water elbowed its way down the high street looking for its escape. We did the same, and found refuge in the doorway of a shop. The window was well stocked with random household things, such as varnish and carriage clocks, but there was also a random selection of bike accessor
ies.

  ‘Surely there are some bike bits we could ask for while we are here?’ said Ben.

  ‘Like what?’

  ‘I don’t know, but your bike is rubbish. It must need some new bits.’

  ‘It probably does, but I’ve got no idea which bits would make it less rubbish if we replaced them.’

  Ben stared at The Falcon as though the answer would appear to him at any moment. ‘Hold on, I’ve got an idea. Wait there,’ he said, propping his bike up and disappearing into the shop.

  I stood there wincing at the thought of him asking the bemused shopkeeper for a free derailleur, tyre, brake cable or inner tube, just for the sake of it. He emerged from the shop with a big grin on his face and two black bin bags in his hand.

  ‘The latest in waterproof cycling gear,’ he said.

  ‘You are a genius.’

  We tore a hole in the bottom of each bin liner for our head and a hole in each side for our arms. The bin bags were big enough to cover our rucksacks, too, and keep our few belongings sheltered from the rain.

  As we set off again, it felt like we were on a movie set. Despite it being 9.30am, the streets were eerily deserted. The rain was so dramatic that the film director would have asked to tone it down because it was too unrealistic.

  We had no idea where we were going. I had left the day’s route in my rucksack, which was now inaccessible because of the bin liner. We cycled in the direction which our instinct told us was north. Two weeks on the road had given us an acute natural awareness of our location and direction.

  Or so we thought.

  ‘This is the road we came in on last night. We need to be going in the opposite direction,’ I said.

  ‘I thought it all looked a bit familiar,’ said Ben, as we turned around and retraced out steps.

  Less than a mile north of Carlisle on the A7 we passed a branch of Morrison’s - the supermarket (other supermarkets are available). We both agreed that cycling in such horrendous conditions was particularly unpleasant, so decided to stop and try and get some breakfast.

  We entered the supermarket followed by the glare of several exiting shoppers, who seemed a bit confused by our attire. The fashion of knee-length bin bags and skimpy shorts had apparently not taken off in Carlisle.

  ‘Shall we try and get some bread and butter like we did in Ellesmere Port?’ I suggested.

  ‘I really fancy a fry-up. What do you say we try our luck at the café?’

  We approached the lady at the till and tried our well rehearsed routine.

  ‘Ye want a free breakfest? Ah cannae authorize 'at. Yoo'll hae tae gang an' spick tae th' stair manager. Gang ower th' the customer services desk.’

  Everyone in Carlisle seemed to be Scottish. And not just a bit Scottish, but extremely Scottish. It was almost like they were pushed out of Scotland for being too Scottish.

  ‘What the hell did she just say?’ asked Ben as we walked away.

  ‘I’m not sure but I think she told us to go and ask the store manager.’

  We eventually located him at the Customer Services desk. He was Scottish.

  ‘Sae ye want a free breakfest?’ he said. ‘Och aye, Ah hink we can sort 'at it fur ye. Whit will it be? Two full Englishes? Or shoods ah said Scottishes,’ he said with a cackle.

  ‘Two Scottish breakfasts would be amazing. Thanks so much.’

  ‘Nae problem. gang an' tak' a seat an' i'll gie a body ay th' kimers tae sort ye it.’

  ‘Ok,’ we said, without the faintest clue as to what he had said.

  Five minutes later, we were brought two large fry-ups and a pot of tea. If the Scots in Scotland were even half as nice as the Scots in Carlisle then we were in for a treat.

  The rain had not relented by the time we braved it back outside, almost two hours after we entered. Our bikes, which we had unsubtly pretended to chain to the trolley depot, were still there. On this rare occasion, I secretly hoped that the bikes would have been stolen. That way, we could have abandoned the whole trip – due to circumstances beyond our control – and then headed home to our warm dry beds and home comforts. There would be no shame in admitting defeat, having made it so far, only for our trusty steeds, that we had worked so tirelessly to acquire, to be taken from us by a couple of pesky Carlislians.

  Unfortunately, nobody had seized the opportunity, and the bikes remained where we had left them, ready for us to climb aboard with our damp, bin-liner-coated arses.

  Reaching Scotland was certainly an anti-climax.

  A bridge across the River Sark marks the border and we were greeted with a brown ‘Scotland Welcomes You’ sign in the town (if you can call it that) of Gretna.

  Gretna is of course famous for its registry offices. In Scotland, the 19th century law that allows 16 year olds to marry without parental consent is still taken advantage of. The first building you see after entering Scotland is one such registry office. The ‘First House in Scotland Marriage Room’ or ‘Last House in Scotland’ - depending on which direction you approach it - is a single storey white and black building, right next to the main road. I’ve definitely seen more romantic wedding venues, but it did have a certain charm.

  It was noon and still raining heavily. There was no sign of any brides or grooms, but I got quite excited by the idea of a couple turning up for a spontaneous marriage, and urgently requiring two witnesses. Unfortunately, nobody did. The only way that a wedding by the side of a busy road, on a wet Thursday in Gretna could have been less romantic, would be if Ben and I had been the witnesses.

  ‘Have you ever been to Scotland before?’ asked Ben as we stood hugging the ‘Scotland Welcomes You’ sign (this is a compulsory rite of passage for anyone that enters Scotland by bike or on foot).

  ‘Yes. This is my second time,’ I said.

  ‘When was the other time?’

  ‘About five minutes ago.’

  ‘Eh?’

  ‘I had to nip back into England a few minutes ago because my route instructions blew back over the border.’

  ‘You’re a moron. So you’ve never been to Scotland before today?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Me neither.’

  ‘Rubbish, isn’t it?’

  ‘Yes. It never stops raining.’

  We posed for a photograph by the sign (again, compulsory), and then set off again. We followed a fairly quiet road that ran parallel to the busy A75, but the cycling was incredibly unpleasant. The rain had collected on the road so much that we were cycling through an inch deep puddle that stretched all the way from Gretna to Dumfries.

  ‘Ben, do you remember that ear stud that Eric gave me back in Cornwall?’ I said as I cycled alongside him to avoid being sprayed by his back wheel.

  ‘Yeah, why?’

  ‘I’ve lost it. It’s been attached to my t-shirt all this time, and now it’s gone. It must have got knocked off by the bin liner.’

  ‘Oh well. It looked stupid anyway.’

  ‘That’s not the point. He gave it to us for good luck.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘Maybe our luck has run out.’

  ‘Cheer up. You’re becoming as miserable as me.’

  On the way into Dumfries a car pulled out of a side road right in front of me. I applied the brakes, which were ineffective at the best of times. In water, and at high speed, they were completely useless. I was half off the bike by the time I hit the car. The Falcon’s pedals and frame slammed into the back driver-side corner of the car, leaving a hefty scratch and a slight dent. Most of the skin was missing from my right knee, but other than that, The Falcon and I had come away quite lightly. The lady’s car (I’m not being sexist – she was a female driver) definitely came off worse. She pulled to a stop and got out of her car to inspect the damage. Not to me, but to her car.

  ‘What have you done, you idiot?’ she shouted. By this point I had picked The Falcon up off the floor, and was cycling as fast as I could down the hill to catch up with Ben. Yes, technically I was leaving the scene of an accident, but t
here is no doubt that it was her fault. After all, she did pull out in front of me. But I also knew that my bike didn’t have adequate brakes, and when it comes to driving they say that if somebody hits you from behind, it is always their fault. I assumed this probably applied to cyclists, too, but I didn’t want to hang around to find out.

  ‘What happened to you back there?’ asked Ben as we pulled into a side road.

  ‘I just had a bit of a run in with a car. I told you our luck had run out.’

  ‘If your luck had run out then you would have come off a lot worse. Are you ok?’

  ‘Yeah, I’m fine thanks,’ I said. ‘It was a bit scary. I think that’s my first ever bike accident involving a car.’

  ‘Really? I’ve had plenty of them. If you think Dumfries is bad, you should try cycling in London.’

  ‘So what’s the deal? Whose fault would it have been, and should I be responsible for getting her car sorted?’

  ‘I’ve no idea. I’ve never hung around to find out either.’

  We happened to have stopped right next to Robert Burns House, which is ‘one of Dumfries’s most notable tourist sights’. Or so our route book claimed.

  Robert Burns, or Rabbie Burns, or Scotland's favourite son, the Ploughman Poet, Robden of Solway Firth, Bard of Ayrshire or just plain old Bob, as I like to call him, is Scotland’s most famous poet. I’m sure most of you know this already, but for those – like me – whose history is missing a few key events (such as everything that happened, ever) then I think it’s sometimes helpful to give a bit of historical background. Where was I? That’s right… Robert Burns is Scotland’s most famous poet. He wrote poems, and he... errr... he did something with Liberalism or Socialism or both. And I think he probably invented Burns night, too. That’s all I know, I’m afraid.

  ‘Shall we go and have a look around Robert Burns House?’ I asked Ben.