The Bike

I’m 32. I don’t have a bike.

I’m not intending to buy a bike.

I see a film called “Breaking Away.”

It’s about a boy who lives for his bike,

The joy of a boy in the life on a bike

The very next day I buy a bike.

On a bike to work, on a bike around Leeds.

My son on the bike to take him to Nursery

My wife on a bike is taking our daughter

On our bikes from the campsite to get to the sea.

Loving one rides leads to another

Leads to another that’s steadily longer

Wharfedale, Nidderdale, Wensleydale, and Swaledale

But the Tour de France, says a friend

Do I watch the Tour de France?

Who is this in the mist on the mountain?

It can’t be, it is, it’s Stephen Roche!

He wins the Tour. What a race!

What an event! Vive le Tour!

I must have a go at a mountain myself.

It’s too hot it’s too steep it’s too far I’m so slow

Still 10k to go yes I’m loving the challenge but why can’t it stop?

I can stop I can stop I keep peddling I can stop I don’t stop

I won’t ever get there I’ve got there I’ve made it I’ve made it.

The bike has brought me this beer and this view

Of the mountains embracing the sky at the top.

I go down I take off I am starting to fly

But I break by the bend and then break again

I’m too chicken to fly I’m just fluttering down

But I’m not a Pro I’m a tourist and I can’t wait to try this again.

On a bike in the Alps and the Pyrenees

On a bike in the Picos and Sierra Nevada

On a bike in the Dolomites, Apennines, Cevennes

On a bike by the fjord, the Rhine, and the Volga

On a bike by the Nile and a bike that punctures

And thorns kept puncturing by Kilamanjaro

On a bike in the sun and the rain and the wind

Sweating and soaking and shattered and when can I do it again?

I’m 52. Campaign to cancel the debt of developing countries

G8 leaders are meeting in Birmingham. Get to the Demo by bike.

They meet in Cologne we get there by bike.

They meet in Okinawa, we get there by…you what?

Fly to Washington and just keep riding west.

Here come the rivers, the Potomac, Missouri and Rio Grande

And here come the mountains, Appalachians and Rockies.

And here are the plains with roads that don’t end

And here is Indiana where “Breaking Away” is set

And here is our host who was in the movie

All these places we’ve been to and people we’ve met

All because of that film and here we are where the film was made

And here is the sun getting hotter and hotter till here is the desert

Where the son I once took on the back of the bike’s now leading his Dad

We do 113 miles in 120 degree heat I’m no longer solid I melt

But here’s the Pacific the bike’s been the way to cross the USA

And here we are on the 4th July in the Hollywood Bowl in LA

Then fly to Japan and its “mishi atsui” its hot and sticky and mostly raining

By bike from Fukuoka to Kumamoto to Kagoshima

No I don’t believe it either but here is the boat for the Demo in Okinawa.

And campaigning continues by bike across France

Over the Alps to Genova, over the Rockies to Calgary

London to Edinburgh’s not very far so we go via Kenya and Tanzania.

And finish campaigning in the oh so flat bug-filled forests of Latvia and Estonia.

Thanks to the Bike shops advising on bikes

Selling bikes and mending bikes

Thanks to Caygills, Drakes and the Edinburgh Co-op

Put bikes on a ferry for Arran, Jura, Islay, Orkney and Mull

Put bikes on a ferry for Lewis, Harris, Uist and Skye

Then push the bike through snow at Pitlochry

Put the bike on the train then the bike on a boat for Sardinia, Corsica,

Put a bike on a train to the Cotswolds

And here is the bike by the River Jordan and the sea of Galilee

And the bike’s drinking Guinness on the west coast of Ireland,

The bike’s by the pub with the fiddles and flutes on the Wild Atlantic way

From Berwick on Tweed down the coast and across to Hadrian’s wall

Then Teesdale Dentdale and here I am back in Swaledale

But why are all these motorbikes here

So many police on motor bikes here and all these promo vehicles

So many cyclists going so fast yes here they come it’s the Tour de France in Swaledale

The tour de France is passing the Farmers Arms and the Black Bull

I’m watching them ride over Grinton Moor and the next day

Here’s the official car at the head of the race and here I am in the car

From York to Sheffield I’m in the car at the head of the race

In a car at the head of the Tour de France

Too many things that couldn’t possibly happen are happening

And here I am translating for Bernard Hinault

And here I am on the Champs Elysees I’m watching the finish of the Tour de France

I didn’t have a bike.

Because of a film I bought a bike

Because of the bike I watched the Tour de France and went to the mountains

Because of the bike I went to so many places.

Because of the bike I met so many people

Because of the bike I made such very good friends.

And because of the bike the joy on a bike of a journey with those I love.

I’m now 72. My wife and I still go on holiday by bike.

An electric bike but it’s still a bike.

So, if I’d never seen that film…