THE MUSINGS OF ONE OF THE MOST ELOQUENT THINKERS IN BIKERDOM
IT WAS JUST ABOUT A YEAR AGO THAT WE IN THE UK BEGAN TO HEAR OF THE NEW AND MYSTERIOUS VIRUS THAT WAS STEADILY MAKING ITSELF FELT IN EUROPE, AND I DON’T THINK ANY OF US COULD’VE GUESSED THAT, JUST SIX WEEKS LATER, WE’D BE IN LOCKDOWN AND FACING A YEAR
There’s still a long way to go before we see an end to the restrictions and privations of the Covid-19 pandemic, and I don’t doubt for one minute that the whys and wherefores’ll continue to be discussed for years to come but now, as there is the faintest glimmer of light at the end of this very dark tunnel, I thought to lighten the mood with thoughts of getting back to enjoying our freedoms once again.
For many years I’ve enjoyed the habit of ‘commando camping’. Now, before you go leaping to the wrong conclusion, this isn’t a reference to camping with no pants on… though that is always an option if that’s what floats your boat.
Commando camping, for me, entails impromptu trips to secluded places where I can escape from the stresses of everyday life for a little while. It also entails the avoidance of paying exorbitant prices to camp on commercial campsites amongst the usual choice of anally retentive middle-class wankers with their palatial glamping tents, or tracksuit-wearing chavs and their snotnosed feral offspring.
My favourite commando camping comes from spending nights on secluded beaches. A carefully chosen beach offers all that I require in a campsite; somewhere relatively flat to park a trike and pitch a tent; adequate facilities for ablutions (use your imagination); and, most precious of all, peaceful solitude. As much as I enjoy rallies with large numbers of fellow bikers camping within a few feet of each other, there are times when I much prefer to travel alone, or with just a few friends, to recharge my psychological batteries, and unravel the Gordian knot of my tangled soul.
Of course, there are always those who’d be horrified at the thought of people camping at the seaside without paying some greedy landowner for the privilege but, thankfully, we have some law on our side. Many years ago the Sea Anglers Association got into a legal battle after some prime fishing beaches were taken over by the Ministry of Defence for use as firing ranges and so were, therefore, deemed to be Government property. Luckily there was a clever lawyer in the Sea Anglers Association, and he had found, during some extremely diligent research, that the Magna Carta (if you don’t know what that is, you should be ashamed of yourself) guaranteed that the English coastline would remain free (for fishing) for the English people, in perpetuity.
The reaction of the sneaky civil servants in the MOD was to point out that, although they had to agree that the beaches were not private property, the Ministry owned all of the land through which access to the beaches could be gained, and that trespassers on this MOD land would be prosecuted. Thankfully, King John (a much maligned monarch, but actually no more of a horribly corrupt self-serving parasite than all of the monarchs before or since) had also been forced to guarantee the freedom of English inshore waters (it’ll be interesting to see if Brexit negotiators were aware of that clause) so a group of sea anglers took the rather obvious step of gaining access to these beaches by boat, on a day when firing exercises were to’ve taken place, and began fishing in a line along the sand.
The MOD were caught completely by surprise at this audacious invasion from the sea (I personally find this lack of foresight quite worrying – had the MOD really never thought our beaches were vulnerable to marine invasion? After all it was a tactic that worked quite well in Normandy…) Anyhow, the upshot was that the MOD had to clean up all of the unexploded shells and other assorted military detritus that they’d previously littered these beaches with, and also they had to allow access to these beaches on ‘non-firing’ days. Job done! A fine example of people power (even if it did have to rely on a piece of legislation signed in the year 1215 at Runnymede by a mostly French English monarch). So, if you want to enjoy a blissful night commando camping on an English beach, the trick is to ensure that you have some fishing gear with you. Then, if someone tries to move you on, you’re protected by the Magna Carta!
Of course, you do have to be careful when camping on the sand. Some years ago, after attending the excellent End of the Road Rally on the Lizard in Cornwall, I and a few friends decided to spend a week touring Cornwall, and I was in charge of leading the group in commando camping on some of the secluded beaches I’d discovered on my solo sojourns over the years. All went well until, one night when we were camping on a south-facing beach, a storm blew up without warning. Though we’d camped well above the high tide line (an essential element of beach camping), as designated by the obvious line of seaweed and assorted flotsam, the force of the storm was driving the waves much higher up the strand than was usual for that time of year. I awoke to the feel of very cold water seeping into my tent, and I had to quickly scramble out into the fast-encroaching surf, and bellow a warning to my stillsleeping compatriots. I don’t think we’d ever broken camp so quickly in our lives! Still we hadn’t had to pay for it, and the ensuing storm looked frighteningly beautiful as we watched it from the safety of a cliff-top café some fifteen minutes later.
The best things in life, as they say, often are free!