REFUELLING

Some things go together. Bikes and coffee, winter Sunday rides and pub roasts, clear skies and a full tank... You get the picture. 
Between life in general and lousy weather on weekends, I haven't managed to ride much lately, so I was in almost as desperate a need of a ride as the bike by the time the skies and my schedule cleared. Sometimes the best way to refuel my battery is a good ride. I'm really not that different from my bike.  
As usual after a hiatus, the engine growled and yawned for a bit before waking up properly, then purred very happily all the way to a coffee shop I'd passed previously, but never tried. It had looked promising, so I made a mental note and luckily managed to remember that. It's not a massively long ride, so is great for winter runs or busy-life runs, when you really need a break from everything but can't afford to take a very long one. 
Southdown Coffee and Wine in Brockham off the A25 has paved parking - no slippery gravel here - and the coffee is good. I can recommend the pastries, too. The staff are friendly, and wished me a safe ride when I left. Places with pro-biker staff and good coffee are to be treasured. And frequented, in the most literal sense of the word, so as to help to keep them in business.

WINGING IT

Last summer, there was a lot of media attention on the decline of insert-insect-of-choice. Part of the proposed solution was to allow kerbs and islands to grow a little longer, to be mini-meadows. This has certainly had an effect on winged life, as well as being really pretty to ride past, or be stuck in traffic beside. My visor is dead-bug-central far more often than last summer. I even hit a butterfly on the motorway – which hasn’t ever happened to me before. 

In mainland Europe, you get poppies and company growing right up to the road in some places, so close that a bird can fly out of a hedge and straight into my arm. I’m not sure who was more stunned when this happened – me or it - and the same question occurred as the pretty butterfly wings plastered themselves to my headlight.