Life in Lockdown - Summer V2.0 (Katherine Moore)

Life in Lockdown - Summer V2.0

By Katherine Moore

I write this at my home desk, a giant wall planner in my peripheral vision blocked out with great swathes of colour, the mid-section awash with blue, then penned over in a scrawled frenzy of black biro.

Granted my freedom last autumn with the decision to go freelance, this summer was going to be big. Endless trips and jollies, mostly work related, and mostly in the UK, but with some really exciting video missions to Ireland, guiding new gravel routes in the Pyrenees and a bikepacking rally in the Dolomites too. We’d launched Unpaved Podcast this year, and we’re scheduling a road trip to record series two, travelling all over the UK to speak to off-road riders in their backyards. As a writer with a tiny little chromebook and unlimited hotspot tethering, I’d set myself up to be able to work from anywhere, and indeed that was the intention. The endless storms of the winter and being almost house-bound working on my own meant that I was looking forward to this summer season more than ever.

It’s hard to grumble, isn’t it? No matter how the turn of events has affected you personally and your day-to-day life, unless you’re fighting on the front line, you’ve lost someone near and dear or are struggling to get by with life’s essentials, any whine or moan seems so insignificant, so trivial. Yet so many people’s lives have been affected in relative terms, and I think it’s important for everyone to be able to vent their frustrations.

Then there’s a difference between venting and dwelling. I’ve held back moaning publicly (apart from when as a newbie freelancer I wasn’t going to qualify for any government support), but to my close friends we’ve opened up about how we really feel. Then I’ve moved on. A few days perhaps for it to sink in, and now it’s onto summer V2.0.

Summer V2.0

We were taking every day as it came, weren’t we? Nothing really seemed that serious until it was here. Doing all we can to follow government guidelines here in the UK, we’re granted daily exercise outside and advised to visit the shops just once a week for essential groceries. Both my partner John and I are working from home, which I’m grateful to say is like a little sanctuary to me. He was going to move in soon anyway, but this has just accelerated the process…

Within the confines of our new routine, we have to look for new ways to get our adventure thrills. I can’t deny that I was relieved when one of my hardest events for this year was cancelled, the long miles just not coming to me yet after such a hard start to the year with awful weather and dwindling motivation. With nothing so serious to ‘train’ for, things take on a different meaning.

The situation makes me realise, now more than ever, how important the outside world is to me. More than for exercise, to train or to socialise, that’s what bike riding is to me. It’s the total immersion in the natural world; the feel of the crunching stones beneath my tyres, wafts of wild garlic, hawthorn blossom and passing horse stables, spying roe and muntjac deer through the hedgerows, the cackle of green woodpeckers from up in the trees.

I’m probably riding slower. Taking more pictures, smelling the flowers. As my now sole riding partner, John is subject to my endless pauses. Sure, we miss the coffee stops, the pub lunches, and really miss camping outside. With no garden, bar a bike washing space, it would be impossible for us to recreate that luxury at home.

Not wanting to take the biscuit with our daily exercise, we’re sticking fairly close to home. After John finishes work at 5.30pm every day we head out to the east of the city, avoiding the built-up areas and out onto the quiet lanes, eerily devoid of traffic. Each night I have targets in mind; not efforts, not wattages to hit, not distances nor speeds; but these are new sectors to explore. Byways, bridleways, unmetalled roads, hidden singletrack; we’re slowly and methodically covering our doorstep and riding every glorious section of dirt we can.

To keep it for myself would seem selfish. Admittedly right now there’s a lot of people that can’t access these parts, but I hope that when we can exercise and travel freely again I can share these golden trails with my friends. Documenting through endless photographs of tracks, usually with John’s butt ahead of me for scale, it’s a daily process of route plotting, riding, uploading, and then refining. My latest mission is a route that circles the city of Bristol taking in the best off road tracks and trails in the green belt, perhaps a future event in the making…

My mum used to set me ‘projects’ in the school holidays when I complained I was bored. Writing a series of picture books or planting a miniature garden; this is no different. It gives me purpose, and I still get to indulge my outdoor habit.

Katherine Moore

Katherine is a gravel and bikepacking enthusiast who judges her rides by stoke level, rather than speed. When she’s not scouting out the best long distance and local off road routes in the UK, Katherine works as a writer, presenter and host of the Unpaved Podcast. If you’re out on the trail you’ll likely see her from a mile off, thanks to her rather bright colour palette.

Find out more at www.katherinebikes.com and www.unpavedpodcast.com. Find Katherine on socials @katherinebikes and @unpavedpodcast and check out Katherine’s Komoot collection here.