Ride the change: cycling from London to Glasgow for the climate

Instead of cycling the full Ride the Change route from London to Glasgow, Nicola Baird joins the first two days (135.4 miles). Here she relives the pedally sweat, while wondering how much of a metaphor this truncated journey could become – keen to meet targets, but just not managing because life gets in the way 

Ride the Change: Nicola with day two cycling companion, Anne.

Even amateur long-distance cyclists are watertight planners. Not just their super-technical kit – an ensemble of lycra and high viz suitable for any weather that is likely to be encountered during 70-mile days of pedalling – but also the detail about when to take a break, and what to eat and drink.  On the Ride the Change cycle from London to Glasgow where the COP26 meeting is happening (a year late thanks to Covid-19), it’s like joining a group of Olympic athletes who prefer to talk the detail of climate campaigning rather than incremental fitness gains made so popular by Team Sky’s Bradley Wiggins.

There are more than 170 people on Ride the Change’s first day (24 October), with 70 who plan to take the next seven days to cycle 475 miles from London to Scotland. Their aim is to inspire all sorts of people to take climate action before the crucial COP26 climate meeting in Glasgow. Some will be working in the meeting’s Green Zone. Most have jobs in addition to being climate activists… all also have super resilience, spare inner tubes and gadgets that make the navigating a little easier: totting up the miles ridden at the same time as counting down the miles left to go. Analytics will soon become as important as ideas about cutting carbon emissions.

Just like the participants of COP26 I started with big ambition. They want to save the world. I just want to do a big cycle ride with likeminded people.

But life gets in the way of the best intentions.

After two days I parked my bike – now with a flat front tyre – at Coventry train station’s cycle racks (which are not even covered!). I’d told friends I was going to Glasgow, but I also knew that there were more important tasks that I needed to do during the same time when I should be pedalling. My heart and legs were willing, but being human I also needed to prioritise a visit to my friend who’d been having a bad time and lives not so far from Coventry. And after that I hoped to visit my daughter who’d just moved to Edinburgh. So, yes, I will get to Scotland, but it will be the wrong city because I’m no longer following the ‘plan’. 

This ability to be side-tracked (and put things off) is a massive problem for all us humans when it comes to climate change and COP26. We have the ambition to tackle the climate crisis but repeatedly take detours.

We will hear over the news how the Glasgow meeting goes in early November. We all hope that keeping the temperature below a 1.5C rise will be possible. We want country plans (the NDCs) for 2030, 2040 and even 2050 to be achieveable. We must have climate justice and a rejig to our economy so fossil fuel energy comes to a stop. But it’s even easier to deviate and delay if you’re a world leader with competing pressures. 

Ride the Change

Sometimes being in a group with a shared aim is truly energising, so long as you stay with the group. For me the hard work of cycling a long, long way starts the moment we all pass the dramatic backdrops of Westminster Bridge, the Houses of Parliament and Buckingham Palace, because that’s where I lose everyone. I’m not sure I notice this at first as traffic is noisy along London’s busy Edgware Road. I’m concentrating on what’s to come: worrying about traffic, my ability to navigate in the dark and how my bike will cope with big hills and muddy off-road sections. Fortunately Brake the Cycle/Adventure Uncovered, who specialise in cycling holidays, have provided a route which mostly takes us on quieter or flatter directions.

I’m joining for just two days, which will see my very ordinary get-around Finsbury Park bike take me 135.4 miles. We’ll climb up over the Chiltern hills, drop into Oxfordshire and then network over cider and climate chat in the evenings. Some of the group are staying with friends or even camping, although many, like me, have booked into Premier Inns because they let you take your bike into the room. It’s turning into a pricey protest.

The cycling speed and distance is also well outside my comfort zone. I’m used to doing 10 miles max, rather slowly and always punctuated by traffic lights. What’s more I’m 57 years old. But I love being outside and I love talking with people who want to do something about tackling the climate crisis. So for the past two months I’ve been gradually upping my cycle abilities in a bid to have a go at getting to Glasgow.  Aside from having to get fitter, it’s not too hard to organise a bike super-service (thank you Finsbury Park Cycles) or ask keen long-distance cyclists to explain the intricacies of Kamoot or Ride with GPS. I also have a few chats about battery life with Just Eat and Deliveroo drivers when we happen to stop at Highbury Corner’s traffic lights - their experience makes me decide that the only way of keeping my phone in juice is to borrow a battery pack. 

The proof, though there seems to be a little short ride added on to this from the day before!

Navigation
I also sign up to Strava and discover that every journey can be recorded and analysed for speed and effort. I manage 200km of training in October (Strava has set me the target of 400km) and the generous people using Strava happily offer me “kudos” after every ride, even when it’s clear that I travel at a snail’s pace on my regular route down to Blackfriars Bridge and on to Elephant & Castle.  I grow to love this App as it lets me ride freestyle and records the speed and distance in kilometres, which for anyone who thinks imperial (rather than metric) creates an impression that you’re going further and faster. In contrast Garmin and the other devices where you upload a GPX map, will then dictate your route through arrows, voice commands etc. Going off route is greeted with a blare of music and red arrows instructing you to turn back.

Anyone who drives a car will be very familiar with modern mapping systems. But I don’t have a vehicle and am a terrible navigator because I don’t like following a set route when there are distractions – a field of sheep to admire, blackberries to pick etc.

“You’ve got to plan everything,” insists super-cyclist Michael wearing shoes that click on to his bicycle pedals when he shows me how to use a Garmin. Now retired, Michael has cycled from London to Glasgow in just two days (two days!!) and does his best to arm me with technology. But really it’s his wife, Julia, who offers the best takeaway. “You’re sensible and fit, it’ll be fine. Enjoy it!”

Make a pledge
During the training weeks I admit that I begin to lose sight of the mission to encourage friends and family to make a pledge that helps them cut their personal carbon use. Hermione Taylor, who co-founded Do Nation wants the Ride the Change cyclists to collect 3,000 pledges which range from air drying washing (saving half a tonne of CO2e / driving 12,000 miles) to drinking tap water rather than bottled water (cutting out a lifetime of plastic waste). Thankfully some of the riders, especially from sponsor Arup’s team, are brilliant champions for cutting carbon – spurred on by a leader board where the current champion has garnered more than 400 pledges. By the end of Day 2’s gathering in Coventry, Hermione says there are now 3,500 new pledges to save carbon, that’s the equivalent of 1,500 flights to Glasgow. It would be great if readers of this article could have a look at what pledges are on offer, see https://www.wearedonation.com/en-gb/do-actions/

Here’s how my ride went…

Anna from Flight Free giving a lead to Nicola during the
Ride the Change cycle from London to Glasgow. (c) Adventure Uncovered

Day 1: London to Oxford by bike

London to Oxford is 70.3 miles (or more if you get lost). The map’s already shown that it’s up hill to lunch; downhill after. What I hadn’t realised is that after a gathering of all the cyclists at the Tea House Theatre in Vauxhall and some rousing cheers the group breaks up super fast. By 10am I’m cycling on my own. Deluded (and used to solo training) I assume there must be a group of slower riders behind me and pedal on steadily getting the hang of Ride with GPS as I cross and recross the M1 as we weave out of the suburbs, through a corner of Hertfordshire and into Bucks.  The lanes through the wooded Chilterns are full of speeding cars and gated, well-maintained houses but the bonus is repeated views of magnificent red kites. No one seems to be around, though I do almost talk to one person, an elderly lady standing outside her house who congratulates me for being so “energetic”. Through the sweat (which for me collects on my upper lip and then pools in the hollow below my chin so I look as if I’m dribbling) I beam.

Around noon five cyclists shoot past me – at a speed that I absolutely can’t match.  Apparently, they had a dramatic tyre blow out near Hendon and after an hour of failing to find the right spare part they manage to patch it with gaffer tape. Patrik Ewe, head of fundraising at the climate charity Possible (founded after the film the Age of Stupid came out), is itching to make up time so he can chat to people over lunch at Wendover Woods. This is why Ride the Change’s bike mechanic, Anna Hughes, who is lugging around two paniers of repair kit and had just helped sort out the blow out, is left behind to look after me. To be given such an experienced long distance cycling nursemaid is a total gift for me, definitely not so fun for Anna. However, as she doesn’t have navigation it’s up to me to shout directions towards her while she keeps the pace from the front. Almost immediately we are gifted by the sight of several red kites, and not long after that a muntjac crosses our route. But mostly we’re just trying to get to lunch…

After a steep and speedy downhill through Wendover beech woods which then have to be grimly climbed back up to reach the lunch point. We are definitely greeted by worried faces: I get the impression that the organisers wonder if they should bundle me and my bike into their van (lent by one of the sponsors Abel and Cole), but we’ve been told repeatedly that this is a “journey not a race” and so they don’t insist. I feel like it would take very little to make me sob. And I can see that Millennial Anna is h-angry, but thankfully two meals have been saved for us and fortunately, as Anna follows a plant based diet, it’s bean stew with vegan cheese and a vegan flapjack. Perfect, except it is getting cold and starting to rain…

In the end Anna and I cycle together for the rest of the day: we don’t make it into Oxford until 7pm just as the speeches are starting. But we get on well (although it must be infuriating for her that as I get more tired I keep reading the map upside down). When the rain starts she explains why she started her Flight Free campaign to encourage people to travel without using planes and racking up their carbon footprint. My family decided to use a plane every 10 years back in 2001, and have managed no problem so far – better in fact as we haven’t flown this year (which would have been the third flight in 20 years). We've also had fabulous staycations and taken the train to Europe. So it’s not a difficult decision to sign up to #flightfree2022 too, as I’m certain I’d have never made it through day one without her thoughtful companionship, which also included fixing my derailleur to make the very lowest gear work again.

Deep water
We’re only 12 miles from Oxford when the journey starts to get proper tough – this is a 70-miler and I’ve never gone so far before. In fact I’d already done five or six miles that morning getting from home in Finsbury Park to where our ride headed out from the Tea House Theatre in south London. Even on the smooth surface of the national cycle signposted route (basically a main road) it’s hard to keep going. There’s one excitement when we have to dismount at a flood. The past couple of fields have been flooded and now there’s a ford that is out of control. This must happen often as there is also a raised footpath we can just wheel the bikes across, although it is tempting to go straight through. If I had waterproof Ortlieb panniers on either side of both wheels, then it’s possible my bike would have converted into a floating barge and let me drift to Oxford. Instead, we remount by the Old Fisherman pub (no going in) and continue through Shabbington. Over lunch Anna reckoned we could smash 35 miles within three hours so we should pedal until 5.30pm and then have a cup of tea. This target has kept me going, but of course it’s a Sunday and when the clock ticks up to 6pm she looks around and remarks that there’s nowhere to stop, so shall we just keep on after a banana for me and for her the last of her crisps? Agh. I’ve used psychological boosts enough on my family, and now it’s been used on me – strange how the person suggesting the plan (real or not) gives confidence to the others.

We may be in a group but everyone’s journey is inevitably different. Today I am very much a follower, grateful for Anna’s patient expertise and energetic speed setting.

Ring road
For cyclists and walkers the outskirts of any big town involve complicated crossings of the ring road – but seeing the well-lit bus depot and then the Cowley car plant fills me with a strange joy of familiarity. We’ve nearly made it! Oxford is fortunately a city of cyclists which means we can follow a nifty off-road route that brings us to a hill overlooking the amber glow of the city. There are no obvious spires, and this time I don’t even hear a bell, but it’s as exciting as being in a Philip Pullman storybook looking down on to the city after this long day pedalling.

I keep following Anna’s rear light, slightly bemused by the amount of people and lights on Iffley Road. Back in the mid 1990s I used to work off one side of this road, and live on the other, and it was Sunday dead. Now it is buzzing with people as they wait for their mates picking up kebab and pizza from brightly-lit restaurants.  At last we are crossing Magdalen Bridge – there’s no need to detour under the famous Bridge of Sighs - instead we go down High Street, which is definitely is longer than I remember, past students in gowns and stone doorways opening into college quads. A final stop to consult the map and we’re flashing over Folly Bridge towards the White Horse at Tap Social on the Abingdon Road where it seems we are the very last to check in. Oh dear.

Instead of feeling elated – I’ve bloody done it – this just makes me feel like crying. I know, I’m tired and hungry (and will be hungrier still as you can only order food through Deliveroo and I neither have the app nor the space on my phone to download it), but it’s weird to feel like a frustrated teenager ticked off on a list and then forgotten! I need the world to tell me I’ve got here, despite my ineptitude and lack of bike know-how. I’m another one of the great British amateurs who bumble over long distances with just a bit of fishing line (in the modern world this would be a USB rechargeable head torch) to make the world a little bit better for everyone by asking people to acknowledge my effort not with money by making easy-to-do lifestyle changes…

But right now, I just need a slug of water and my kind husband Pete to call me with a short pep talk in which he tells me to (basically) keep on keeping on and get some food. As a West Ham supporter he is no stranger to getting over feeling low. Wheeling my bike down to Oxford’s main station, on the way to the Premier Inn Botley where I’m booked to sleep, I even start to long to find a supermarket (places I normally avoid) so I can buy something to eat – the restaurants of Iffley Road seem like a distant dream now. Luckily, I spot a man with a tell-tale Ride the Change green wrist band eating from a giant plate. He’s inside a little Keralan restaurant serving delicious vegetarian Thali so I chain up my bike, go inside and order just what he’s got. Nev is from Cornwall and a reluctant chatterer but he mentions that his companion for a little while (until he went off without her), Anne is in a similar age group to us three. I’ve got a new target for tomorrow: I will find Anne and cycle with her. 

Hermione Taylor from Do Nation - the brilliant organisation that helps people pledge to cut their carbon emissions - during Day 2 of Ride the Change from London to Glasgow. (c) NB

Day 2: Oxford to Coventry by bike

At 6.40am I’m in the Premier Inn restaurant getting black coffee when I spot a cheerful looking woman who might be Anne Dixon  And it is: what a marvellous moment it is when she says she’d be happy to team up with me today – it seems like she also rode much of yesterday on her own.

The morning starts dramatically as within 10 minutes a Balliol student has fallen off his e-scooter and is lying on the cycle path on Banbury Road between me and Anne. For the next half hour, we keep his air way clear, stop the bleeding over his brow and keep him calm. An ambulance is called which gives us the opportunity to leave unlucky George. He probably tumbled off at 10mph, but a whack like that on your head is going to put you in A&E at the least. It’s unnerving and I dearly hope he’s recovering well. 

There’s a lot of blood this morning – the busy A road out of Oxford which passes Blenheim Palace is littered with road kill, mostly scattered bits of pheasants, but I also see a debrained rabbit and at one slight bend,  two fallow deer are piled on top of each other on the verge, presumably dragged off the road after they were struck by vehicles. I’m very glad I opted for a bright yellow cycle jacket, as one momentary mistake has such serious consequences for anyone not in a vehicle.

Soon we join some quieter roads and have plenty of chance to chat. Anne, who has four grown up children, has been practising around the Isle of Thanet, in Kent, and is great company. She says that the Ride the Change group WhatsApp has concluded that the right amount of bikes for a keen cyclist is always one more than you have. Obviously, you want to be able to lend a bike to a friend, but there’s also the desire to have a road bike, and maybe an off-road bike, and a fold-up bike and perhaps even an e-bike. Four bikes! And then I realise that over the years I’ve bought all the bikes in my household, so that each family member (Pete and our two daughters) can have their own wheels.

Cycle miles
We keep being passed, and then passing, other groups on Ride The Change today as they stop for water, chats and repairs, which is a good morale boost. As well as overhearing all sorts of interesting ideas about carbon capture, carbon counting and cycle journeys that negate the need for a plane, Anne and I chat away the miles.

After veggie burritos at the hugely popular Lock 29 street eating stalls for lunch there’s a tough pedal up the long hill out of Banbury over hedge cuttings (which will lead to many punctures, although fortunately not for me until the day after this ride) and by estates of new housing. Eventually we’re rewarded with a stretch of broad road with 60 or 70 mile views to the east and west. On this bright autumn October day, it is a completely beautiful landscape. The cars keep whizzing past, but there aren’t too many and distractions include side noises of a fox hunt and then to my companion Anne’s delight the sighting of a campervan sales centre. She hops off to send selfies by their King Campervan sign to her family, which results in a flurry of excited WhatsApp back.

Roadside attraction on Day2 with suitably autumnal mushrooms. (c) NB

Road works
The afternoon pedal is a real joy. We’re into Warwickshire and the landscape and villages are just so perfect…. Until we hit the temporary road signs directing construction traffic for the HS2 railway. What a mess this is: infrastructure that will get travellers from London to the Midlands faster at a cost of at least £22 billion more than the original budget. HS2’s website is convinced the project will create the world’s most environmentally friendly station (see the virtual tour and signs outside Euston) and is tackling climate change… but that’s hard for me to understand. Where it’s being built across the countryside, the place looks an unfinished mess of mud. Near Leamington Spa there’s a plaque put up to the spot where the 300-year-old Hunningham oak was felled. At least 29 hectares of ancient woodland, around 80 football pitches, (though campaigners say this is an under-estimate) have been cleared and there are barriers everywhere behind which diggers stalk the skyline. 

It’s also difficult to understand the scale of this project, but it brings home the need for anyone without a financial stake in it to be offering an alternative vision of sustainable green jobs. With so much focus on the world's rising temperature and the climate crisis there should be no projects that either continue to make use of fossil fuels (especially coal mines in Cumbria or Cambo oil in Shetland) or that destroy biodiversity (road and train track construction) allowed to go ahead. On this bike ride we do use quite a few national cycle routes, but most are repurposed train lines, invariably closed by Beeching in the 1950s, which is rather different to arrow-straight new built roads/rail that split up this bit of the countryside from that bit.

It’s 5pm and Anne, riding in front, points up and east towards a surprise rainbow. There’s no rain, it’s just an arch of colours dominating the valley as we come out of Stoneleigh. it's also where we are joined by Craig on his electric cargo bike. Craig is on a mission to get more people in the NHS using e-bikes. All too soon we’re on the edge of urban: there’s an airport, and an ensemble of newly-built roads taking us up the hill to Coventry. One of the road bridges has a line of healthy-looking reeds growing on it, probably by happenstance rather than an attempt to make a New York High-Line. Our destination is the Tin Theatre in Coventry’s canal basin where a curry dinner is promised, but first we have to do a loop past the famously bombed-out cathedral arriving just as the sun sets and turns the empty window arches into a perfect frame for conversation.

City centre Coventry has had a big pedestrian push, although cars are still flowing through it. There’s also good signage, a Medieval street to enjoy and in one of the open shopping centres a children’s playground is the central attraction. I’ll be stopping here – on a good note today. I'm feeling tired but satisfied, and proud of the porridge power that’s taken me so many miles. I don’t feel sweaty or too stiff either which just goes to show that maybe a short cycle ride from home or a tube station/bus stop to work might be pretty easy to do if you’ve never tried it before. Especially if you can use an e-bike.

What happens next?

My two days with these cyclists may have come to an end but like them I’ll keep talking about ways anyone can tackle their carbon emissions, just by making a pledge on the Do Nation site. 

Not making the whole route has a strange parallel with the way the COP26 meeting is going. Governments want to do the right thing but are distracted by costs, political alignments and popularity. In the same way I’ve stopped for personal reasons: keen to save on hotel bills and then distracted by being so close to a friend who lives nearby and has been having a tough time. Climate change hasn’t gone away. But I’ve stepped away from it for a moment.

UPDATE: Or rather I stepped right into it as amber (danger to life) weather warnings for the north of England from the Met Office - and nine flood warnings and 15 flood alerts from the Environment Agency - meant that my attempt to take a pre-booked train on Thursday from the Midlands up to Edinburgh was stopped. For years people wouldn't link weather with the climate crisis, but now it is likely that as the temperature rises we will see more, and more intense storms. As a train user all I knew was that f]rom early morning on 28 October, Avanti had nothing running beyond Preston, or was it Carlisle? Information for train users not logged on to Twitter was unclear, other than the "service was in chaos" thanks to "landslides", "floods" and even "faults on the train" (I think the latter was a PR damage limitation sentence). All that time the intrepid all-the-way-to-Glasgow cyclists were battling through vast amounts of rain, and flooding to keep to their schedule and get to Kelvingrove Park for the Saturday morning marches on 30 October. Meanwhile I gave up going North at Crewe, found a train back to Coventry, unlocked my bike and then took another train South back to London. It is sobering that my 134.5 mile, two day route to Coventry can be done in just an hour on the train.

Regardless of our level of climate action (or activism) there will be times when we can’t keep up the pace. And that’s OK. But after we’ve taken that breather, we need to come back to the original plan and make more and better changes that will help us all tackle climate change.

The world will be judging how the COP26 meeting goes, just as it did for Copenhagen (fail) and Paris (success). We all hope that keeping the temperature below a 1.5C temperature will be possible. We want country plans (the NDCs) for 2030, 2040 and even 2050 to be achievable and are perhaps getting our heads around the way this will mean living life differently. We  need our governments to commit in word and deed (cash!) to climate justice and intergenerational justice – and they may all manage that. But first we need to rejig our economy so fossil fuel energy comes to a stop. And that is probably the hardest of all future tasks because life is going to look very different in just a few years’ time whether we aim for zero carbon or keep on stalling on real action. Whatever route the COP26 takes us, good luck to us all.

 A special thank you to Anna Hughes, Anne Dixon and Pete May as well as the Ride The Change group.

 

·      * Support Ride the Change: cycle to COP26 with a small eco action (or more) which cuts your carbon emissions. You have to make an account so that in two months time you can confirm that you did what you promised! Pledge via https://www.wearedonation.com/en-gb/businesses/ride-the-change-to-cop26/campaigns/nicola-baird-ride-the-change/pledges/create/featured/?fbclid=IwAR0XPkgSdjPtN5P5kHN28KIbPSgGEadjo2NCbb7I9Jlutx_nu1QwcAGKUlM Or make your own at www.wearedonation.com

* Ride the Change is a collaboration between Possible, Do Nation, Adventure Uncovered, Brake the Cycle and Arup with headline sponsor Abel & Cole, silver sponsor Symprove and bronze sponsors, Cayley Coughtrie and AECOM. This is the biggest ride that Do Nation and Adventure Uncovered have ever organised and people from the NHS, Arup, Unilever, AECOM, C-Capture, Leap Eco, CRA, Anthesis, Abel & Cole, Brompton and Lego will be joining legs of the journey as well. 

·      * Brake the Cycle runs www.adventureuncovered.com

·      *Pledge to be flight free (for 2020, for your holidays, for life) at https://flightfree.co.uk #flightfree2020

 

 

 

 

 

Conversation by elephants: from Green Park to green thinking

 

Stories and ideas inspired by the lantana elephant herd in Green Park, London which are modelled on Indian elephants and made by indigenous craftspeople in Asia. Words by Nicola Baird (see www.nicolabaird.com for more info about my books and blogs). 

The lantana elephant herd moves through Green Park: amazing activism art (c) NB

The elephant herd in Green Park look as if they are flowing across the park out of the tube and down the hill to Buckingham Palace. Randomly cycling to explore central London with my university colleague Gracia we are both amazed to stumble on to an art safari. 

We’ve covered no air miles, read no hype but are utterly awe-struck by the size of the herd. Each elephant is individually sculpted from lantana, a rattan-like material which a volunteer in a hi-vis vest explains is an invasive weed, despoiling habitats. Lighten our footprint and wildlife bounces back says Coexistence which put up the project for https://elephant-family.org/ 

Trunk detail on the lantana herd. (c) NB

It’s clear these models are made by people who know how to look deeply. Each elephant seems to be moving. There are calves, bigger youngsters and grand old dams. In total “there are 72 elephants and they’ll be in Green Park until 23 July,” says a dreadlocked security guard who has managed to luck out with a job that involves walking around a hard to steal set of exhibits, currently moored outside under the trees of Green Park. Gracia and I wander slowly noticing lifted forefeet, curled trunks, swishing tails… We are all-seeing in this famous park deliberately planted with open vistas by Henrietta so that her famously-philandering husband Charles II had less opportunity for liaisons – though he still managed to have at least 100 illegitimate children. “Deforested for surveillance,” suggests Gracia which seems a remarkably 21st century approach. Restoration was nearly 400 years ago so no surprise that Green Park has a decent spread of avenues now, as befits a national park city like London. And it is down one of these big tree lined avenues that the elephant herd is progressing, attended by curious visitors. 

The project run by Elephant Family is called Coexistence and has an intriguing aim – to get watchers to share their stories and an attempt to reboot our nature understanding. “This isn’t a call for an extreme return to the wild. Look around you, wherever you are. Who do you share your world with? Can we increase our coexistence everywhere, and rewild ourselves. Nature is intelligent and adapting. Other life forms will meet our efforts halfway, if only we give them the chance,” writes Coexistence on the website. 

The elephants are made by craftspeople from the Tamil Nadu jungle who clearly know the way elephants move. These magnificent creatures in Green Park look as if they are walking towards tea with the Queen – trunks swinging confidently. Of course, they’re not: these are artworks on tour and also for sale raising funds for elephant protection – a baby is £6,000; adolescent £12,500 and the 7.5x12x4 foot matriarch £22,000. 

Messages from the elephant in the room - Green Park (c) NB

For years the term “elephant in the room” has bumped around environmentalists conversations as they talked biodiversity loss, population pressure and a warming planet at meetings they’d flown to. An elephant has become such a signifier of these types of reluctance to address the big picture that spotting this herd immediately makes me think they are there to raise awareness about climate change. And in fact they will be, as those not sold are taking a detour to Glasgow to help support the COP26 climate meeting run by the UN in early November. They will certainly cheer up this vital meeting. You can read more about elephants and climate change on the Coexistence blog, see https://elephant-family.org/news-views/news/what-do-elephants-have-to-do-with-climate-change/ 

Elephant stories
For almost all of us, elephants inspire us to share stories: our encounters on TV (thank you David Attenborough) or real life, our efforts to save them, our funny moments. In the 1970s I remember re-reading my little brother the story of the Elephant and the Bad Baby by Elfrida Vipont whose elephant and tiny passenger went “rumpeta, rumpeta, rumpeta down the road”. I always felt sorry for the Bad Baby - who was definitely tricked by the Manners Police – but also for my brother whose only experience with elephants was via these Raymond Briggs’ illustrations. In contrast I’d spent my summer as a three-year-old being used as a toddler honeytrap by our entrepreneur Dad. 

Let's think and move like an elephant. Nicola posing by one
of the lantana herd at Green Park.

Dad had acquired a life-size mechanical elephant (built in Essex and named Jessica) which could take people for rides. He’d get me on to this giant’s back to either pose for the press or encourage other families to climb aboard. I was quite a scowly little girl, but I liked being in the corner seat behind my dad on top of an elephant. He’d dress up as an elephant handler when he operated the controls, no doubt crossing his fingers that the licence plate the DVA insisted was attached to Jessica’s tail wouldn’t fall off and ruin the looks-like-a-real-elephant spell. Fun as she was, his mechanical elephant soon became a liability. She triumphed on Blue Peter then fell through the floor at Whiteleys department stores near Paddington. She was destined for Republican fundraising in the US (from an animal motif point of view Republicans are elephants and Democrats donkeys) but storms delayed the ship, so she never made it. Like my family’s car she’d regularly break down and was super hard to fix. My Dad worked from home and it wasn’t unusual for random telephone callers to begin, “It’s about an elephant…” During peak elephant crises he began to avoid the phone. The last known sighting was rumoured to be on a Birmingham allotment. My Dad died more than two decades ago but my Mum says if you happen to have news about an unusual elephant she’s not interested! 

Slowly memories of my elephant life drifted away. Then in 2000* I visited a friend in Zimbabwe and just near the garden of the Victoria Falls hotel the taxi we were using came to a halt as a herd emerged from scrubby trees and crossed the road. Their big feet didn’t prevent them from moving silently – but they left behind a torn trail of branches. One particular elephant standing apart, with flapping ears, seemed vast: my nearly two-year-old daughter looked at this massive land animal with complete composure. In contrast I felt quite weak: a flesh and blood elephant was a very different beast to poor mechanical Jessica. 

Around the time I was born the world population was 2.7 billion and wilderness accounted for 64% of the world. When you compare this to 2020 the numbers seem to have been put in a shaker and jumbled themselves out of control. World population is now 5.7 billion and inevitably wilderness space has fallen to 46%. It seems amazing in a way that so much is still left. But that’s not how the elephant herds must see it. On the Coexistence website you can find stories of the Indian elephants used as models – Highway Hathis (hathi means elephant in Urdu) who have to constantly cross busy roads and railways and the Crop Raiders on the scavenge for 150kg of food a day. 

Both these herds have at least one human hero who has turned around their chances of survival. For the Highway Hathis this was Sanjay Gubbi who has imposed sanctions (slower vehicle speeds and roads closed at night), whilst for the Crop Raiders it was Dulu who came up with the idea of a buffet barrier rice field between the village and forest.  But it took a community commitment to make the changes happen.

Spending time with the lantana herd in Green Park you can get to know the characters, discuss art, activism and exhibitions. As you stare and snap for social media the volunteers gently engage you in conversation about the elephants. It’s a brilliant way of bringing the elephant in the room – in this case a need to coexist with all wildlife – into our front of brain understanding. Days later I took a train to Ash in Kent to a wedding and at the station, opposite the garage was greeted by a good view of a new Bellway homes construction site, walled by panels and ringed by a busy road. The billboard claimed: ‘Coming soon Wildflower Meadow’ conjuring up images of red poppies and blue cornflowers and not a large, tightly-fitted set of brick houses. 

Message from the lantana elephant herd: “If some people can live with elephants surely we can learn to live with beavers, badgers and bring back our fast vanishing birds and butterflies.”
Could this be possible with these housing complexes built so tightly to main roads? (c) NB

This uncomfortable disconnect between what our ever-expanding population is promised – wildflowers and meadows – and what is coming – crowded brick houses on a road - made me revisit the message the Green Park elephant herd was created to share: “If some people can live with elephants surely we can learn to live with beavers, badgers and bring back our fast vanishing birds and butterflies.” Yes, we surely can follow Coexistence’s message, but to do so, most of us need to look deeply into the way we organise our lives if we want to give those smaller animals and ecosystems a fighting chance for survival. 

When it comes to PR, being a massive elephant has a lot more impact than being a mini-beast. But at least we humans still have the power to make a positive difference. Some suggestions: 

• In the garden leave out food and water for birds and other wildlife; keep all cats indoors at night and never use slug or snail pellets. 

• Getting around aim to use your own steam (walk, scoot or cycle) or public transport. 

• Avoid food waste - farming destroys habitats so it makes sense to at least use and eat what you have bought.

• Measure your carbon footprint and aim to bring it down. There’s a fun measuring site on https://footprint.wwf.org.uk/ 

More about this herd and the thinking behind how it is supporting Asia’s wildlife at elephant-family.org The lantana elephants move out of Green Park on 23 July 2021.

FOOTNOTE

*2000- after this trip my family made a commitment to only fly every 10 years and reduce our carbon footprint. I last made a plane flight in 2011. In theory I'd have probably taken a flight in 2021 but for lots of reasons - including my own carbon budget - probably will not. I can't imagine that we'll be behaving just as we do now in 2031, so maybe that's plane trips over for me.

Thinking: not thinking on the Seven Sisters cliff tops

A windy walk with friends along the South Downs and over the Seven Sisters offers all sorts of escapes. Words by Nicola Baird (see www.nicolabaird.com for more info about my books and blogs). 

The point about walking, perhaps even the joy of walking – for me – is that I stop thinking. The rhythm of puffing up the hills, feet belting out their unfit tune, eyes busy spotting landmarks and flowers, mind dragging up lessons learnt in primary school geography classes as meandering rivers and pebble spits etc emerge combined with finding safe places to park my feet (and keep going) stymy any attempt at thinking.  All the famous walker-writers from the flaneurs of Paris and the Romantic poets to today’s psycho-geography fans seem to think that walking is where the synapses fly. Definitely not mine.

 

And now here I am with two old friends – neither have met each other before – pounding along one of the most beautiful sections of the South Downs way over the 280 ha section of the Seven Sisters Country Park, past Birling Gap and up to Beachy Head. It could be a four-hour thinkathon. Instead it’s a 12km serious muscle workout for the two Londoners (though not super-fit Sally) and a chance to chat and story. 

 

We’ve started about teatime and Storm Francis is blowing-in so that every photo shows the truth of longer lockdown hair – as you open your mouth long strands arrive unbidden. Fortunately this doesn’t stop conversation and chat billows just as wildly as our hair, taking in teaching, schools, masks and long-ago life when I did Sally’s shopping and Gisella ran a regular car boot sale. Four hours later we’ve walked close enough to Eastbourne – where Sally lives – to connect to a pizza app and order a takeaway. Strava has a report too for Sally, a little more accurate than my guestimate text to my family that we’ve “probably done 20,000 paces”.

 

A walk on the Downs is so deceptively tough. The long rises up and steep curves down on chalky grass might help eat up the miles, but you need to be properly fit to manage the gradients without muscle soreness.  Even with a bit of pain and no big-business or book idea dreamt up it is a fantastic walk. As the Downs drop towards the classic view of cottage and cliff, the salty sell of seaweed smacks into your senses and then after crunching over gravel – the car park at Birling Gap – you then join the path up the slope gradually noticing the scent of thistle and grass predominating again. There are sheep and cattle. All shades of green and to our right a grey, stormy sea. 

 

After months in London the big sky and huge theatre landscape makes me feel a bit small. 

Perhaps that’s thinking…

 

And actually thinking is what I don’t want to do because it’s just been announced that the Earth has lost 28 trillion tonnes of ice in less than 30 years – exactly the same time span as I’ve known Sally (and that seems like a blink of an eye). Polar modellers say that 28 trillion tonnes is the equivalent to covering the whole of the UK with a sheet of frozen water 100 metres thick – a huge amount of melted water. Being human it is far, far easier to keep going doing the same things, without reflecting on just what rising temperatures are doing to the planet. Or why and how we must do something now. Read the full Guardian article here.

 

What next?

I know there are XR events coming up: a gathering at Parliament on Tuesday 1 September is billed as an ‘unfuck the system” day. Covid-19 has forced a year-long delay from the planned November meet-up COP or conference of the parties meeting in Glasgow until 2021 (1-12 Nov). Yet again I want to believe that the UNFCCC can get things done… like it did at Paris in 2015. And I want to see governments and individuals making changes too: but first let’s rest my walkers’ legs, eat pizza and chat because thinking ice melt, global warming and climate change is just too painful to think about today.

 

•       Info about Seven Sisters and the Seven Sisters Country Park, Sussex https://www.sevensisters.org.uk/things-to-do-at-seven-sisters/
•       You can catch a bus (the Coaster with free WiFi, 12, 12A and 12X) at Eastbourne which stops at the Country Park and then get walking. Or take a bus from Brighton (a bit slower) but it’s a journey with sea views, windmill and a good tour of some lovely Sussex scenes you may already recognise thanks to Eric Ravilous’ art.

 

 

 

 

Christchurch Dorset needs a political revamp - here's why

This blog is about family travel around the world without leaving the UK in order to reduce our impact on climate change. My husband and I always try to have a weekend away in December and this time we went to Christchurch, Dorset... and yes it did make us think about what Christchurch NZ might be like this time of year. Words by Nicola Baird (see www.nicolabaird.com for more info about my books and blogs).

That's Christchurch Castle behind us. Rain above us
(but we didn't mind!).

I've just spent a weekend in Christchurch. That's Dorset, not New Zealand. But these two towns, Christchurch, the largest city in New Zealand's South Island, and the Georgian coastal town packed with holiday homes and retirees are twinned. In fact they've only been twinned since 1911, and the reason seems to be because NZ troops during WW1 were stationed in nearby Brockenhurst which is the heart of the New Forest.

Christchurch NZ is on an earthquake fault line. Christchurch in the UK has created a different rumpus - until 1974 it was Hampshire. It doesn't quite feel like Dorset even if scones and cream teas are available. But then again visiting any British seaside town in winter has a danger of it not living up to expectations, especially if there is a great deal of icy rain...

More sensibly, both Christchurch also have two rivers...

A couple of nights in Christchurch, Dorset was really a treat though. There is a ruined Norman castle and a Norman Manor House, built in 1160, both juxtaposed by a very splendid bowling green. And of course there's the beautiful church, the original The Priory, which appeared super busy in the Christmas run-up - on the Saturday holding the Messiah and then on Sunday a Christingle service.

Pete by the ducking stool (it's a model for tourists and anyway
was exclusively used for women) on the mill race beside
the River Avon.

We stayed at the King's Arms which is proper posh, but friendly - though slightly worryingly described by a Daily Mail review as "a jewel on the Dorset coastline". We also had a cup of tea at the modish Captain's Club on the banks of the River Stour, down by Christchurch Quay and were able to enjoy seeing it crammed with people lunching in family get-togethers and also listening to live jazz.

Getting to know you
In the evening there were many places to eat, including quite a few gastro pubs, e.g., The Ship at 48 High Street, where you can eat fantastic pies and listen to a band. Wondering down Bridge Street and the High Street on a Saturday it was amazing to see the amount of places that have security guards outside them.

Snapshot from Daily Echo which covers news in Christchurch
- death, crashes, burglaries, attacks: not so nice after all.

It feels so affluent... but clearly there are problems as the local paper reveals. By day there was a Big Issue seller standing under an umbrella, and in the evening one homeless man curled into a sleeping bag. And over at the nice Druitt Hall where craft and jams are sold the ladies told me this was the very last Monday sale - done in tandem with the town market - for them as the rent was going up and they just couldn't afford it.

How many of these tongue-in-cheek
Jeremy Corbyn unofficial albums will
be gifted in Christchurch (with or without irony)?

Clearly the problems are here in this Christchurch, but what we didn't see was a sense of the solutions. In Archway, London, near my home, one of the local gift shops has got in a dozen of the Jeremy Corbyn unofficial albums (a lot of silliness in this with masks, crossword, stories, comic strip etc) which no doubt will sell well because people think they can influence change.. and aren't Tory by instinct. In fact Christchurch has been represented since 1997 by Christopher Chope, MP, who is a Tory. I wonder if people in Christchurch think he's done a good job or not? Looking at his Wikipedia page it's clear he's an old Thatcherite; a pioneer of selling off local housing stock (and for a while known as Chopper Chope because no council house was safe during his stint on Wandsworth council). He was predictably also one of the greedy ones during the expenses scandal.  Wikipedia may not be a fan... but he's also 70, tried to stop a debate about Hillsborough and in 2010 hosted a meeting for climate science sceptics.  I don't think he's done a good job for this constituency, never mind the country. If I can tell that from a two night stopover, what on earth are the locals thinking of him? Come on guys, especially anyone under 70, your town deserves better.

For starters he can help those ladies running the craft market in Druitt Hall keep going... If I was them I'd be asking!

Visitors to Christchurch, Dorset will see people shop, and dress up beautifully to go out but it's not clear how well the locals are coping with austerity. It's as if it hasn't quite hit them yet - or at any rate they haven't yet felt the injustice or developed the power to take a stand. I know you think I'm judging that simply by an absence of Jeremy Corbyn! Annual 2018 copies on sale (£9.99), which is quite a unusual yardstick. Don't judge this either: I came home with delicious cheese scones from that last sale at Druitt Hall, plus some Belgian chocolates and a bottle of Mermaid gin both bought as a gift at friendly The Christchurch Confectioner, 72 High Street.

We also stopped at Ye Old George, 2a Castle Street, for a drink. Here we found a plaque explaining that this was where a barred cell used to house convicts due to be transported to Australia. Right now it looks into a courtyard covered in fairy lights where hardy drinkers warm up with mulled wine. It's a happy place, but was obviously a site of real misery. And in an interesting twist The George is also a super flash hotel in New Zealand - not to be mixed up.

I'm pleased I've been here. For starters it was new to me - it had plenty of history, heaps of dramatic ruins, an incredible coastline, lots of moored boats to enjoy and the biggest collection of swans I've come across. Tourism and politics don't go well together but it would have been good to find out more about how this once vital town is preparing for climate change, flooding and the challenges that higher interest rates and chain stores bring. People kept saying to us, sadly, everyone's in Bournemouth, shopping. I wonder if they were? They could just as easily be worn out by poor leadership.

Over to you
When you take a visit do you try and find out about the political situation too?

Essex vineyards tour: it's a new wine world out there

This blog is about family travel around the world without leaving the UK in order to reduce our impact on climate change. Climate change means that many more entrepreneurs are starting up vineyards in the UK. On a visit to three Essex vineyards you can match locally grown wine with seasonal treats, take a tour of the vines or simply savour the Essex scenery. Words by Nicola Baird (see www.nicolabaird.com for more info about my books and blogs).

Essex wine on sale at New Hall vineyard

"English wine is having a renaissance." This wonderful phrase kept coming up during a day-long whistle-stop tour of Essex which included three vineyards, one brewery and a new entrant to the flavoured gin business, Wilkins & Son, which is already world-renowned for their delicious Tiptree jam and chain of tea rooms around Essex.

Ever since I visited the EU display in Brussels about European grown wine - four years ago - I've been an EU wine convert. This means that I don't buy new world wines in a bid to avoid the considerable carbon-heavy shipping costs. Recently I've become a big fan of Borough Wines' refill bottle option. It's always from Europe and is a good economy, and green, option as my three bottles have been refilled many times rather than just being used once then recycled.

The big question
"Do you have European white wine?" is my question to every pub and restaurant I visit nowadays. But after Visit Essex invited me along to see New Hall vineyard, West Street vineyard and Dedham Vale vineyard I see that it is time to alter my pub challenge to "Do you have any English wine?". And pubs really could because the UK now has around 600 vineyards and 140 wineries.

Crouch Valley wines 

As I was born in Essex - and my husband, Pete May, has written the witty book Joy of Essex - my question should perhaps be even more focussed to "Do you stock Essex wine?", not out of a kill joy instinct, but because it's a fabulous drinking choice.

New Hall vineyard, established in Purleigh in 1969, are the perhaps the stars. At any rate they grow 12 varieties of grape, make around 100,000 bottles of wine a year of which some have been spotted in Waitrose. Manager Lucy Winward  - super lovely and knowledgable - explained that this part of the UK has an historical link to vineyards. She could even point towards New Hall vines growing in the same spot as recorded around the time of the Magna Carta. I don't think she said that deal was celebrated with a glass of New Hall Signature, but perhaps if Brexit actually ever happens (and I say this as a Remain voter) then it could be marked with a glass of Essex-grown Signature (the Signature Reserve 2014 is delicious). It's the mild climate along the River Crouch which helps New Hall vineyard's success. In fact there are now six vineyards in this part of Essex, covering more than 200 acres and turning out 200,000 bottles of Essex wine  - or should we say Crouch Valley wine - annually. Something the Loire Valley or the Beaujolais region may one day really worry about...

The bacchus grape (originally German) seems to thrive in Essex. As someone who spent a childhood of Christmases at Goldhanger, near Maldon (where the salt comes from) and really isn't far from New Hall, my memory of estuary Essex is damp Decembers. For a grape - neither frost nor snow fans - this is a huge plus. In fact for the vineyards hugging the River Crouch, Essex's long coastline makes the area an excellent wine growing site (because the sea helps regulate the temperature avoiding extremes of temperature). Add in the impact of climate change - mentioned by all the vineyard managers - which is simultaneously making wine growing in the UK easier and in the increasingly hotter US and parts of Europe harder (because it is just too hot), it is clear that English wines aren't just having a Renaissance, they're becoming the wine of choice.

I loved seeing the machine at New Hall too because this vineyard, about 7 miles outside Chelmsford, is also a winery, where wine is made. New Hall has a large acreage of vines, but local grape growers can bring over their grapes and get them added to the New Hall wines, or separately bottled. You can even support the business (community supported agriculture) by renting a row of vines for around £400 and then buying back 'your' wine when it is bottled for a peppercorn amount. I bought bottles of New Hall's Signature, Bacchus (2014 Reserve) and Chardonnay. My plan was to host some English wine tasting back home in London, but already one of my feckless teenage daughters has taken the Chardonnay (without my permission!) and drunk it without keeping tasting notes (never mind manners). Thank goodness she is not growing up on a vineyard.

West Street Vineyard has a purpose built restaurant in
a well-designed building modelled on the famous
Crossing Temple barns, which were originally owned by the
Knights Templar.

Touring the wineries
A classic wine-lovers holiday pleasure is to tour the wineries around Perth, Australia or New England, US which might involve a stop and shop of local wines, a self-guided walk around the vines and a fabulous meal. Thanks to Essex-Australian Jane Mohan's vision you can do something similar at West Street Vineyard which is just outside Coggeshall.

Coggeshall has long been a wonderful place to visit - for antiques, pretty street front, historic tythe barn and food offerings. It's famous for Ley lines, murders (back in the day) and monks. Now West Street Vineyard, bought by the Mohan's in 2009, is an obvious stop point. It's an award-winning place to eat, serving really delicious seasonal food (two courses with a glass of West Street wine are around £18 and three around £20). I'm vegetarian and was given the prettiest plate of crispy camembert with all sorts of seasonal trimmings as a delicious starter. There's nothing like eating lovely food looking out over rows of grape vines, so it was no surprise that I loved the main too, a pumpkin risotto topped by a deep-fried boiled egg (never tried something like this ever before and thought it fab, but then I had just done my first wine tasting which involved six glasses of Essex wine, followed by a white Essex wine for lunch). And then there were puddings - again beautifully arranged. It was such a foodie treat, but served in such a relaxed manner just like they do in Australia.

Wine tasting at West Street vineyard

Jane also offers wine school events (around £15 per person) which reveal her absolute passion for wine and help you find out more about how wine is made and the flavours developed. Over six tasting glasses of English wine (see pic) Jane explains how she fell in love with vineyards as a 17-year-old when she was sent by her parents to learn French in France. Back then her newly acquired love for rosé must have seemed a worry, but now she's an Essex vineyard owner - who reckons she's tried 965 of the 3000 grape varieties - it all makes sense. In fact I began to appreciate rosé myself as the strawberry and cream flavours revealed themselves as scent and then taste. Jane now has six acres of vines but to harvest she relies on West End's volunteers who are summoned via Facebook. A day's picking earns you a meal. As Jane is equally passionate about the joys of a delicious meal and a glass of something nice, eaten with friends and family, those post harvest dinners must be a real treat to join.

"The best place to buy wine is the cellar door." JANE MOHAN, WEST END VINEYARD, ESSEX

For the long-suffering - but enthusiastic - Essex wine growers raising their harvest must be incredibly stressful. As Jane from West End Vineyard, who used fires on three intense frosty April nights - eventually unsuccessfully - to try and keep her vines warm pointed out: "You are at the mercy of the vagaries of the climate. You have to be an eternal optimist or a complete nutter because wherever you are (in the world) there's always something that can wipe out the crop." Wiping out the crop has to be built into a vineyard's business plan.

Deham Vale specialises in wine, but it also has an orchard of 460 walnut trees.
Both harvests are late October - followed by a wine and walnut festival.
The smell of fresh walnuts in their shells is delicious.

If West End vineyard was like being in Australia, with its fantastic food; then Dedham Vale vineyard was a nature paradise. It seems miles off the beaten track - even in a county like Essex which is 70 per cent rural. The tasting barn overlooks a pond where kingfishers regularly hunt and every spring the lucky see an otter with her cubs. The whole vineyard is surrounded by woodland and views across the vale. Amazingly this is another Essex spot which has been growing wine since Roman times. Definitely worth asking what have the Romans ever done for us?

Piles of logs and heaps of walnuts at the entrance to Dedham Vale Vineyard.

Festivals, weddings & nature walks
Obviously there's wine tasting at Dedham Vale Vineyard too. This 40 acre, mostly wooded estate in Boxted, on the Essex-Suffolk border is stunningly beautiful. It's not far from the place where Constable painted The Haywain or equestrian artist Munnings lived in Dedham (which still has a visitable museum). Deham Vale Vineyard covers 7 acres (plus there are 10 acres of vines at Mersea) is a place to get married, go to a walnut and wine festival or simply drop in to purchase wine at the vineyard. Here I tried their Colchester Oyster, a dry white that one of the vineyard team reckons goes "really well with Thai and has proved very popular". Drunk as an aperitif it was fab too.

"Grapes do well in Essex because it has the best climate in the country. The driest town is Shoeburyness," explains Simon Ward, who is clearly not a fan of rain (though he's not keen on drought either). Of course grapes need some rain, but if there's too much they rot. At the moment Essex vineyards are obliged to follow an EU regulation that toughens up grape vines because once they are three years old, vines cannot be watered. This ruling is intended to encourage the vine root to deepen and take water from lower in the soil which has a long-term benefit.

There's so much to love about local grown food not least the fact that less carbon is needed to ship the product around the world. I also really love that it's grown by people who want to explain what they are doing and share their wine as widely as they can. As you can tell I've become a bit of a fan girl - hopefully you might be encouraged to do so too. So, here are:

10 reasons to try Essex - English - wines

1. LOCAL Instead of picking up a bottle that's been shipped 12,000 miles around the world you can get it from just down the road, less than 100 miles from London. I've spent the past four years avoiding new world wines because of their carbon footprint - as a result I'm used to drinking wine which is less sugary, less alcoholic and which you need to enjoy its mineral qualities rather than expect gooseberry popping flavours.
2. FAMILY RUN The three vineyards we visited were family businesses, all run by people passionate to make the best possible wine. Jane at West End Vineyard had sold her house to finance the business. There's nothing like drinking wine - or doing a tasting with someone whose passion is to create the best possible wine.
3. IN THE PINK If summer is made for rosé and pink fizz then Essex can provide it. And how.
4. RED ALERT It's still hard to ripen grapes to create the best English reds. Global warming will change this reckons Jane from West End vineyards. It's not something she wishes to think hard about because it signifies so many other world problems. "If we end up with Malbec in Essex - or any heavy red - then climate change is happening."
5. PARTY TIME New Hall is just about to celebrate it's 50th birthday - in 2019 - something that Rasto, the Slovakian born winemaker at the vineyard is currently trying to find the right wine combination. He's so good at making wine that he's already produced some wonderful tasting elderflower wine.
6. KNOW HOW There's no need to be a snob about English wine. English winemakers are creating some of the best wines you can buy at vineyards all around the world.
7. THE ONLY WAY TO GET ESSEX WINES ISN'T JUST IN ESSEX If you are in London then it's easy to find Essex wines, e.g. at Borough Market
8. VINE RUNS Get to know an Essex vineyard by joining the 5k or 10k Dedham Vale Vine Run along the vines and through the orchards on 2 June 2018, entry info here.
9. CLIP, PICK, DRINK Have a look at the websites and see how you can get involved. You can just drink English wine, or talk it up (like this blog). Or you could volunteer and pick the grapes during harvest time, or be part of the pruning at West End in January. Yes, you may be thinking what could possibly go wrong - but it might be an amazing way to learn more about vineyards, vines, Essex and the UK.
10. CELEBRATE English wine week 2018 is Saturday 26 May - Sunday 3 June 2018. What better excuse to get t know English wines better?

Do let me know if this piece has inspired you - either to have a try of Essex (or English) wine, or simply ask for it at your favourite wine stockist. 

• New Hall Vineyard, near Chelmsford has daily cellar tours and tastings. Plus a rather fab (free) xmas display.
• West Street Vineyard, in Coggeshall runs bookable tastings (they are really interesting) and serves delicious meals. Totally recommended. During the summer head over from Sunday-Thursday 9am-5pm, and Friday & Saturday from 9am - 11pm. From 1 October 2017 - 1 April 2018 the vineyard is closed on a Monday and Tuesday. 
• Dedham Vale Vineyard near Boxted.
• Info: Visit Essex organised the vineyards tour for bloggers.