Bimbling for pastries

The night has started to dissolve into day as I hand over my passport a minute or two after 5am. Pedalling towards the town a large bulbous moon, brighter than all the street lamps, hangs low in the sky. I climb through hushed streets towards the coast rode to the east. Away from Dieppe the sky is a turquoise and peach watercolour. I know these roads well but really only in the dark or by dawn twilight. Roads etched deep with recollections of rides past, to Rouen, to Amiens, day long long loops out from Dieppe or down to the Loire and beyond, once to Gent by evening and ultimately to Copenhagen. The landscape an old friend. The dips and turns known, that roundabout there, crossroads, the barn on the left opposite the agricultural supplier. When to click down a gear, get out of the saddle for a few pedal strokes. A flittermouse skedaddles across my eyeline. Pylons and turbines, gathered in social groups, fizzing and whirring with chatter as they stride across the fields. A blood orange…