Elephant Stone

As expected Sarah’s day at the races turned out to be a boozy affair so she was in no fit state to join me for the Parkrun. I decided to take my camera with me because during the week I’d talked myself into going elephant spotting after the run.

Having just missed out on a PB last week by 10 seconds (is 10 seconds just missing out?!?) I made an effort to try and beat it this week. The start was a bit of a disaster. Plenty of us we still strolling across the grass to the start when suddenly everyone else was pegging from the line!

I don’t wear a watch so the only way I can tell if I’ve done a decent run is how I feel at the end. I felt pretty much similar to last week in that I was pretty knackered so I thought I’d done OK in my quest for a PB.

I don’t wait around so once I’d had my barcode scanned I headed off to unlock my bike for the ride to work so that I could print out a map showing where to find the elephants.

When the weather in nice the ride to and from Richmond Park is a really nice one. OK it’s mostly on busy west London roads but there are some decent views along the way. One of these is from Chiswick Bridge so I decided to stop there and take a couple of photos. OK, OK, I really wanted a photo of the Griffin Park floodlights!

As I was slowing down I noticed that tell tale hissing sound from my back tyre. Yep, a puncture! I don’t carry a pump and repair kit because the cycle to and from work is only ten minutes each way so if I get a puncture I just walk it home.

So there I am, hot, sweaty and well annoyed with the prospect of a 45-minute walk back to W12. All I could think was that even in the close season being a Brentford fan causes misery! I was too pissed off to even bother to take any photos.

I made it home at about half ten and repaired the puncture. As it turned out it was the day for punctures because the new couple in Flat C were outside mending theirs as well.  Sarah was still wallowing in bed so I had some cereal, a shower and then got ready to head out on the bike to find those elephants.

After a quick pit-stop at work to get the map I was on my way. First stop was Kensington Gore and from there I went down to the Natural History and V&A museums.

Then on to (bear with me here!) Sloane Square, Kings Road, Royal Hospital Chelsea, Orange Square, Fulham Road, Harrods, Knightsbridge Green, Hyde Park Corner, a couple of sites in Hyde Park, Marble Arch, Old Quebec Street, Park Lane, The Dorchester, The Hilton Park Lane, High Street Kensington, Notting Hill Gate and finally Holland Park.

I was a bit apprehensive taking the first few photos but I soon got past that and had a really enjoyable afternoon cycling around west London. I hadn’t taken much notice of the parade until last week but I met loads of people making their way round London trying to collect the full set. A bit like Panini stickers I suppose. I need to pop into Westfield and bag another four. Be a bit silly not to seeing as it’s only a three minute walk away!

The parade is only on for another couple of weeks so it’ll be good going for to get even half the collection. Still, they are all in one place the weekend of 26th June so that’ll make it a bit easier :)

I’ve uploaded all the photos to Flickr and as it turns out so have a hell of a lot of other people!

A few beers in Chiswick with Chris in the evening capped a pretty decent day.  On Monday I checked my time and WOO HOO I'd managed a PB.  This time it was a case of 'only just'...one glorious second...turns out my 13th run wasn't an unlucky one :)