Yet Another Cycling Forum
General Category => Rides and Touring => Topic started by: andytheflyer on 05 December, 2017, 04:35:53 pm
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I'm from the Lincolnshire Fens, where everyone used to ride a bike when I was a lad.
I've just been on holiday to Australia, and passed through Port Lincoln, not far (in Aussie terms anyway) from Adelaide. Whilst in the Tourist Office, I looked at a map of the area on the wall, and there looking back at me were a few place names familiar to many a Lincolnshireman. Like Boston, Spilsby, Grantham and Louth - 21 in all. Mostly they were islands - said to have been named by Matthew Flinders' crew. I find it hard to believe that some of these small villages - small even by Lincolnshire terms - could have been home to his crew - villages like Lusby and Hareby even now are only a few houses.
Flinders was from Donington, near Boston, and was the first to circumnavigate Australia - but he's hardly known even in Lincolnshire, and yet in Australia there are banks, a river, universities and many streets named after him.
So the idea came to me to plan a ride taking in all these place names, and it works out at 195 miles. So, a 3 day recumbent trip in the spring beckons. There's a bit of a diversion in it as I have the opportunity to get a free BnB, but a Lincolnshireman would soon spot that and could effect his own shortcut there!
For any interested Yellerbellies: https://ridewithgps.com/routes/26569687
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"home to only a few houses" so the second or third sons ran away to sea, didn't they? Nothing for them at home.
Flinders is famous in Oz, gets taught in school (not that I remember much)
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Hrumph.
I don't believe he was called Mathew.
Yours in Green Ink,
Matt
(https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/9/90/Flinders_Map_v1P.png/300px-Flinders_Map_v1P.png)
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Thanks mattc - corrected - I didn't think it looked right but got called away!
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"home to only a few houses" so the second or third sons ran away to sea, didn't they? Nothing for them at home.
Flinders is famous in Oz, gets taught in school (not that I remember much)
That surprised me. I recall being told a little about Flinders at school, but AFAIK there's no memorial in Donington. The story goes that he was captured by the French on the way home and imprisoned on Mauritius. By the time he did get home, he got a less than rapturous reception, and was largely sidelined and forgotten. The esteem with which he is held in Oz is very humbling when we Lincolnshiremen can't even give him a fitting memorial in his home village.
I'm hoping for a book or 2 on Flinders for Christmas.
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Flinders was a tough nut sailor and a good scientific observer.
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Thanks mattc - corrected - I didn't think it looked right but got called away!
Well I do have a slight advantage in spotting that particular typo ;)