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The M1 corridor


The rain. There are a lot of houseboats along this section of the Grand Union Canal. This one has a huge paras... ... and this one has been extended using a car body. Canal locks. I'm not riding a bike like that. This was marked on the map as a railway but I can tell from those cables that I've actually encounte... Vicarage Road, the home of second division team Watford. The side of the ground. 104. Watford... First game 1922. Capacity 17477. Record attendance unavailable. With just a few days of this trip left, I've finally found a combination of hardware which lets me l... Vicarage Road. In this part of town, I saw a few statues relating to how things used to be around the year 1900. Th... It looks like a minimalist Segway. Funny looking temple. My hotel. I've stayed here before. It's a bit of a dive but it's a lot cheaper than some other place... The view from my window. Elstree is famous for these film studios, and the television studios which are out of shot behind me... When I saw that there was a football match on tonight in Borehamwood, my first thought was to spend ... Meadow Park. Sixteen days ago, when I was at the giant ... All I know about Meadow Park is that its capacity is 4502. Meadow Park. 105. Boreham Wood... I've now completed the fifth division. This ground is the 24th of 24. Clouds. I only experienced a few brief showers today and was able to shelter from them under trees. ... Bromley suporters. Even though I only decided to come and watch this game yesterday, I happen to hav... The attendance at this match is 364, roughly a tenth of the smallest attendance I had seen before to... Boreham Wood 2 - 3 Bromley... There's a big hill on the pitch next to the goal. My hotel makes reference to Elstree's history in the film industry. The village of South Mimms, which gives its name to the motorway service station. Oh, I got some petrol from there only about a year ago. Big flood defence gates which can swing together to block the road. It's definitelty autumn now. I first saw gym equipment in parks in Spain but it seems to be becoming popular around here too now. Old Hatfield has a funny jumble of architecture. A modern church in Old Hatfield. A map of Hatfield in the 1780s. Old Hatfield. Old Hatfield. There seems to be some confusion about the distance to Welwyn. "Until 1840, this building was the site of Newton Haven's first post office." It wasn't bu... In the film, the five main actors came jogging down the road on the right on their way to the first ... One of Welwyn Garden City's tree-lined avenues. The place where the characters in the film rang some... "Now THIS... is a pub!" In the film, this is the exterior of the second pub, the Old Famil... The town centre of Welwyn Garden City. My favourite part of the film is from when the characters leave the second pub until one of them goe... Welwyn Garden City. "It's high time we got on to... the Cock" says Gary as he fails to jump over this hedge. The Two Willows, which is the Famous Cock in the film. Gary drinks the remains of somebody else's be... Then he runs round this corner making chicken noises, and into the fourth pub, which you might be ab... The fourth pub, called the Cross Hands in the film. The characters have a long discussion in the win... That's all I'm going to say about that film. The characters leave the fourth pub through its real ba... Welwyn Garden City. A golf hole. The old village of Welwyn. Stevenage's ground appeared slightly before I was expecting it. Broadhall Way, also known by the possibly undesirable name of the Lamex Stadium. This is one of the ... Just like Middlesbrough, this club is nicknamed the Boro even though that four letter sequence doesn... 106. Stevenage... Broadhall Way Central Stevenage has a comprehensive network of cycle lanes alongside the roads. Each one has a sig... Stevenage. These are rather complicated-looking bike racks. I don't know whether I'm using them properly. I arrived at this hotel during a rare period when I was already able to check in but still early eno... My view tonight. It's unusual for a Tesco to proclaim so proudly when it was opened. 1988, in case you can't read it. A bright, clear sunrise in Stevenage on Thursday, day 41 of what was intended to be a 39 day trip. I... Okay, I think it's time to give the answer to ... I have to go past Stevenage's football ground again so I get to see a sign on the cycleway which I m... A bare field. I wasn't sure whether to take this picture because it does make this region look flatt... I knew there used to be a railway line from Luton to Dunstable, which is now a guided busway, but I ... East Hyde. A large snail, which retracted into its shell when I started trying t take picture of it. He's after my bike again. I mentioned when I was in ... Luton. I don't think I've ever entered Luton by this road before. It goes straight from the town centre to ... George Street, Luton's main shopping street. This was going to be the thumbnail picture to represent this page of my website but I don't much lik... Don Millers is still here! And I can wheel my bike right up to the counter. I may have to stop brief... Luton Town Hall. Early in this trip, I was saying what the notable industry was in some of the towns that I visited. ... Kenilworth Road, the home of Luton Town. Weeks ago, I said that before this summer, I had only ever ... I'm sorry this picture has come out blurry.... 107. Luton Town... The ground's name is Kenilworth Road, which is a dead-end road on the other side of the ground. This... According to the Wikipedia page about Luton Town, "The club first stated its intent to leave Ke... Bury Park, near the football ground. Oh. The fabric at the front of my saddle has been wearing away for a few weeks but now part of the s... The M1. Milton Keynes. Milton Keynes has dense network of cycle paths, just like Stevenage. This is where the amplifiers come from. Stadium:mk, seen from the car park of a neighbouring supermarket. First game 2007. Capacity 30500. Record attendance 26969. Stadium:mk is the home to Milton Keynes Dons, the other half of what used to be be Wimbledon FC. To ... 108. Milton Keynes Dons... Stadium:mk A view with berries. Shops which share the stadium's car park. A sikh temple. Central Milton Keynes. The town of Milton Keynes is based on a grid system. In the suburbs, the roads of the grid are relax... The bike in Milton Keynes. Milton Keynes. A Network Rail building. Milton Keynes. A junction of cycle paths, inside a traffic roundabout. On the way out of Milton Keynes. I was going to take a picture from this side anyway but only got my camera out just in time to catch... The same place. Someone has amended this sign. I considered doing something similar this morning to a sign at a junc... It's at the top of a hill next to the railway line. Possibly an old water tower. The village of Hartwell has a wooden war memorial. I have called this page "the M1 corridor" so here's another picture of the M1. Northampton. The former Express Lift Tower to the left of centre is easily recognisable. Another view of the motorway. I can see part of my next stadium, Sixfields. The tower, one of only two elevator testing towers in Europe. It was used from 1982 to 1997. The Northampton branch of the Grand Union Canal. Northampton Town's Sixfields Stadium. First game 1994. Capacity 8900. Record attendance 7557. This is the final fourth division ground of the trip. The only grounds left after this will be in th... 109. Northampton Town... Part of Sixfields. They're having some difficulty shutting that door. You get a good view of the stadium from up here, although not as good as this picture which I took a... Northampton. The lift tower is a listed building but the land around it has been turned into houses. Northampton Rugby Club's club shop. The rugby ground. A church and matching pub. This isn't a great road. I've been riding on the route of an old railway line. This is where the tracks resume. The cycleway ... Some fields and a ray of sunshine shining through the clouds. Wigston, on the outskirts of Leicester. The rock is a commemoration of the Queen's diamond jubilee. ... I'll be staying here tonight. It was student acommodation for the University of Leicester from 1960 ... The reception area. The restaurant building is on the left. The buildings are now listed. I don't believe it: this trip is actually going to work. I've got 7 more grounds to visit out of the... My room tonight, in case you're interested. I opened the wardrobe to hang up my clothes and found all sorts of delights: coffee, biscuits, which... This place has more bike parking than any previous night. Some people don't seem to be using it prop... Today is going to be a Tale of Three Cities. Here's the first: Leicester City.... 110. Leicester City... Leicester City Stadium was opened in 2002 to replace the old Filbert Street ground, which I will vis... For a while when I was a rower at university, I had a cox who would wear a Leicester City hat so I r... This road, named after Leicester City's best known player of recent times, runs across the site of t... The site of the Filbert Street stadium is now mainly wild, except for the one building, which is stu... The road runs across where the middle of the pitch was. Filbert Street doesn't technically fit into any of the categories of grounds that I'm visiting becau... For a while, this area was a car park but it's not even that any more. I don't know why there's a copy of the Statue of Liberty here. Perhaps it's the Statue of Filberty. The base of a wind turbine. Horses grazing by the roadside. The ropes on them are just long enough to let their noses reach the ... Lutterworth... ... featuring this cobbler's shop... ... and this strangely shaped town hall.