Mahatma Gandhi

I was nicely reminded of the Mahatma (“Great Soul”) in Chester a day or two ago, you may remember. The young woman behind the counter told me her grandfather was born in Porbandar, where Gandhi also came from. I remembered my visit there, perhaps 30 years ago; I remember climbing the almost impossibly steep open stairs to the tiny upper floor of the Gandhi house; I remember the fleets of colourful fishing boats, and the huge and polluting industrial ship breaking.

In fact, I’ve thought of Gandhi more than once on this journey. On a bicycle I notice the things that are discarded by the roadside – lots of food packaging, of course, and also a surprising number of gloves. The gloves are mostly work wear, and almost never in pairs.

Gandhi lost a sandal out of an open train door once. He immediately threw the other after it, explaining to his bemused travel companions that then someone might find a useful pair of shoes. A single sandal is no use to anyone.

So when I see a discarded glove, I’m always (consciously or subconsciously) looking for its pair.

And here is the Mahatma, striding purposefully outside Manchester cathedral. It’s an emotional moment for me. Gandhi spent years walking the unpaved roads of the Indian countryside, visiting unknown and tiny places. India’s soul, he said, resided in its 700,000 villages, and he wanted to know that soul.

As I near the end of my journey, this darshan of India’s Great Soul is an overwhelming blessing. I touch his feet, and then my forehead.

Manchester’s cathedral is an oasis in the great city. Expensive, as well as less expensive, retail names stand out from the polished facades on one side, smart offices overlook the other. A bright yellow Metro cuts through. Everything sparkles with cleanliness and prosperity.

And in the middle of this celebration of modernity and success, the cathedral, dating from 1421.

The cathedral isn’t enormous, but it has the widest nave in England. It didn’t use to have; there was once an abundance of chantry chapels filling the side aisles; but they were demolished in Reformation days, and this big open space emerged.

Canon Ian, the Precentor, and Gareth, the Head Verger, are here to welcome me. Arrangements are straightforward; there’s a big Grammar School choir from Devon performing at 12.00, a eucharist at 1.00, and then it’s me. Not much time for warming up, then; but time instead to see the sights.

It’s a lovely place to play, looking at the postwar windows at the back, and a sizeable audience. But we rushed the sound check, and I have to switch the microphone off for cello, and on for voice, which is a fiddle, a distraction.

Jim, an orchestral director from California, is very impressed, he says. Clare introduces herself as the other member of the Extreme Cellists, and presents me with an orange Extreme Cello cap, which I feel an extreme honour. There’s book signing; there are bike questions; there’s tidying up; so I’m later than I meant to be setting off into the wind to ride 30 miles through Bolton, up onto the West Pennine Moors, and down into Blackburn.

The wind is tiring, and I make a sudden decision to stop – far too soon – for tea and cake. I’m admiring a flowery coffee pot, which Ols says is from Saudi Arabia. The other flowery pot, like himself, is from Istanbul, where he was a tattoo artist before his Manchester family persuaded him to come here, a year ago. I suspect he spends most of his time with that family, because he still speaks very little English. But he has an amazing skill in stringing words together to make sense, if not sentences. And he insists I need two pieces of cake, though he will only allow me to pay for one.

There are too many cobbled streets in Bolton; it’s too cold and windy on the moor; and there is too much unmaintained road and uncollected rubbish on the long run into Blackburn. But the welcome at the little Rafay hotel is warm, and the lengths they go to to find a safe space for the bike are impressive. I collapse in front of the tennis, eating takeaway out of a box.