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EQUESTRIAN events were dominating The Thing in London, so it was time for the grouch on the couch to get on his high horse.

Actually, it was only my Brompton folding bicycle, a trusty steed that’s taken me many places, including the Thames from London to Oxford.

And unlike Zara Thingummy, I don’t have to wear a top hat and riding jacket with gold buttons. Shirtsleeves rule, OK?

The weather being iffy, I rode down the Leeds and Liverpool canal, across the Aire Valley from me, as far as Saltaire, the Victorian model village.

That way I avoid hills, except for the fine views. No wonder Yorkshire raises good cyclists like Lizzie Armitstead. All those damned hills.

It was a lovely morning with a stiff breeze behind me.

The towpath was very muddy and treacherous in places, but I didn’t fall off once.

There’s nothing like the smell of newly-rained trees and flowers with a backdrop of fields, dry stone walls, and hills.

I pity Chris Hoy. All he sees is his front wheel or someone’s back one.

Wildlife everywhere. Mallards with their young, swans with cygnets, white and Canada geese, moorhens and a lonely heron lazily flapping his wings across the river below.

Not many canal boats about this day, but their names amuse and intrigue. I understand “Escapade” and “Here There and Everywhere”, and even the Up Pompeiian “Lerkio.”

But “Why Clanks”? Boaters are real individualists.

I saw almost no sign of Olympimania. One house in Silsden flew a five rings flag.

I might have been on a different planet.

Indeed, I was, until I got to the workaday world of Sir Titus Salt’s creation of mill, church and village.

Two hours on the saddle, 13 miles, not quite Olympian, but an event all the same.