motorcyclemeditation.com

London traffic moving with grinding slowness over the weekend, not helped by a few key routes closed off for horses converging to Westminster for some ceremonial extravaganza.

Various street diversions desultorily signposted. Generally, a peremptory notice of road closure plus an arrow pointing in a direction that everyone with local knowledge recognizes as obtuse. The very next crossroads devoid of clues, and the next. After that, another arrow but by that time you don’t know if you’re on the original diversion or on some other.

No problem on the motorcycle, quickly to the front of every queue, occasionally getting lost, London’s coiling streets making it near impossible to tell direction. A confusion confounded by the contrariness of the main mental reference, the Thames. Awareness of being north or south of it pulsing in your mind’s hinterland as the only thing to hold on to, but the river actually rolling and twisting like a lazy dragon’s tail, the bridges across it going as easily west to east as north to south, a subtle formula for disorientation.

Once or twice, finding myself perhaps a mile from where I thought I was. That mile having cost four minutes on the motorcycle, would have been an hour in a car. Same again to get back on track. Worth it for the adventure. And for the tiny incremental slice of London knowledge.

Amidst the labyrinth, only taxi drivers having the requisite skills, their geographic knowledge staggering. Also having entitlement to use bus lanes. Also, acting in concert, stopping traffic to let other taxis through. Therefore, masters of the London roads. Accompanying such status, arrogance and a sense of entitlement. A situation delightful to motorcyclists, masters of the masters, passing them at will, indifferent to their impotent irritation.