ONE CROWDED HOUR

"One crowded hour of glorious life

Is worth an age without a name."

So said Sir Walter Scott - and he was quite right. So, a crowded day must be worth much more. Take Tuesday, for example.

9.00am - a two-mile ramble through the Kentish orchards with Henry, which woke us both up. The pruning of the apple trees seems almost done - a few weeks earlier this year. Buds are well advanced and despite the high winds (which is nothing more than March doing what it should) there are unmistakeable signs of Spring being just around the corner.

1.00pm - hit the M26, M25, M3, A340 and find myself by 3.15 in the remote, silent country churchyard where my grandparents are buried, along with the ashes of my father and two of my aunts. A family grave. A place of pilgrimage. I leave flowers, tidy up the plot, take in the contemplative scene of 700 years of quietude.....and shatter the illusion of timelessness by attempting a couple of mobile phone calls. I should have known better.

Mid afternoon - time on my side. I`m due at Southampton Town Quay at 6.30, so I take the chance to spurn getting back on the treadmill of the M3 and the M27 and instead I head off across country - I`ve decided to go the pretty way.

Watership Down

So it`s across to Kingsclere, turn left up past Toby Balding`s racing stables (home of Claire, I believe) and climb the hill to Watership Down, immortalised by Douglas Adams. And Mike Batt?

"Bright eyes,burning like fire.

Bright eyes,how can you close and fail?

How can the light that burned so brightly

Suddenly burn so pale?

Bright eyes"

Reminds me of the churchyard I left an hour ago.

But on we go, across the old straight track to Whitchurch with its Silk Mill and my first glimpse of the waters of the River Test, which will also make their way to Southampton Water this evening. A short stretch of the A34 until the sign for Stockbridge encourages me to leave the traffic once more and then the long, arrow-straight switchback A30, past Leckford Hutt to the outskirts of Stockbridge. Pick up the Romsey road and meander down the valley of the Test through Kings Somborne and Brook and into the confusion which is Romsey.

River Test

A little way outside Romsey, I make the M271, the short motorway down into Millbrook and the suburbs of Southampton....but my peaceful progress through the Hampshire countryside has meant I`ve missed the long term roadworks on the M27 as they turn three lanes into four.

5.30pm. Town Quay. An hour before I meet friends from the Isle of Wight Ferry. I buy the Daily Echo and have my packed `lunch` - albeit a bit late. The sea is quite rough in the cool March gale, but the safe haven of Southampton Water means the ferries keep running - just as well as my season ticket is aboard the Red Osprey (I hope.)

6.30pm. We meet up and walk the familiar route from Town Quay to St. Mary`s Stadium, putting the world to rights as we go. It`s good to talk after the hours of being in the saddle.

7.45pm. Saints kick-off against the foxes of Leicester City...and despite a poor performance in a poor game, claim three vital points in a 1-0 win, thanks to Stern John (he of the grumpy disposition) scoring with a late volley which evaded the despairing clutches of the Leicester custodian.

10.20pm. Have walked back to Town Quay on a bit of a high - it`s been 13 games since Saints` last win - and am relieved to see my car still there. Head back through the city but this time make for the motorways - it`s late at night, not much traffic. Listen to Classic FM, which soothes my passage and arrive home at 12.20am yesterday morning.

Henry - the bookend of my day - welcomes me home, wags his tail, seems pleased to see me, as I am pleased to be home once more.

It was a long day`s journey into night but without any of Eugene O`Neill`s melancholy. Instead, whilst it may not have been everyone`s idea of excitement, it was, for me at least, one crowded day of glorious life and worth an age without a name.