by the Cellar Fella
It's great to see the Windsor runs are so successful. The Cellar holds such sweet memories for me, my second home in the '60's.... I know that this isn't about The Bee but us Cellar boys used to visit you on a regular basis. I'd like to spin a few yarns to add to those stories already on The Busy Bee site.... I first encountered the owner of the Cellar in early '64, a Mr. Bleach known to one and all as "Ol'Bleachy", a tall well educated chap much resembling a deputy headmaster at any school you wish to choose, a man with a wry sense of humour. I can see him now in my minds eye, behind the counter surveying his "school of scallywags" dressed in his smart english styled check shirt, awful greeny brown cord trousers, brogue shoes and topping it all off with a blood red cravat. Always ready to reprimand his "children" should they make a habit of tilting his fruit machines, a lovely man and as I said with a wry sense of humour, always ready with a witty comment for his customers. On one particular occassion he was standing outside the cafe surveying his empire when I mentioned that my eyes felt sore, dry and gritty. He was quick to inform me that the lack of wearing goggles on warm dry days at high speeds on a "motorcycle" would be the contributing factor. He said I needed to rest my eyes and the best time to achieve this would be to close my eyes and count to twenty as I approached roundabouts and road junctions at high speeds. Yes he certainly was a humourous character. On reflection i'm surprised that he put up with us for so long, he must have been the recipient of backlash from tourists, local folk, police, the press and the local council thru to us jamming his jukebox with foriegn coins and dropping gallons of oil out the front of the cafe from our not quite oil tight bikes. After The Cellar closed it's doors for the last time, Mr. Bleach relocated to his other cafe, a tea room around the corner... Just by chance some twenty years later I happened on Ol'Bleachy in his tea room whilst out on a day trip to Windsor with my family. "Hello" I said, "remember me?" "How could I forget you, you were the one with the motorcycle" he replied dryly. We finished our cream tea, I nodded goodbye,,,he then made a comment that stunned me as I moved to the door, "How are your eyes now? you didn't take my advice did you?" Sweet memories of 'Ol Bleachy who sadly passed away some eight years ago. The Cellar was a wonderful place to be, especially on a sunday afternoon, the jukebox blaring out the latest ditties of the day, plenty of birds to chat up and bikes that stretched way past the T junction. Couple this with an ice cold coke and a warm afternoon , I thought I was in heaven. On top of all this was the continual roar of four stroke engines as bikes raced over the bridge followed by the occasional tyre sqeal as the "new rider in town". underestimated the traffic light at the main junction. To look up from The Cellar and see yet another Ago race across the bridge,,, he knew as he came into sight that all eyes would be on him, his moment of glory, his passport to fame with the excellent possibility of being accepted as one of the Cellar boys. I know not why but there always seemed to be a surplus of birds, possibly drawn to the place through the media and press coverage of the mildly infamous cafe and it's "wild leather jacketed yobs". A favourite was to get birds to go and hire a phut phut boat, steer it to the Cellar river steps, then the boys of their dreams would jump in and go for a free boat ride, remembering to duck down low as the little boat would phut phut down river past it's hiring out bay and hirer who was always out for every penny, 'twas sheer fun messin'about,,, messin'about on the river. There was a sadder side to The Cellar, sometimes a letter from the family of a boy that had had an accident would be pinned to the pillar by the counter, expressing their feelings, and in extreme cases thanking those who were so kind as to attend the funeral. One of the boys I rode with worked in a little garage in Iver, I would ride over from Uxbridge every day so we could have our dinner break together. One particular day I arrived there at the garage only to be met by his boss, "havn't you heard?........." I'm sure you don't need me to finish the sentence for you. I look back and sometimes wonder if I didn't dream certain things, such as the day a massive wooden crate was manhandled from the railway station to The Cellar, a huge crowd gathered as the crate was carefully dismantled and out of it emerged a 100% fully chromed vee twin Vincent. It just stood there glittering in the sunshine, do any of you readers remember this? Please say you do, otherwise i'm hallucinating and may be asked to go for a little ride with the chappies in the white coats. I'd like to finish my trip down memory lane by highlighting a particular evening, Tuesday 27th August 1967....On my way over to Windsor that evening the primary chain snapped in Slough, I got a lift back home, grabbed a few links, got back to Slough, repaired the bike and rode on to the Cellar. Not a lot was happening so after a while I decided to go home,,,,just then a pretty young blond girl came down the steps by the cafe, we got chatting and to cut a long story short, we have now been married for thirty three years. Question is one of fate.......If my chain hadn't snapped that evening so long ago, would I have still met that pretty blond girl on the steps at The Cellar in Windsor?
Go fast, The Cellar Fella.
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