Tuesday, August 3, 2010

By Magdalene Landegent

Victor Gale, a licensed London taxi driver, dips his bicycle tire in the Missouri River in Sioux City before embarking on his first RAGBRAI.

Gale left his cab in England and brought his bicycle to Iowa after making friends with people from Merrill and hearing about the ride.

A Merrill connection drew a British man to Iowa with his bicycle in tow.

Victor Gale, a London cab driver, came to the United States this month to ride in RAGBRAI (the Register’s Annual Great Bike Ride Across Iowa).

He decided to come after hearing about the cross-state bicycle ride from Merrill resident Sara Jane Hauff while she was a passenger in his cab.

“I got enthused about the idea of dipping my wheels into the Missouri and Mississippi Rivers,” Gale said. “I didn’t know it was such a big ride. It’s a massive ride, really.”

Since Gale’s work is driving his cab, his vacation usually involves two-wheeled transportation.

“Every year I go away somewhere to bicycle. Usually I go to the Alps or to Italy,” he said. “This year I thought I’d come to America.”

So July 25 found Gale on the banks of the Missouri River in Sioux City.

He sported a jersey with the English Flag, a red St. George’s Cross, and wondered what it would be like “being basically a lone Briton among 10,000 wild Americans.”

“It’s going to be a cultural experience,” Gale said before the ride.

A week later, his prediction proved true, in the best possible way.

“It was an incredible journey,” Gale said. “I was struck by how nice everybody is in Iowa. The open door friendliness is not something you find easily in London.”

He also enjoyed the concerts every night along the RAGBRAI route.

“Americans know how to rock,” Gale said. “All ages. Not just youngsters.”

He appreciated the veterans memorials in each town, the hospitality and “good grub” churches offered along the way and the amazing amount of food available.

“They treat it like it’s the Olympic games coming to town,” Gale said.

Camping, he said, was a bit of an adventure.

“I haven’t camped for 25 years,” he laughed. “It was culture shock, especially since it’s very hot here.”

Gale was introduced to Iowa’ heat and humidity soon after he arrived in the state — while he was outside re-assembling his bike after the plane trip.

“I was just dripping. It was pouring off me,” he said.

Still, he found Iowa’s scenery pleasing and the ice cream even better.

“I asked for a small cone and they hand me a great big thing,” he said, describing his visit to the Blue Bunny Ice Cream Parlor in Le Mars.

And since Gale is used to life in London, he was surprised when to learn people leave their doors unlocked in Merrill.

“The absence of crime here is very good,” he said.

In general, Gale said, he was impressed by the state of Iowa.

“I’ve been to the East and West Coast on holiday, but never to the Midwest,” he said. “I’m used to a city with hundreds of thousands of people around me. It is a different environment.”

Gale, originally a British government worker, decided in 1998 to make a career change and drive taxi in London.

But it’s not so easy as just getting your license.

Gale — like all London cabbies — had to memorize the London “Knowledge.”

The “Knowledge of London Examination System,” its full name, is a study more than 400 street routes and thousands of sites in London.

“You have to memorize the 400 runs,” Gale explained. “You sit in front of the examiner and he says, ‘Take me from the Institute of Electrical Engineers to the Crystal Palace Sports Center.’ They can ask you any obscure little point.”

Preparing for the exam took Gale three years. For some it takes five.

“I made a database with 13,000 points around London, all different sites,” Gale said. “Of those, I knew 12,000 just like that. It was repetition, repetition, repetition, repetition.”

During this time, Gale started to experience headaches.

Later he found out that medical studies have shown that a taxi driver’s brain actually expands during the period of studying the “Knowledge.”

“It’s a colossal feat of memory,” Gale said. “That’s why London taxi drivers are internationally known as the best taxi drivers in the world.”

He’s even driven around a few British film stars like Colin Firth.

He also says he drives for many Americans, including his Iowa host Hauff and her husband Ron Osborne.

They found out about Gale’s cab service through one of her family members who was on vacation in Switzerland at the same time he was.

When Hauff and Osborne decided to take a trip through London and the English countryside, they connected with Gale.

“I can take people places the busses can’t go,” Gale said.

He enjoys being his own boss, setting his own hours, and getting to take time off for vacation when he wants.

Next year, Gale’s planning an Italian bicycle trip, but he may return to Iowa for RAGBRAI down the road and bring friends.

“And,” he said, “when anyone from America gets into the back of my cab, I’ll ask them, ‘have you ever done RAGBRAI?’”

Source of info Daily Sentinel