As you may know, I am a Beatles fan. Not the typical one that can name a few of their greatest hits or more known songs. I am a hardcore Beatles fan.
When I was 13 years old, or thereabout, I borrowed a CD from my godfather that had some mixed oldies songs from the fifties and sixties. The only one I still can remember was ‘Ain’t she Sweet’ sung by John Lennon. His voice was so powerful and full of energy, yet the lyrics were so simple. I learned years later that it wasn’t even one of their own songs, but a cover of an old 1927 tune.
In any case, I couldn’t get it out of my head. And, from that moment on, I had a mission. I had to know more about this band. So I started looking for their songs and records.
The Beatles’s homes
Let me remind you that, in those days, more than thirty years ago, there was no internet and I was living in Madrid. So information and resources were scarce, to say the least.
I checked my parents record collection and found out that they had their two greatest hits LPs, the red and the blue. So I copied them into a tape and started listening to the cassette eagerly and constantly.
Some time later I got a hold of a book with a brief introduction to their origins and rise to success, plus the lyrics of some of their songs.
That’s how I started this lifelong obsession with the fab four, their music, their lives and their careers. Moreover, they were the reason I started learning English by myself, because I wanted to understand what they were singing about.
The Beatles’ songs
Moving forward a decade or so, I got a scholarship, at university, to study whatever I wanted anywhere I chose. And, obviously, I chose to go to Liverpool and spend a summer there improving my English.
For many years I’ve been buying any book about them, as a band or as solo artists, and collecting records and other memorabilia.
When I started planning this journey cycling around Europe, I wasn’t sure if I would go to Liverpool again. Nevertheless, as I was going around Scotland and heading south to England, it was clear to me that I had to go back there and cycle in some of the places I had visited all those years ago, and even, maybe, some new ones.
I took all these snapshots, because, let’s be honest, that’s all they are, in a day. I cycled around Liverpool for more than four hours and did more than 60km, and it was worth it.
Most of these places I had visited before, but some others were new to me or, as in the case of Strawberry fields, I had never been able to go inside before.
other places
