Solo riding - in a different sort of lockdown...

It's VE day and I'm reminded of my late mother's story of a wartime solo cycling memory. My father was posted to Langholm in the Scottish Borders for a while ( to teach Canadians from the prairies how to drive Sherman tanks on winding hilly roads ). My mother would visit him some weekends. She would finish work in Liverpool on Friday and catch the train ( Ged: remember Exchange station?) to Carlisle with her bike. From there it's 21 miles to Langholm and by now it's late evening. Not bad in June when it's light till 10pm in Cumbria but otherwise much of this is on an empty road in the dark. No problem say the modern Audax riders, but this is the 1940s. No LED lights and anyway, it's the blackout, so even the light you do have must be masked to a little slit so it's almost invisible and can't have lit up much, if any, road surface. Fortunately I suspect there were few potholes in those days. The return journey was always totally in the dark - a late Sunday evening departure to catch a 2am train train back to Liverpool for work on Monday morning. She never came to any harm.