Today's ROAD ride

Re:

The temperature has finally dropped and I had a Saturday afternoon free, so off the the Mendips I went. Not a long ride, just a couple of hours but it was nice to get out and about.

From home I took the usual back lanes to get over to Burrington Combe, this is a much more enjoyable climb that Cheddar Gorge... when I say 'enjoyable' there is more actual climbing, less traffic and you are less hemmed in by trees, rocks and such. It is not as good looking though.

My ride was my 853 Rourke 'summer bike'.



Once I got to the top of the combe I took the usual 1st right towards Charterhouse but as I did not fancy Cheddar with all its visitors and OAP's driving at 15 MPH I took a new route and turned right again just before the Roman lead mines, this is a really nice road with a few extra climbs on it.

Top of the Mendips.


I carried on this road for a while heading for Shipham and was delivered the surprise of finding myself at Tynings Farm, by one of the nastiest b'stard MTB climbs on the Mendips.

Near Tynings Farm, some of my favourite Mendip trails to the right, Wales in the distance.


From Tynings farm it was downhill all the way to Shipham and then a left turn up a bit of a lung buster heading towards Cheddar, the reward being a fast downhill all the way to the garage. Right and right again had me heading towards Axbridge which I rode through to avoid the dreadful main road which I inevitably had to join the other side of the town (with the inevitable close pass van) and quick hop onto the A38 and a slog up the last bit of Shute Shelf and then left towards Winscombe past King's Wood, again a bit of a climb and another whizzy downhill, this one with plenty of twist, turns, pot holes and cars.

From Winscombe I turned left up the long climb to Banwell where a complete knob jockey in a white van just HAD to overtake me on the run downhill into the village. This always pisses me off because the road is narrow so as soon as they have overtaken the car / van HAS to jam their brakes on and this always hold ME up. In other words, they would be better off staying behind me as I am faster than them. This guy had a point to prove as I had sprinted to accelerate downhill and he had had to perform a very dodgy overtake (all caught on camera).... anyway, right out of Banwell onto Riverside, from there to Loxton and from there to the A370 where I caught up with a few other riders. Talking to the chap leading the ride, who was wearing a jersey nearly as bright as mine, he, and possibly the whole group, were in W-s-M for the weekend down from the Peak District, they were just at the end of a 50 miler which had covered many of the roads I had just been on, except they'd been to ride Cheddar Gorge, I bashed on when he slowed for the rest of the group to catch up... I hope the curry he was looking forward to lived up to expectations.

After that it was just a couple of climbs, first past the crematorium, next past the Nut Tree pub and finally up my road to home. 35 miles, 2,000 ft of climbing in a little over two and a quarter hours.

It was nice to get out and stretch my legs. Fingers crossed for dry weather over the bank holiday weekend.

Re:

I’ll be descending to Cheddar next Saturday night,Sunday morning. The Exmouth Exodus goes that way. Haven’t seen it in daylight for a long time.

Re:

Look for all the car tyre tracks on the road, certain 'unsociable types' use it for drifting.... I'll bet it get's well loud.

Re:

August Bank Holiday is not a chance to be missed in the cycling world of Neil M, so I thought I'd fit my nice new Spa Cycles Nidd saddle to my Trek Tourer and give it a try. I had some tools and a comfy sofa spare saddle in the panniers, along with some wet weather gear (typical August Bank Hol) and off I set heading over to the Strawberry line.

I was later leaving home. 8.15am agin a planned 7.30 departure, but still had the line pretty much to myself.



I met a few joggers and dog walkers as I got closer to Axbridge and found a few cyclist in the middle of the village, then it was off along the deserted S line around Cheddar reservoir into the town itself. A quick visit to the public loos found me watching a guy carefully park a BMW i3 on the pavement almost blocking the entrance to the loos. He was obviously visiting the little Tesco and chose to ignore the vast car park at the back of the building, I crossed the road and was about to remount when I saw the driver heading / staggering to Tesco, a guy in his mid 30 quite obviously totally sh*t faced. I hopped back on and just hoped he was not coming my way.

The Cheddar Gorge was all but deserted, which was the plan, so I had a leasurely tick tock up all the steep bits, being passed by a roadie who was doing about 1/2 a mile and hour more than me and who was puffing like a traction engine.



Once at the top of the gorge I headed left towards Yoxeter. I was following cycle route 3 but there was no hint of a sign or sticker. Past Yoxeter range I crossed the Shepton Mallet road and headed down some tiny lanes towards Chew Valley, and had my first spotting of a Route 3 sticker. As I got to the two hour mark I decided to stop for a munchy bar a drink and a chat with some locals who were most interested in what I was up to.


From here it was more lanes and then a couple of well sign posted changes of direction and wheeeeeeeee down to Chew Valley Lake. I have to confess the signage was unnecessary as I know this part of the Mendips well, But I was keen to see if a less knowledgable visitor could find their way.

Past the lake and into Chew village I was looking now for route 410 and roads I have never ridden before. I easily found both, and a couple of unexpected steep climbs, and again passed by a couple of puffing roadies, friendly sorts who completely ignored me and my greetings.... well I can't blame them, some bloke with baggy shorts and an old Trek is really not a PROPER cyclist... is he?

While winding through completely unknown territory near Winford and heading for Felton I found this.... I have no idea what it is, a water tower maybe.


It is not a flue as it is solid on all four sides right down to the ground. Anyway, by now I was 30 miles in and the Nidd was making its presence felt... you know, down there. But me being me I pressed on and just rerouted in my head, cutting the 70 planned miles back to 50.

Felton is a delightful little hamlet, I would say the average house price there must be about £7.5million or so, nice work if you can get it.

From Felton I headed off to Lulsgate, just across the A38 from the airport, and my last photo.



No idea who she is and she is no conversationalist that's for sure, but impressive never the less.

I pushed the bike across the A38, it being too insane to consider riding the short distance I had to go to get to the top of Brockley Combe. I ran out of gears on the big ring (big being a relative term) going down the Combe, so freewheeled and spun my way to the bottow, straight across the A370 and into the back lanes that eventually dropped me off in Claverham. Past my late mum's last house and along to the outskirts of Yatton, back to the A370 and the not too unpleasant grind back towards home, by which time me and the Nidd were getting way too intimate, and just to spice things up a little I was riding straight into a playful 15 to 18 MPH gusty wind... lovely!

Off the 370 towards Wick St Lawrence and then back home riding into a headwind that really was starting to get tiresome. The climb back to my house ended up actually being more painful that the Cheddar gorge or Route 410 and I was very pleased to get home.

50 miles, 2000 ft of climbing and around 4 hours moving time.... and a bruised arse. :facepalm:

I don't know how you break in a saddle, without it breaking you first. :mrgreen:

Still, I can think of worse ways to spend a Bank Holiday morning.

Good luck with the Spa saddle.

I bought an Aire with Ti rails. Over 1,000 miles later it still feels like I've picked up the soap in the showers of HMP Belmarsh... even after a shortish ride.

To be fair, my B17 has taken years to capitulate, but at least it did give a little from day one.

Re:

Thanks for those words of encouragement, fortunately it was cheap.

I also have a brand new Selle Anatomica saddle which was also bought at sale price, but it cost more than the rest of the bike, so I'm a little concerned about overkill.

I have a nice flatish saddle on my Genesis tourer, it is an OEM Madison which cannot be bought but I may try it on the Trek and put the Anatomica on the Genesis.

Try the assorted snake oil potions on the Spa... You have nothing to lose.

I commuted on mine for a several months and it was perhaps thinking about acquiring a hint of sit bone dents... Just a hint though. I had applied Proofhide 3 times in 18 months, which perhaps wasn't anywhere near enough.

Something I hadn't thought to attempt was to try backing off the tension bolt a smidge. You could try that if the oil and arse combo doesn't work

I too had Monday off and like Neil I made the most of it and got a decent ride in with Brian (epicylo)
We used the day as a scouting mission for a few other rides that we had been talking of lately and for this ride we knew we weren't getting the early start we would need and we also had no idea what the weather would do as so far this long weekend the forecast had been less than accurate.
I had managed to wrangle the Monday off as I was supposed to be down in Yorkshire for the Jack Taylor ride but after being away in Germany and then away last week for work I just couldn't get all the way down for the weekend. Not to worry as I had some great rides out on the Dummy and thankfully Brian was back from Glasgow and we were able to plot a run down the national cycle route 7, the section from Kinguissie south to Drumochter Pass, from which we then deviated onto the dirt that ran 90 degree to the A9 and up into the hills.
The cycle route has some really nice cycle paths with the first section to Newtonmore only leaving the cycle path when into Newtonmore itself, then it was local quite road to Ralia, crossing over the Spey several times. We stopped at this piont and had some lunch at the Ralia cafe before rejoining the cycle path that while running close to the A9 was really quiet and peaceful as is sheilded by trees and bushes so you don't notice the traffic at all. Further on before Dalwhinnie we joined a very quiet road that runs on the oppsite side of the glen from the A9, it's a nice open road that seemed to be channeling a pretty steady headwind so not as easy as we thought it should be, but hey, no rush.
We stopped at Dalwhinnie village for a coffee as we knew there wasn't going to be much else south of here unless we kept going to Bruar which was also a bit further than we planned. Just out of the village where the road joins the A9 the cycle path starts again and from here on ran along side the A9, sometimes close, like footpath close and other times deviated away into woods or followed the old road, crossing over little narrow wooden bridges here and there with a surface that was very smooth tarmac in places but for the most part it was gravel, rough in a few spots but I thought it was pretty good considering the alternative was to ride the A9.
We took the usual photos at the Drumochter sign and then headed further south to explore a dirt track we had seen many times running up into the hills before Dalnaspidal. It was a nice peice of dirt road, rough due to the big rocks embedded but rideable. We stopped at a small creek crossing and took a few photos and Brian ventured slightly further up the hill to confirm that it just gets better. So a plan was hatched to head back here to investigate this track some more as we think it would go right over the hills and certainly looked rideable for as far as we could see it snaking it's way up the valley. We couldn't go too much further as time was getting well on by this stage and so we rode back to the cycle path and turned back north and hoped that headwind would now be a tailwind.
Safe to say we made good time back on the cycle path to Dalwhinnie, for quite a few kilometres I was sitting on a steady 30 -35 klmh over the gravel and skimming through the narrow bridges, just one of those little bits of a ride that feel like a steady effort and a steady cadence for mile after mile, great fun and certainly quicker than the run down.
After quick afternoon tea at Ralia around 6pm we hit the road for the final few miles back through Newtonmore and onto the car. On this stretch we could see to the east that it was bucketing down with rain on the Cairngorms and thankfully we made it back dry and only got the rain when driving back past Aviemore. Certainly a late night for me by the time I dropped Brian off and then drove back north it was about 10.30 or so. Well worth it though as it was another great ride out. No rush, just riding our bikes in a nice part of the world, no real destination, just to enjoy the ride and the company.
We have found two good off road rides to head back for so it was successful on that front as well.


Jamie

DSCN5209 by Jamie Dyer, on Flickr

DSCN7045 by epicyclo, on Flickr

DSCN5197 by Jamie Dyer, on Flickr

DSCN7049 by epicyclo, on Flickr

I said a bike trailer Brian! a bike trailer
DSCN5212 by Jamie Dyer, on Flickr

DSCN5215 by Jamie Dyer, on Flickr

DSCN5219 by Jamie Dyer, on Flickr

DSCN5223 by Jamie Dyer, on Flickr

DSCN5224 by Jamie Dyer, on Flickr

DSCN5228 by Jamie Dyer, on Flickr

DSCN5231 by Jamie Dyer, on Flickr

DSCN5244 by Jamie Dyer, on Flickr

DSCN5256 by Jamie Dyer, on Flickr

DSCN5259 by Jamie Dyer, on Flickr

DSCN5264 by Jamie Dyer, on Flickr

DSCN5272 by Jamie Dyer, on Flickr

DSCN5277 by Jamie Dyer, on Flickr

DSCN5278 by Jamie Dyer, on Flickr

Re:

A grand day oot.

Great photos, thanks Jamie.

That tower may be a shot tower. It was filled with water and molten lead etc dropped in the top. The water supported it as it cooled to get a round ball by the bottom.