another Welsh mission, anyone fancy meeting up?

so, i'm doing another Welsh mission roadtrip, since this redundancy announcement last october i have been trying not to spend money, and frankly i have done quite well at that, i officially finish at the end of july so i have a while to go yet, as of next thursday i start my rota'd 18 days off and as i have done a bit of extra overtime i figured i'd get a welsh trip sorted.

so my plan is:

saturday 12th, ride at Afan, should be there around 1pm, then camping the night.
sunday 13th, drive to Brechfa, ride, then drive on to Dolgellau
monday 14th, penmanchno, never ridden here before but have heard good things
tuesday 15th, Llangdegla
wednesday 16th, coed y brenin

then home but if i feel like it i may stop at afan to ride thursday.

so if anyone wants to join me on any day let me know

the bikes are ready


IMG_2091 by Dr. Branom, on Flickr

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Nice road trip.

If I was fit, I'd be up for a day out.

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fitness doesn't count for much with me. it's all about how muddy you can get:-

this was yesterday! the pic in the first post was taken today after much cleaning, new pads and new rear hub bearing, new gear cables, had to strip the shifters to pieces to get all the mud out!

IMG_2066 by Dr. Branom, on Flickr

IMG_2074 by Dr. Branom, on Flickr

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I mean fit as in recovered from my broken ankle.

I'm back riding again, but only mild road stuff at the moment as the cast's only been off a couple of weeks and I can't really put much power through my right foot yet.

Next time bro.

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ahh ok, i'll let you off then!

i do alot of these missions on my own, which i'm happy about but people always seem to say "i'd love to join you" etc but then when i let people know what i'm up to people still don't pop along for a bimble, do i smell?

We live in Bala and things are surprisingly dry round here given the rain we've had, but i'm sure we can always find you somewhere to wallow. Most of the fallen trees have been cleared at llandegla and cyb so most of it is open again.
I might join you for a ride or two if the weather is half decent, and you'll have me. Penmachno is a bit grim in the rain as it's pretty exposed. Have you ridden the Marin trail at llanrwst? It's less outrightly/unnecessarily rocky than Penmachno.

Rich

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i think i have ridden the marin trail, is that not the one at betws y coed? we did that at the Old World Champs in 2010, i did it on my vitamin t2. being honest i like the rocky stuff! i thought i'd try penmachno purely because i haven't ridden it before.

always happy to have riding company though, so if you are up for it let me know, i'll be online on the sunday night but not saturday, i'll be staying at the royal ship inn in Dolgellau

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ok, so i thought i'd update this thread with the rides!

first day riding was yesterday (saturday) at Afan forest, didn't leave till late morning for various reasons, going to a questionable bar in London after the handmade show was one, picking up the van after it's MOT at 9.30 was the other! by the time i was loaded up etc it was 1130am, then i got stuck in traffic crossing the Severn Bridge, 45 mins wait!

by the time i got to Afan it was 4 pm and i was hungry so i went to the cafe then got the bike out, i didn't want to ride in the dark on the new Blade trail which would have been a possibility so i decided for Whytes Level trail with added extras. for those that don't know the valley trees have been cut down due to some weird disease, the guts of the ride is now completely open, which i think makes that initial climb even worse!!

that said, overall the trails were riding really nice! and the extra bits i did included some of the Blade trail (which is new) and were really good, if my legs last i may stop to ride it on the way home and have an extra day to do it.

here's what the hillside looks like at the mo, those that know the trail know that this section was until about 6 months ago covered in trees. quite sad really

P1130279 by Dr. Branom, on Flickr

after sleeping in the van i got up, had breakfast in the cafe and headed to Brechfa, i have only ridden here once, that was with Makster, i headed for the Gorlech trail and turned into a carpark about 5 miles too early! doh! i thought it was the same carpark as before but refurbed, got the bike out anyway and headed for a trail called the "Raven" which turned out to be pretty damn good, it was a Black trail, the climbs were pretty damn tough, but the downhills were epic so i was pretty happy with that. the nice thing about these trails is that they are off the beaten track so not once was i caught up/held up by anyone which was great.

have a couple of pics

P1130286 by Dr. Branom, on Flickr

P1130285 by Dr. Branom, on Flickr

P1130283 by Dr. Branom, on Flickr

P1130281 by Dr. Branom, on Flickr

P1130280 by Dr. Branom, on Flickr

Brechfa rules, the best trail centre that I've ever ridden.

The bomb hole is great, last time I was there I saw a guy slide the whole way to the bottom on his backside closely followed by his bike!

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i think it gets forgotten because it's so far west, but that makes it nice and peaceful to ride