We had arranged a little family ride today, as my wife has not ridden a bike in a few years and so we thought it would be nice to meet up with my daughter and ride a nice easy trail from Yatton to Cheddar along the Strawberry Line. My daughter had to dip out, as she has a cold, so my wife and I decided to ride anyway, which gave her a chance to get used to her 'new' 1991 Bear Valley and gave me the chance to give my Franken-Rourke a good try out.
The weather was stunning, the trail is delightful and so were 99% of the people we met along the way, except for a tiny minority, every one of whom was riding either a road, audax or cx bike. We did see a small group of 'gentlemen' all on cx bikes and all in identical tops, they were very jolly and said 'hello', but they were the exception.
I do quite a lot of road riding, and have told my wife about the 'gloom cloud' that seems to hover above many of the serious road riders I see, today my wife got to see them too.
We had a really nice ride, and even though things were getting a little busy on the way back, it was fantastic to see family after family out in the sun, on their bikes, and I just ended up feeling sorry for the few miseries that did not seem to be enjoying their riding and felt they had to scowl at everyone.
The weather was stunning, the trail is delightful and so were 99% of the people we met along the way, except for a tiny minority, every one of whom was riding either a road, audax or cx bike. We did see a small group of 'gentlemen' all on cx bikes and all in identical tops, they were very jolly and said 'hello', but they were the exception.
I do quite a lot of road riding, and have told my wife about the 'gloom cloud' that seems to hover above many of the serious road riders I see, today my wife got to see them too.
We had a really nice ride, and even though things were getting a little busy on the way back, it was fantastic to see family after family out in the sun, on their bikes, and I just ended up feeling sorry for the few miseries that did not seem to be enjoying their riding and felt they had to scowl at everyone.