*channel flip*Well, what can I say? It seemed like a good idea at the time, and I'm now an honorary member of the Liberal Democrats
[1] gnarly randonneur caucus, I suppose.
So, the Original plan was that I meet up with andygates somewhere in the vicinity of Clun first thing on Friday morning, and ride the Midlandsy section with him for the day. Interest from Charlotte and redshift caused this to evolve into a proper weekend of camping-based Silly Bike Adventuring, which naturally I couldn't resist.
I tried and failed to pack light (though it seemed I still managed to pack less than Charlotte, and andygates was naturally hauling a far more significant load), and set off for Craven Arms by train at early o'clock on Friday. This went surprisingly well, given that my previous experiences of Arriva Trains Wales services have been distinctly dodgy bike-wise.
"Somewhere in the vicinity of Clun" turned out to be
Foxholes Castle campsite, which managed that ever endearing combination of being a radio blackspot at the top of a bastard hill. Nevertheless, after a little under an hour's largely uneventful
[2] riding, I successfully tracked him down by the fallback method of simply rolling up to the campsite and asking the proprietor if they had seen "a guy called Andy, on a bike, epic facial hair?". They pointed me in the direction of the tent field, where it seems he had pitched on the far side to maximise altitude.
I nibbled some breakfast (it takes a good 20km before I'm properly awake) while he packed up his impressively over-specced tent, and then we were off.
The ride started well, with a gravelly descent into Bishop's Castle. Gravelly descents being infinitely preferable to gravelly ascents, which I'd had the dubious pleasure of on the way up. Out of Bishop's Castle, and we headed north up the A488 to Shrewsbury. The reasoning being that 'A' roads tend to take sensible route
around across hills, and never
[3] have chevrons on them.
The route may have been sensible, but the gravity certainly wasn't: There were numerous occasions where we found ourselves pedalling downhill, in spite of a nominal tailwind. Any attempts to freewheel were futile. They'd clearly installed the hills at a wonky angle, or the Earth's rotation was messing things up, or something. We carried on with the relentless climb until, as I'd hoped, we ran out of 'up'. Then followed some of the best leisurely freewheeling descending I've done. Not R17 material, for the most part, but the road kept going *down* for a good 9km. I don't recommend it in the other direction
The road stopped going down, and we found ourselves in Minsterly. This seemed like good time to stop, at which point I realised that my front brake wasn't doing all that well in the stopping department. A spot of fettling concluded that it was merely pad wear, and with some precision tweaking I soon had a pair of significantly stoppier brakes. That sorted, we took the opportunity for a quick game of Pooh Sticks. Unfortunately that was a no-score draw, as it turned out that someone else had already played Pooh Sticks on that bridge using half a tree and the contents of their kitchen bin - the debris snagging our sticks mere inches from the finish.
Appreciating the novelty of having to pedal to make the bikes go, we carried on through Pontesbury and Hanwood - where a class of middle school children expressed their approval at my bike - and into Shrewsbury, which we learned was the birthplace of Charles Darwin:
(We also learned that recumbents are much better as a camera stand than the ground when using the self-timer.)Some slightly older school children declared my bike "sick as fuck", which I reckon is a new benchmark for down-with-the-yoof coolness. A little random navigation then got us to a slightly surreal athletics-themed cafe, where you can get protein shakes with your
CAKE. I reasoned that at least they wuldn't have a philosophical objection to the presence of what, with hindsight, I laughably described as 'smelly sweaty cyclists'. Consulting the map, and bearing in mind that the night's campsite was about as close to Chester as a biscuit, we decided to ditch the CTC's route and continue with the successful strategy of using nice sensible-looking A-roads to avoid the worst of the hills.
Out of Shrewsbury on the A528, I noted that all the places named "mount pleasant" I've been to have been oxymoronic from a cycling perspective. Then the B5476 for a nice long straight descent (in the interest of knee-conservation I failed to reach 40mph), stopping briefly to de-insect my eye and to reinforce my pannier (which, through an unfortunate consequence of design incompatibility, was determined to wear a hole in itself on my rear brake mechanism) with some gaffer tape. We then continued to Wem, where we made use of a Little Shop to stock up on vital supplies.
The rest of the afternoon was a much quieter, and indeed flatter, laney route through Whitchurch to Wrenbury. The weather had improved greatly, to the point that mild sunburn was a feature, and I ran out of water (the downside of using a hydration pack rather than bottles is it's a lot harder to judge how much you've used) a couple of kilometres from the campsite.
The campsite was reasonable enough, apart from the fact that the facilities block was being refurbished, and they had no showers available, and we had to use the pub-quality pub toilets. That didn't stop them charging us £10 each for a night, though.
We pitched up in a grassy field near the invisible tap, and a reasonable distance from the BSA motorcycle rally we were warned to avoid, though they appeared harmless enough.
That evening was spent mucking about skiddling electrons from one device to another, peering at maps and definitely not playing pool. It had occurred to me that since we were significantly nearer to Crewe than to Chester and that Charlotte's train was likely to stop there, an alternative route for the next day would be a good idea. While peering at the (1:250k) map, attempting to infer gradients from place names, rivers, radio masts and the like, I noticed the
Pickmere radio telescope was marked. I wondered if this was
Jodrell Bank, and since it wasn't far off our route, whether it was worth visiting. Andygates determined the actual location of Jodrell Bank using the electric internet, and we concluded that while it was slightly further off our route, the third largest steerable dish in the world wasn't to be missed, and that we'd save as many miles by not heading west to Chester and back. I texted Charlotte suggesting this option, and a Plan was formed.
We went to bed just as the rain started, and were woken several times during the night by the sound of heavy rain on the tents. While my cheap Argos effort managed not to actually leak, it did get a bit soggy and was invaded by gastropods. I reckon those are even worse than earwigs.
Saturday started moistly, and we were less than quick to get going. Drying the tents was a bit of a lost cause, though I did manage to evict the slugs before stowing mine in the pannier. We set off for Crewe, to meet Charlotte who had done the early o'clock train thing up from London. In the interests of making progress we took a nice sensible route that hardly involved any pseudo-motorway dual carriageway, stopping only for this:
Arriving in Crewe, we bypassed the station (which I regard to be a circle of railway hell second only to Mordor Central itself) and headed straight for the coffee shop that Charlotte had found. We met up and caffeine was consumed while I failed to diagnose a fault with my Mk 2 dynamo charger prototype, as I had left my lightweight racing multimeter at home to save weight. I haven't investigated yet, but I've made a note that the finished article should include sufficient blinkenlights and test probe attachment points so that you're not completely in the dark without a proper electronics toolkit. Also a modular design to allow for faulty sections to be disconnected if necessary (so solar can still be used if the dynamo section packs in, or so the battery section can be bypassed entirely, for example).
ETA: I've now bench-tested the charger. Fault was the output stage of the photovoltaic optoisolator chip controlling the input FETs. No, I'm not entirely sure why, but I'm reasonably sure it wasn't a thermal issue. Annoyingly, if I'd had a multimeter, and the sense to have socketed the chip, I could have fixed that on the road by moving the whole lot two pins to the side and using the spare channel. Worth bearing in mind - I'd eschewed sockets on the basis that they don't take well to vibration, but they do make repairs and diagnostics a lot easier.Then the rain began. It was rather a lot of rain, and Charlotte looked unimpressed. Andygates and I had gone the night without washing and were already cultivating the gnarly randonneur smell, so were only slightly less bothered by the prospect of a thorough soaking. Which is just as well, as that was what we got, with assistance from road spray on the A534 to make sure we were drenched from all angles. Switching to the minor roads at Sandbach ensured that we had plenty of mud and liquid cowshit to go with the soaking. The cycling was a lot more pleasant for not having to dodge lorries, though.
We had a couple of minor navigational moments, including the Openstreetmap data encouraging the Garmin to lead us down a non-NSTN-approved farm track in the pouring rain. With some ziggy-zaggy goodness we eventually made progress in the right direction, and the fine upsitting Mr Gates eventually spotted a large dish behind some hedge or other.
The Lovell Telescope is big. You just won't believe how vastly, hugely, mind-bogglingly big it is. I mean, you may think
the dish on the wall of Mal Volio Towers is a bit on the large side, but that's just peanuts compared to the Lovell Telescope.
Switching off our assortment of RF-generating gadgetry, we entered the site and made our way to the visitors' centre. We were pleased to discover they had a proper bicycle parking facility with a roof, Sheffield stands and a highly trained guard duck. Lunch was had in the cafe, while we watched the dish moving between targets through the subsiding rain. At some point we realised that we were supposed to be meeting redshift in Lymm, and indeed had to be the other side of Preston that evening. A quick visit to the loos (during which andygates temporarily morphed into Wowbagger) and a rather shrieky change back into my soaking wet jersey later, and we bid goodbye to
SCIENCE and the sitting duck and set off.
A brief outbreak of common sense had seen to arrange to meet redshift halfway, in Knutsford. Our stay was brief, but suffice to say that it included such hideousness as bagpipes, morris dancing, an out of tune glockenspiel performance of the theme from The Great Escape and re-enactment of the royal wedding by small children. It came as something of a relief when the nice normal beardy guys on penny farthings turned up.
Eventually redshift fought her way past the road closures and appeared, and we escaped the may-day madness in favour of a bit of cycling. The weather improved steadily as we rode up through Lymm, taking in some road surfaces of a quality that wouldn't have been out of place on the FNRttC to Blackpool, and then over the toll bridge at Warburton.
Charlotte had expressed concern at the amount of blood in her cake stream, so a motivational pub stop was had, and Mr Gates partook of the motivational beer. Exchanging motivation for progress, we continued through assorted uninspiring villages while I became increasingly stupid without really realising it. I vaguely recall redshift appealing to my sense of geek navigation with "Look Kim - Winter Hill!", but to be honest my main memory of that 20km is of having an increasingly full bladder and a suspicion that my Stupid Digestive System wasn't working as well as it should. It became apparent that I was suffering from the bonk just as my odometer rolled past the 100km mark on the summit of the climb up to Billinge - we stopped at the top of the hill, and my attempt to dismount was decidedly non-graceful, in a failure to maintain separation from the ground kind of way.
Emergency chocolate got my legs more-or-less working again, and we rolled down the hill to Billinge, where we stopped at an extremely
local pub for essential loo, salty stuff and sugary liquids. The full extent of my digestive woe became apparent, so I made the reluctant decision to break out the hyoscine tablets and hope I had enough sugary crap to keep me going for the rest of the day. I apologise for being snappy, irritable and less than entirely coherent - while I'm sure my companions recognised hypoglycaemia talking, it's still a bit cringeworthy with hindsight.
Fleeing Billinge before the natives took after our recumbent bicycles with pitchforks and flaming torches, I concentrated on keeping the pedals turning and trying not to forget to do important things like give way at roundabouts. I think there was an evil dog around then, too? The next bit I really remember is the fast descent from Bank Top, where the road did that going round a bend then disappearing out from under you thing. The adrenaline from the associated speedy descent woke me up, and I'm fairly sure I started making sense just in time to suffer problems with my front shifting, culminating in what I assumed was a bent chainring, but on closer inspection turned out to merely be loose chainring bolts. As I sorted that out, the weather noises started.
Through the lanes towards Ecclestone, and the weather hit properly. Epic fork lightning, lumps of water falling from the sky and sinister rumbling of thunder. We stopped to put our waterproofs on (I don't usually bother on the recumbent, but I knew I wasn't on top form and the last thing I needed was to get really cold), and then stopped again shortly afterwards so andygates could take the obligatory 500-miles-on-the-odometer photo.
Now I'm still not entirely sure if it was the salt, the effect of the antispasmodics or the drop in temperature, but from then on I felt much, much better. In fact, I was positively enjoying it, in that masochistic kind of way that comes from being utterly soaking wet on a bike with umpty miles left to do before you can do anything other than keep riding. The others didn't seem to be having quite as much fun, and Charlotte may have made 'Travelodge' noises. I was happy to bring up the rear with my Radbot laser of death, humming the Manic street Preachers'
Australia while the others picked their way through the soggy darkness in search of a sensible A-road route to Preston.
[4]A sensible route was found, which felt distinctly downhill, but the numbers confirm the opposite. The jury's out on whether that's down to tailwind, gravitational anomaly or blood sugar. We stopped in a layby for more chocolate, and got distinctly cold, but I didn't care, and was at the euphoric giggling stage.
I'm sure the others think I'm mad, but the main thought that was going through my head was that since I had the accident in October and have been battling knee problems, I'd been thinking that I might never actually get to do any of this crazy bike shit again. I'd barely had a taste of it before, and I've been oscillating between abject despair at the fragility of the human body combined with massive waves of JFDI ever since. That's probably long-term unhealthy, but for now I'm exceedingly happy to have done well over 250km over two days in adverse conditions with a camping load and bugger all in the way of cycling fitness.
Some more bombing down (up?) sensible A-roads (though it seems from the map that some of them were in fact B-roads) had us in Preston just after 10pm. A decision was made, and redshift accompanied andygates to the campsite while Charlotte and I sought out a Travelodge for some dirty recumbent hotel room action.
(Camera got wet, hence the lack of usable photos before this point.)While I liked the idea of camping on principle, I was acutely aware that as soon as I stopped riding I was going to start feeling bloody awful, and I'd be a lot better off indoors in the dry with a hot shower available when it happened. This turned out to be the correct decision, as my body decided it had had enough while waiting to find a place with a room available. The last kilometre to the Premier Inn was hell, and it took an awful lot of hot water to stop me feeling cold and wobbly.
Many thanks to Charlotte for doing all that complicated organisational brain stuff, and restoring me to some semblance of humanity by procuring a suspicious sausage and associated salty goodness when I'd reached the not-doing-a-very-good-job-of-standing-up stage. With hindsight, the ride was deeply silly, and I'd fear what might have happened if I'd not been with a group. On the other hand, if I'd not been with a group, I doubt I'd have got to such advanced levels of silliness in the first place. On the gripping hand, this sort of heroic stupidity is what it's all about.
This morning was a simple matter of making interesting zombie moaning noises in response to the alarm, eventually culminating in moving from bed. Then drying assorted kit with the hairdrier (surprisingly effective, maybe they're not just for heat-shrink after all) and making our way round the corner to the railway station for our respective trains. I believe the campers survived the night in somewhat less luxurious conditions, so thoroughly deserved the morning's uncharacteristic bright sunny warmth.
Having arrived home after an uneventful train journey, I've spent the rest of the day waiting for my digestive system to get itself back on track, and have finally eaten some proper food and am feeling merely tired. With any luck I'll feel enthusiastic about cycling again in time for next weekend's Silly Bike Adventure.
Thanks again to Charlotte for saving me from certain death, redshift for having Proper Maps
TM and safely navigating us through the howling wastelands of the post-industrial north-west, and to andygates for fantastic company and indeed for putting me up to this in the first place. Best of luck for your onward journey - if you need more heavy duty anti-inflammatories give me a shout and I'll see what I can do.
[1] Optimistic in the face of impending doom.
[2] Novelty roadkill: 2 dead badgers.
Recumbent laughed at by: three schoolkids, field of sheep.
[3] Theory disproved that evening while planning Saturday's route.
[4] With hindsight it is of course obvious that there are no sensible routes, A-road or otherwise, to Preston.
We now return to your scheduled programming...
