There might only have been two of us but we judged the
EMERGENCY Essex Pub Night Ride a great success.
TOKaMaK turned up at mine about 1730 hrs and after a quick bowl of pasta we were ready to hit the road. Just as we were about to leave we discovered that my front tyre had substantially deflated so Son of Oscar was on his back in seconds for a quick pit stop. I am a little annoyed with myself as I knew that the front valve was suspect but hadn’t been bothered to change the tube – lesson learnt.
After swinging through Terling we were soon on North Hill. TOKaMaK took off and I caught up with him in Danbury. Shortly before we got to Hanningfield Reservoir we had to pull over as TOKaMaK’s chain had managed to jam itself between the chain rings. My Magic Bag came into it’s own for the first time in the evening. My riding companion, sterling fellow that he is, has been know to take the piss out of the amount of stuff I lug around with me. Now his hands were covered in oil he magnanimously accepted a squirt of my anti bacterial hand wash. It didn’t do much to shift the oil but 99% of germs were dead.
Shortly after we had another minor drama as I hit a pothole and one of my front lights fell off. It refused to work for the rest of the night but is OK now. We got to The Viper and set about getting on the outside of pints of Jake the Snake and Oscar Wilde mild. TOKaMaK did very well sinking about 5 pints. After my last pub ride and the resultant lapse from sobriety I ended up on halves and had about 3.5 pints in all. The Viper is an excellent pub, I couldn’t appreciate its woodland setting as it was pitch black when we arrived. Jimmy the pub dog is cute.
Last orders were rung, we staggered out, mounted up and set off only to return after 50 yards as TOKaMaK’s back tyre was as flat as a witch’s tit.
Once again the Magic Bag came up trumps, this time with some rubber gloves and a CO2 inflator – which was rubbish. We had two attempts at fixing the flat and eventually set off.
At Chelmsford we went our separate ways. I hooned through the sleeping streets guided by the Garmin. Shortly before Hatfield Peverel my left thigh started to cramp up so I stopped in the car park of the Blue Strawberry for a stretch.
I got home at about 0130 hrs and parked the bike in the kitchen.
This was a classic pub ride. A decent distance, 46.5 miles for me, and a fast pace averaging 14.5 mph. Son of Oscar has also done over 30mph after hitting 31.6 mph descending from Danbury.