After a month of looking after me old mum following a fall and a broken collar bone, her sling came off today and I thought I'd take the opportunity to try to crack 200 km in a day on my local route (Lincoln Gravel Imp on bikepacking) . 16 km in a piece of the True Cross wrecked the only slightly worn Chronicle on the rear that I'd only rotated from the front two days before . The only upside was that it was only a 5 mile push home.

RIP wrote: ↑Tue Jun 13, 2023 11:26 pm Lineside fire, chucked out at Pontypridd! Rode the rest of the way up the Taff Trail. Only took three wrong turns. They need to get their signage sorted out. Enjoyable apart from that.

Couple of days away with electrified mates. First day straight onto the Merthyr - Dowlais road climb, then round the country park to Tredegar. Popped into the heritage centre and had a nice chat with Kevin who told us all about Tredegar being the birthplace of the NHS.



then it was up over towards Trefil via the Sirhowy community garden and another chat, with the redoubtable boss Suzie and the good things she's doing with all the youngsters who've got more time on their hands than they should have



followed by yet more wandering and tea and sarnies with all the lovely Valleys ladies at Molly's caff in the industrial estate



on through the otherwordly Trefil Quarry. We kept a wary eye open for daleks and cybermen emerging from the bunkers





head across the moors to Pontsticill reservoir via the Raggedstone Recommended Route (ta Kev). Arrived at the Red Lion at 16.02, which had stopped doing food at..... 16.00. Had a few commiseratory beers instead.



Down the Taff Trail to Merthyr to worship at the gods of retail



built on the site of the world's first large ironworks. Fred Dibnah is spinning in his grave - iron masters replaced by a roll call of retail fuckwittery. All the names were there. First I likened it to the black monolith in "2001", installed by some strange force to tempt us to spend our money on crap, then I noticed the rays of sun glinting off it - maybe some sort of pagan fertility totem? I'm not sure the fair girls of Merthyr need a totem judging by the number of prams in the place but there we go.

Back to base to gird our own loins for the next day's entertainment

[possibly cont'd....]

next day down the Taff Trail to Abercynon. Well, more accurately the Trevithick Trail, which was once a plateway (railway) from Merthyr to the Glamorgan Canal at Abercynon. Built in 1802/4 it saw the world's first steam-hauled freight train. Unfortunately it only ran three times, because it broke the new fangled iron rails, so it was back to the horses for a while until they invented something better.

Some of the original stone sleepers are still there 219 years later



Back up the next valley to Mountain Ash, and a real slog over the hill to Merthyr via the old Wertha Colliery incline. Not a climb I'd like to repeat, and even Merthyr was a welcome sight at the top

11.12 Leighton Buzzard to Hemel Hempstead for a gentle wobble up the hill to the Bell Inn at Bovingdon (or possibly to the Bovingdon Inn at Bell End, I can't remember) for a spot of luncheon with some chaps. Someone has to do it. No doubt the topics of conversation will follow the time-honoured old codger path of prostates, probates, and... what? I dunno... prosthetics? prostitutes? Return wobble downhill may be less gentle and more wobbly.

That sounds like a lovely few days there Reg!

Captain's log, star date 26.45.78-6a/5, additional: trains back all cancelled. Fatality. Sit and wait. Train north suddenly turns up. Don't care where it's going, I'm on it. Oh. Stops at Tring half way home. Bail out and ride the last 10 miles down the canal. Ah well, at least it's used the beer calories up.

Got a GoPro for my birthday earlier in the year so decided it’s time I started using it with this nice weather. The Pentlands are only a 20 minute cycle from my door so here is a short video of one of my local loops

https://youtu.be/XB5cvqZHy2Q

Went out last night for a final big ride before next weekend's NYM300. Couldn't decide where to go, so ended up doing a slightly extended variation of my Round Cambridge the Hard Way route. Slightly over 200KM to get back to the house, I maybe mildly broken, expectations for doing next weekend in a oner have diminished slightly...



Have to say that I'm quite impressed by the Racing Ralph in Super Ground ADDIX Speed, especially compared to the Rocket Ron that came off. Initially felt so good, I was convinced that I'd previously been riding while dragging the rear brake. Although I'm not sure next Saturday's forecast is particularly favourable for running it...



Ran out of both food and water near the end, and was struggling with issues from having been seated for extended periods; none of which should be an issue next weekend though.



Looking forward to a beer or three this evening.

A good ride round the Trossachs for me. A bit of rain around at first but eventually cleared to another fine evening. 190k this time, thanks to a variation on the return leg. I'm fair puggled!


Strag on a bridge next to the aqueduct that takes water from Loch Katrine all the way to Glasgow. It runs in a continuous downhill the whole way!

expectations for doing next weekend in a oner have diminished slightly...

big old tough route next week mate. a leisurely 2 dayer will be far nicer.

Went out for a big 72 mile off road ride on Sunday on the Unit. It was going to be a bivvy night, but in the end I didn't fancy it after some poor nights of sleep recently (thanks kids! ). I didn't pack light as I wanted plenty of food on me, as there's not that many options for getting food or water directly on route. Set off about 6:30 and made my way circuitously to the ridgeway near Farnborough (Berks). Really peaceful morning with lots of skylarks heard.


Then I followed the ridgeway west and cut a corner off by not going into the Og valley and instead using the old ridgeway route and meeting the trail again at Barbury castle, I then turned off right near the end of the ridgeway to go to Avebury in search of lunch. I was feeling the heat a bit by this point, but there was a decent breeze which kept me from completely frazzling. A good lunch in the NT cafe revived me nicely, lots of yanks about and 'celebrity' spotted Keith Brymer Jones from the Great Pottery Throwdown, he wasn't in tears. Then headed back up the hill and on to Fyfield down towards Marlborough. The tracks through the down are probably a gravel riders dream, but the landscape was brilliant, rolling chalk downs left to grazing and apparently England's best assemblage of sarsen stones.


Pit-stop at the garage in Marlborough for an ice cream and refill the bottle with something sugary and isotonic. Then it was riding I know well, following the Kennet Valley all the way home. There's some really nice off road between Axford and Littlecote, keeping close to the Upper Kennet in all it's chalk stream and trout filled beauty:

Then I popped over the hill to Froxfield and joined the K&A canal all the way home (bar some tarmac to avoid the crappy towpath section), and passed the horse drawn boat. All-in, it was a cracking ride. None of the terrain was that difficult, but I managed to stay off road for a huge proportion of the ride. I also stayed comfy on the bike. The only niggle was that the bike still feels heavy going sometimes. It might be the 2.6 tyre up front, but it's a fast rolling mezcal and I was happy with the volume it had and soaking up the chatter. It might be that it's just a bit of a, well, unit. The geometry and riding position is great, but I just feel the drag a bit and it has no sprightliness. It's a niggle that keeps me contemplating a light frame. Aside from that, it performed well and looks good! Next ride is Snowdonia in 3 weeks for a bivvy or two.

New terrain for me today. Around the Trawsfynydd area.
1st time finishing a ride at a former nuclear power station!

What a glowing * report

* see what I did there, I will get my coat.

Lazarus wrote: ↑Sun Jul 02, 2023 9:31 am What a glowing * report

* see what I did there, I will get my coat.

After Karls talk on Friday evening about the Silk Road mountain race and the Iditarod a few of us bivvied down in the sand dunes a few miles down the coast.
It was rather pleasant...

Very nice!!

Fancy a beach bivvy now, I've only ever done one and that was a couple of years ago now...

Verena wrote: ↑Mon Jul 10, 2023 10:10 pm Very nice!!

Fancy a beach bivvy now, I've only ever done one and that was a couple of years ago now...

Beach bivvies are great but sand gets everywhere!

Great report, always fancied a beach bivvy, sadly it is a bit too busy on my local stretch of beach (14mile round trips worth) plus over night sleeping is banned :( Might try a winter one at some point.

The other day I got wind of a trip that one of my TdF heros Thomas de Gendt was making from his home in Belgium to Calpe in the Costa Blanca. He had messaged that if anyone wanted to tag along they could. His route passed close to me so I contacted him. Surprisingly he replied and we met on the road about 30 km from his day's end in Tortosa. 2 other locals had joined them and were breathing out of their nether regions when I caught up. My 15 minutes of fame lasted about that until the first hill where I was dropped. Using local knowledge I caught up with them at their finish and we chatted for a while. Their trip was written up on GCN the other day, the selfie below was taken by his riding partner Jelle Wallays and I'm the one in the middle trying to breathe.

Just a short ride today, 7am start from the holiday cottage while the rest of the family were in their beds.

I'd done a ride yesterday which started on some interesting off road bits, but my mudguards were making a racket so I'd moved to tarmac. Took them off last night, and put all the riding gear and bike by the back door so I'd not wake my sleeping wife...

From West Bay in Dorset, up a nice tricky climb onto Type down, quick trip to the beach and along a few rough farm tracks... Out onto the A38 for some top gear spinning out and aero tuck silliness (sadly, didn't get the speed camera to flash )

I'd seen a track called hell lane on the map, so obviously this had to be investigated! First sign was good... "Caution, uneven surfaces and overhanging boulders"

A short whilel later was a closed road sign, as the track was now an overgrown rocky/gravel climb a few cm deep in flowing water. Obviously, that sign was ignored! Next km took about 15 minutes, and was very moist, muddy, foolish and type 1.5 fun overall. Shortly followed by an amazing descent down a gorge through the limestone, like a downhill, dryer and less prehistoric feeling Lud's church.

Then onto the road to get back - foolishness led me to ride the A38 again, but this time uphill (way scarier than the rough track) but got back onto the little lanes, and arrived back just as my mother in law had cooked plenty of bacon for breakfast

Pictures are on Strava, if anyone cares... https://strava.app.link/KauPdfLyKBb

I think that a few days round here on the bike would be great! And I'm writing this at monkey world, which is a pretty decent way to spend the day too.

After passing the Eigiau cottage last week and speaking to the warden, I was kindly handed a spare key for a few weeks. So on Thursday I headed up there.
I've stayed there many times now but this was my first 'summer' visit.
Up early on Friday to chat with the local farmer who was just starting to gather hundreds of sheep from the surrounding mountains. It was mesmerizing watching the sheepdogs work to their masters commands
Came back home Friday noon and headed back up there was the Mrs for the night. It was great to see the shearing being done on the trail back to the car.







Huge respect for driving this here, its a bit dodgy in places!

Yesterday's ride was 92km of beautiful Snowdonia goodness.

"Enjoyed" after a 4.30am wake up in a flappy, rain and wind lashed tent (but to be fair positioned in an absolutely stunning location, on a heart warmingly "proper" campsite - bit of grass, warm welcome at the farmhouse by the farmer/owner, who cheerily announced that a 51 year old had just died up on Snowdon that day, tested my Welsh language skills in a good humoured way, and sold me tokens for the shower and took £8 a night off me...), and with a rather choppy swim at 7am in the lake below in the legs already as I popped onto the bike (it was part of the Snowman Legend triathlon), it was certainly a challenging one.

IMG_20230729_191920 by Verena Zimmer, on Flickr

Very very windy, so what would have been a lovely flowy ride down from Capel Curig to Beddgelert was instead hard going into a big headwind, same later on into the Ogwen Valley.

Fortunately not too many crosswinds though, and amazingly it stayed dry, even through Blaenau Ffestiniog !!

Being now so spoiled with the pleasures of audax riding, all that staying 12m away from other riders, and the "feed station" being just someone at the side of the road with water and gels, was a bit of a let down - what no tea, cream buns, cucumber sandwiches, toilets and lovely WI ladies in quaint village halls???
But then all was forgiven, because the out and back ride into the Ogwen Valley and especially the return along a lovely single track lane through the Nant Francon valley was just beautiful. The only photo taken on the ride, for obvious reasons, as there was a short steep bit which a couple of riders as well as me used to get off and stretch our legs for a few minutes.

IMG_20230730_122424 by Verena Zimmer, on Flickr

IMG_20230730_131520 by Verena Zimmer, on Flickr

After the bike, my "run" became painfully slow, the weather came in terribly, and after the initial out and back flattish 12k of the run course, I decided to skip going to the top of Moel Siabod - it would have been a lot of suffering not just for me but also for the poor marshalls out there, and I didn't want "it" that bad...

The picture doesn't do it justice, but up there what you can't see is Moel Siabod. As I was warming myself up and drying off with a cup of coffee and some food at Plas Y Brenin, I heard a few stories from people coming off the mountain, which were getting worse and worse, so I reckon I definitely made the right choice - all credit to the ones who did complete the full course though, very very tough day.
IMG_20230730_190354 by Verena Zimmer, on Flickr

And Jeff, you really do live and play in a stunning part of the world.

Lovely. If those little trees on the right are normally vertical then yes you certainly had it windy .

Well done V, that sounds a tough one!

Verena wrote: ↑Mon Jul 31, 2023 12:19 pm And Jeff, you really do live and play in a stunning part of the world.

It's too bad eh?