Crew: El Pres, Slim, Dunc, TJ, Butty, 3 Sheds, Mr I, Stunt.
Route: BL,Old road & full Zig Zags, Teggs from the top, White rabbit ascent to almost Nessit, foresty furtlings left hand side to join up with son of dentists descent. Up the road past the rangers station, left hand side ascent and up the steps, dentists descent, forest chapel, reverse chazza, usual spot.
Conditions: Warm and sunny, quite breezy, dusty dry trails, cold later.
Notes:
Critical mass this week, and weather still holding summery sunshine, so campfire protocols invoked 🙂
El Pres (and the ever amazing Charlotte) run the Curry and Beer logistics, Butty does routemastering, and the rest follow.
We are warned of the dangers of riding the wrong way up one way streets before we start…prophetic words (or possibly a conspiracy) as a yellow JCB careers round the corner as we head out!
All is well with the world when you can ride in short sleeves and shorts all evening (especially 2 weeks after snow!) and even a grumpy walker cannot dampen our spirits.
There does seem to be a lot of climbing, and some of us are not used to loose dry conditions (some are just back from training in exactly that!). Luckily no dabs reported.
Conditions under the forest canopy are as good as you can get, and sunlight through the trees gets slim all excited!
Dentists descent has seen better days – but it was worth an explore, top gear challenge to forest chapel sees the road lose out to the rocky steps!
Stunt delivers on one match ingition, victuals delivered as promised 🙂
Early season benefits are short grass, no midges (although the stiff breeze may also have helped), the bigger bits of wood are fairly damp – so its a smoky affair.
Despite a hard ride – we are beaten by the curry quantity, and fears of a lager shortage are unfounded.
Jupiter, Mars and ISS all spotted, world set to rights, and a tale of the strangely stretched tyre.
Cold winds and the need to properly douse the fire mean it’s not too late a night.
Warm winds overnight reported by many 😉