Crew: El Pres, Slim, Butty, TJ, Croxy, Lee, Dunc, Smiffy, Bern, PTD, Stunt
Route: Zag, Windyways, Walker Barn, Tea rooms, Cat, Danebower hollow, A54, Cumberland Clough/Brook, Wildboarclough, Standing Stone, Back of the Moon, Shutlingsloe steps, singletrack by the bench, S bends, Nessit hill, normal tracks to the road, but no bob’s bench/ressies and straight to Kings Head.
Conditions: Warm, sunny and midgy
Notes:
After a summer of holding the fort on ride leaderships Pete throws down the gauntlet of organising tonights ride to the collective….and gets a classic route with a kings head finish set up by the president himself!
With a hard food deadline of 20:30 and a decent amount of ground to cover, a 17:45 start is required…and 9 out of 11 riders are there on time (ish).
By the time the peleton is at the tea rooms, we have been caught up by Stunt and PTD to be all present and correct.
No need for a route progress auditor (aka time nag) tonight..the presence of midges is a powerful motivator to keep moving!!
Danebower is dry loose and skittish, Chumby clough has nice dry rock free edges, but the brook section is a rockfest requiring complete concentration!! Gate duty = being attacked by midges, Bern heroically mans the lower gate before the ford.
Wildboarclough is full of young pheasants…hundreds of them, surely they have been bred for shooting and released recently as we have never seen this many before in all our years.
..or if could be that the logging on the North side has cleared them out of their woodland habitat??
The alpaca’s in the field by the turn up to standing stone were rocking the poodle look – presumably post shearing for their rather excellent wool.
Driven hard by the midges, and the fast trails we are at Standing stone with 50 minutes to use up…so a back of the moon mini loop is added. A push up for most (rideable on an ebike) we crest to glorious low sun, savour the most amazing conditions across the moor, then fly down the steps to the gate.
Speaking of flying, Butty has brought with him his hand sized dji mini drone which will give us some great footage of the evening.
We do the overgrown singletrack to the S bends (if we don’t use it, then it will get lost forever), no nipple whipping reported, but plenty of scratches!
Just time to take a few pics at Dan’s bench before hareing downhill (careful of the loose stuff Dunc!). We have to skip the bob’s bench side of the ressie due to the difficulty of getting through the works on the dam, and it’s a hard pedal down to the pub to be on time for food.
Wonderfully looked after by the team there, Inception and Landlord quench the thirst, and the food goes down well too.
Talk of a bivvy night soon, and TJ shows off a small fan/light device for blowing up your matress/tent.
After last weeks excesses, tis a night of moderation with even the axis of evil only being 3 pints and a whisky to the good.