Category Archives: MTB

bikes, combe raiders, GPS, MTB, national park, UK

Exmoor ride – a three year late return

Leave a comment

With February completely devoid of blog posts, it would easy to say that not much really happened.  No travelling & no mountain-biking due to the persistently wet weather & soaking trails in the Forest.  As it turned out, it was just as well I planned very little as all of a sudden I ended up moving house (other end of the village with more living space, bike storage in the garage, fewer flatmates and a lot more conducive to sleep – a slightly longer ride to work, but that’s good) and then my car comprehensively failed its annual inspection and I had to find another in a hurry (unfortunately using money I was setting aside for a new bike & bikepacking gear).

So with March rolling around, I was all too pleased to get away to Somerset and a ride on Exmoor.  It having been much too long since my last visit on a memorably bleak, wet & freezing New Year ride. I was pleased to be back in one of England’s smallest national parks.  My first ride here was on vacation in 2008 when I left Mum at her cousin’s & hightailed it down to Taunton for the first of many visits.

Apparently it was a warmer weekend back at home, but it definitely wasn’t in Somerset – grey skies and the mercury just breaking freezing made for extra layers at the start of the ride, as it happens they stayed on the whole way around.  With the brakes still squealing like a stuck pig on my 1×9, I was single-speeding again – generally not so bad, but there were a few hills that I had to walk part of the way up.  The eight kilometre detour on the road after a missed turning didn’t particularly help.  The ride proper was mostly bridleways, crossing fields and a little bit of singletrack and linking road – a good mix with ample variation.

The furtherest part of the 8 km detour

Considering there were only four of us, we astonishingly managed to extend three hours of riding (37 km) in to a six and a half hour outing!  There were four punctures – I found mine just after Richard had finished fixing the first of his three, a coffee stop (sausage roll for me), and a delightful lunch at a guesthouse – the local corned beef, large slabs of delicious Exmoor blue cheese, ales and pickled shallots made for quite the ploughman’s lunch.  Additionally, we had the dining room to ourselves so the banter and broad put-on West Country accents could keep flowing without disturbing those in the village there to look at the carpets of recently blooming snowdrops.

John heading off to take photos

Richard fixing his first flat under the watchful eye of a large & menacing flock – menacing if you’ve seen Black Sheep, that is

D trying to make a poor choice of photo location more interesting than it was

The only advantage of being out so long was that the day eventually cleared

Not having been offroad for seven weeks I was pleased with how my legs stood up to the punishment that 32:16 hands out after a few hills and a long day in the saddle.  Strangely, up one particularly steep grunt of a climb my chain slipped off as I stood on the pedals (bashed my knee good & proper on the crown of my fork) – I shall have to shorten the chain by a couple of links and bring the eccentric bottom bracket back around a long way. I’m looking forward to Dartmoor with the same friends & a few others in a fortnight’s time.

Back to John & Anna’s for the night – entertaining the twins (three year old Esther & Lydia), a good film, an excuse to cook wonderfully unhealthy French toast & bacon for Sunday breakfast and best of all teaching the girls to ride a pedal bike. Such delight & excitement manifesting itself on faces – & that was just John & Anna! By the time we were all worn out, as well as riding unaided in lines of varying straightness – there was also proper steering and braking action going on. Much fun had by all – even me who was just running up & down the sidewalk/footpath entertaining the alternating bike-less child. A great return to weekends of going places & doing things – just as well, because that’s the first of eleven (at least) in a row.

bikes, combe raiders, GPS, MTB, UK

Devon Weekend – Sidmouth Ride

Leave a comment

With the Combe Raiders (Taunton based) travelling down to the Devon coast, it was an easy opportunity to head west and meet for a Saturday mountain-bike ride. Preferring not to drive two hours each way for a half-day ride, I made a weekend of it by finding a B&B a little further around the coast (south of Exeter).

One of the advantages (perhaps the only one) of starting work an hour earlier than strictly required is that it is easy to get Friday afternoons off. However, the unfortunate thing about travelling west to Devon & Cornwall is that there are no motorways. So I set off in plenty of time to tackle the A-roads; in the end the traffic was good and the trip only took the expected two and a half hours.

The airbnb.com find was another winner as I received a warm welcome in Starcross and was fed exceptionally well the whole weekend. With hosts that like to travel and cycle-tour (particularly in the States) there was plenty to talk about – Jim is planning an A-Z cycle tour of the States starting in Seattle and heading to Florida making sure he visits particular small towns in alphabetical order (X was a bit of a problem to find). The lovable dog and no-eyed cat (it still jumped up on to the back of the sofa etc.) also deserve mention.

It seemed to rain all Friday night, which didn’t bode well for the planned ride. As it turned out there were seven of us riding from John’s parents’ place in Sidmouth. With a group that size I decided I would be able singlespeed and not get left too far behind. We had a great ride, with temperatures in the mid-high single digits and a lot of water everywhere. It rained a fair bit on us, we got spectacularly sleeted on at one exposed stage and there were three reasonable-length mechanical stops (one of which was mine). But that was all part of the fun as there were some good climbs that were a challenge for all – especially me & 32:16 – and had everyone, gears or not, walking.

The flip-side of challenging climbs is proper descents – & with everything being very slippery, they certainly kept us on our toes. There were a few spills, but none too serious. The sun almost came out too at one stage – but that was about a mile away.  John (leading the ride, & riding yet another bike – I can’t keep up – this one a fully rigid 29er SS) was keen to head up one last hill to make a Figure-8 and add a few more miles to the paltry fifteen; that was vetoed in favour of cleaning up & heading down to the seaside for fish and chips.  That was a good decision – it was very tasty and much needed by all.

Devon countryside

Almost sun

Mechanical #2 – broken chain

The only real stream crossing & yet another shiny blue bike for John

I was pretty worn out, so Sunday was very leisurely with a big sleep-in, another (unexpected) full English and a relaxed drive back home via the coast in gorgeous sunshine (we got the days wrong for the ride). I stopped in and saw (Mum’s) cousin Pamela in Poole – the first time since I got my arm out of sling last year. I chose a good day as a roast was just coming out of the oven as I arrived – awesome – and great to catch up too (since I missed all the family news at Christmas just gone).

around home, bikes, engineering, history, MTB, UK, vehicles

Corfe Castle & Swanage Railway

Leave a comment

Somewhere reasonably local that I meant to go all summer was Corfe Castle, Swanage & the Purbecks.  Not being around for a single summer weekend kind of killed that plan, so with the sun shining brightly Saturday last I finally made the relatively short drive west past Poole.

A short leisurely walk from the Swanage Railway (more later) Park & Ride had me circling the base of the hill that the castle stands on.  Having been built by William the Conqueror, its a thousand or so years old, but was ruined during the Civil War when, as one of the last southern Royalist strongholds, it finally fell to the Parliamentarians.   As one would expect from a defensive position, the castle affords really good views of the picturesque Purbeck countryside.

With the castle such a ruin, although some of the walls still stand quite tall, there was plenty of space to wander around & explore – & avoid people, it’s quite a popular place to visit.  Apparently this is Famous Five country & the castle inspired the one on Kirrin Island – I was disappointed that I didn’t discover any dungeons, tunnels or bearded smugglers.

The other attraction around the village is the Swanage Railway that runs various steam locos down to the seaside at Swanage.  A much bigger operation than the Watercress Railway, I was surprised at just how popular it was – difficult to find a seat on one of the six carriages.  The Pullman Observation car looked pretty impressive too – alas, I didn’t have the pound coin needed to upgrade.

Down at Swanage it was time to finally visit the bikeshop I order quite a bit of stuff from – bit of a 29er, singlespeed, cargo bike haven.  I was quite surprised that they had Avanti bikes as their rentals – all the way from NZ.  Wandering down to the shore it was time for a late & large lunch – not much dinner needed that night.

Workmate Henry thought that eight o’clock on Sunday morning was a good time to meet on the other side of the Forest for a ride – he managed to choose the coldest morning of the season so far.  At least that meant it was clear again.  Driving out towards Burley in the mist from Brockenhurst I found all sorts of deer and longhorn cattle.  If it had have been a bit colder the ground may not have been so wet – however, we had a nice little pootle around before the others had to leave.

bikes, engineering, family, friends, MTB, NZ, snow, travel

NZ Visit – Southern Week

1 Comment

Continuing the multitude of too-brief visits, I said my goodbyes to Elizabeth & Cara at Wellington airport & flew south to Timaru where Dad & Adele were waiting for me.  With not having seen Dad in the three-plus years I’ve been away (two and a half years for Adele), it was great to see them again.  It’s a relatively short drive down to Oamaru and amongst poring (& laughing) over family photo albums we headed out to the Brydone (was there another choice?) for a meal.

The fleeting visit to Oamaru over (it’s never been home for me), we headed down to Dunedin to pick Mum from university (only eight months since I last saw Mum in London, but of course great to see her too).  It was an afternoon’s worth of leisurely driving through Central Otago to get to Adele’s place in Wanaka.

Adele gave me heaps for taking this photo through the windscreen, so I should share it

We stopped in St Bathan’s for a quick look at the old mining town (bypassed by the highway, so it’s pretty quiet) and a pint in the pub.

This passes for an old building in NZ, nice pub it was too

We were about a day out with the timing for the skiing, missing the biggest dump (60 cm) of the season just.  Still there was plenty of spring snow to play in for Wednesday afternoon.  High winds dictated that we go to Treble Cone – alas only half of their chairs were running.  When I say half, I mean one – a little smaller than the skifields I’m used to over this side of the world.

Still, with the setting above the lake, the snow-capped mountains surrounding and the high country not covered in snow – Treble Cone is one of the more beautiful ski areas I’ve skied at.  As this was my first ski since the shoulder operation, I was keen to just test the shoulder out gently for the afternoon.  (Bizarrely, the guy that hired me the skis comes from the same village that I live in here in the UK.)  Being mid-week & partially closed, the ski area was pretty empty and Adele & I had a good time on & off piste and I was well pleased with my shoulder.

Wednesday was set aside for tiki-touring.  As we got close to Lake Hawea, we could see a big storm rolling in from the west across the mountains.  We quickly did an about turn and headed south for a very pleasant day exploring old Cromwell (the town was flooded when the Clyde dam was built) and old hydraulic mining sites around Bannockburn.  There was a good hour-long stroll around the old mine workings – the gold was in the sedimentary rock & extracted by what was basically washing the side of the hill away with deluges of water.  This involved rather ingenious & large systems for storing and then directing the water to where it was needed.  The landscape was strangely reminiscent of the badlands of both Alberta & South Dakota in some ways.

Part of the mining area – original height would have been slightly higher that that on the right of picture

One of the bigger reservoirs & not a very interesting photo

That storm really did roll in that night as we were going out for dinner & the rain was still pelting down early in the morning.  The time that I was awake that night was pretty much spent thinking that I wouldn’t get to go for a mountain-bike ride with Adele (who thankfully has finally discovered while I’ve been away that MTBing is pretty cool) that morning before we headed back to Dunedin.  But peaking out the curtains at seven o’clock the sky was strangely clear.  I hustled off to rent a bike – I wanted a bog-standard hardtail but the shop was so disorganised that I ended up with a softtail 29er for the price of a hardtail, score.

Riding from home, we were quickly climbing up the Sticky Forest.  My leg work at the gym while shoulder was recovering seems to have paid off, the hills weren’t much of a problem – although that may have been those big wheels turning.  The trails had drained pretty quickly & we stayed relatively mud-free. We skirted around the edge of the lake to Albert Town before crossing the Clutha River.

The object of the crossing the river was to get Deans Bank Track – a recent DOC project.

Wonderful get-up borrowed from Adele – my old Dobies shorts & a commuter jacket

A few switchbacks to get up on to the plateau before north-west

Pretty spectacular spring morning ride

It’s a well thought out loop & I imagine a very fast loop if it’s properly dry – we had a good time checking it out.  Once again I was pleased with how my shoulder stood up to its longest ride in a long time.

Heading back to Albert Town, you can just make out the new trail down there

So that was a great ride out, about four hours and interrupted only by Adele somehow managing to gouge her big chainring in to the top of her calf – still don’t know how she was able to do that while riding uphill.  Back to Dunedin that afternoon, coincidentally good friends the Careys (where I had one of my 30th celebrations) were down visiting (youngest daughter) Fiona – so that was a good excuse to have another meal out, not too mention seeing James & Becca (I lay the blame of me moving to Canada for a year firmly at their feet – not that I’m complaining about that).

We even remembered to have a family photo, I’m sure I’m not that much taller – must be the cowboy boots

Goodbyes were said Saturday morning (best I don’t dwell on that too much) & I was back up to Auckland for a final pack, check progress of Andrew & Shelley’s kitchen and then fly back to London via LA.  After years of people saying how much of a hassle security is at LAX when in transit, it turns out that is all false – we didn’t even have to go through security again, unlike at Hong Kong.  Home Sunday, back to work the next day to find that I was being sent to Italy the following week for work.  That was a real shame.