Girls on Cogs

Miles: 48
Sunshine rating: Very sunny
Navigation: Excellent (well there was only really 2 roads involved!)

It was a lovely sunny weekend and with only 2 weeks before the start of LEJOG (Land’s End John O’Groats) it didn’t seem right not to be out cycling… Emma was away for the weekend and I’d been invited over to Rugby to see my friend Fabienne’s new house, so having checked the miles (only 24 according to google maps) I decided to cycle over there. I set out at 12.30, heading up great central way. I’d just got a text from Fab saying there was a pear cider waiting in the fridge (what a lovely mate she is!), so I decided to stick to the A426 all the way to Rugby (just in case my navigational skills should fail me on the country lanes…and inconveniently cause extra time!). I made good progress through Dunton Bassett, Lutterworth and followed the road south through Rugby to Bilton. I took a couple of right turns as instructed and was at Fab’s by 2.30. Excellent! We had a pleasant couple of hours sitting out in her spacious new garden, with a little cider and raspberries from my garden. Probably the wrong sort of calories but very nice! I headed back as it started to cloud over, and had a very comfortable ride back, in less than 2 hours.

Thought for the day: Nearly 50 miles cycling in the sunshine, a little cider in the garden can make a very pleasant Sunday afternoon, and still count as training!

Miles: 32

Pub stops: 2

Light aerobatics: 1

So it’s Wednesday night this week for cycling, and a lovely sunny evening but only 2 takers as Em was a bit under the weather…Stav and I planned a nice simple route (so as not to challenge my navigational skills too much) out towards Kings Norton, Ilston-on-the-hill and arrived in Tur Langton in about 50 minutes! Since we’d made good time we stopped at a nice pub in the village and had some good lasagne and an ale in the sunny beer garden before heading back through Kibworth, Wistow and into Kilby.  There was a 20 mph speed limit here, so we took the challenge and broke the speed limit!  It was still early, and there was another little pub – oh go on then!   It was then a shortish ride back through Counteshorpe and onto the cycle trail home – and my front light only jumped off once! 

Miles: 28

Punctures: Mat 1. Inner tube change 9 mins….not bad

How many of us biked to work…. 4 out of 5. Not bad, but could be better!!

So we are back into blogging and Tuesday nights cycling and this week it was a glorious evening. It is also Bike to Work Week incidentally.

Mat, Anna, Stav, Hels and I headed out along the canal to Watermead Park where Mat encountered his puncture. The rest of us enjoyed a short lived lie on the grass whilst Mat effortlessly changed it in 9 mins. I always make a meal of it and get covered in oil! I will take heed in the fact I am not a complete girl and can at least independently change a tyre. Although I love my new puncture resistant tyres. Life is so much easier!

We seemed to take forever to find our way out of Watermead and eventually headed out towards Syston, South Croxton and Ashby Folville for dinner.

Enjoyed a shandy sitting outdoors and had a pub meal.

Headed home in the dark, but this is fairly usual practice and also made good time, despite Helen’s lights jumping of her bike at least twice.

Miles Cycled : 80
Hours taken: 7.5
Navigation: Not bad

Well it made a pleasant change waking up at the Bamford Barn with a clear head! Hel’s and I tucked into a large bowl of porridge with some left over cream from last night……. Surely we need the calories!!
Everyone pulled together to clear up the barn and all headed off in different directions about 11.30am to go walking, climbing and mountain biking. Hel’s and I a little pleased with ourselves leaving 30 mins earlier than planned. We set off at a good pace and headed towards Bakewell and Matlock, using the A6, although it was busy it was also scenic and psychologically it worked well because we cycled nearly 30 miles in 2 hours…. If only for the massive hill towards Wirksworth!
Stav might have a point about the talking (see Tuesday night Club)!!! We did a lot less of it because of the busy road and progressed more miles.
We stopped every 2 hours to eat and apply much needed sun cream. As we approach Derby we decided to take the cycle route towards Melbourne and the signpost for Leicester. Started quite well and eventually ended up on the canal path. Again started reasonably well, but the signs disappeared and the good path turned into a very narrow and bumpy one. We next cycled along a path parallel to the A50. Slightly less scenic and more lots of broken glass! Also encountered a group of ‘youths’ on bikes who gave us a bit of banter. We politely thanked them for moving out of our way and cycled off at high speed…… shame it was the wrong way and had to cycled passed them again feeling a little stupid!
We were now on the homeward stretch, so decided to take the A6 again via Loughborough. We had a quick coke in the pub and set off. Again busy, but not too unpleasant and the sun was still shinning as we arrived home just before 7pm.

What we learned: The canal is not a good option and we probably should of remembered that from one of the early outings in the year.

Cycle paths are not always signposted well.

Less talking… maybe we should only do that every 2 hours?

Sunday night drinking in the pub garden with your mates….is brilliant!!

Miles estimated: 70

Miles cycled: 87

Route revisions: several (due to hilly minor roads…)

Hours taken: 9

With the weekends before the big trip racing past, we decided to cycle up to the Peaks for the summer barn weekend in Bamford.  Google maps said it would be approximately 70 miles, so with an average speed of 10mph (including breaks) we could take a half day off work and still get to the pub in time for food and couple of beers with the gang……or maybe not!).  We set off from Leicester at 1.30pm, and the sun was shining.  Lovely!  We headed out towards Newtown Linford, past the Ferrers Centre, through Melbourne and arrived in Mickleover around 4.30, over 30 miles completed.  We were both gasping for a drink, so had a break at a roadside pub for some iced cokes – well, we were on schedule and almost half way there (or so we thought…). 

Back on the road, we picked our way along some small, unclassified roads which appeared to be a fairly direct route northwards to Bakewell.  It was all very scenic, pretty cottages, rambling roses, sheep in the fields etc….but also very hilly and a bit slow going….and we were probably not going to make it to the pub in time for food.  Oh well…have to be chips on route – we’d eaten all our food and only had one dextrose tablet left between us).  By around 9, we were approaching Bakewell, having changed to B roads in the hope we could gain some time and speed.  We’d definitely be there for last orders!  From Bakewell, we sped along the A619 to Baslow, through Grindleford (there was a big hill here under the railway bridge, and no getting off to push as some of the gang might be driving past!) on to Hathersage, where it was only a couple of miles to Bamford.  Despite the light evenings, it was properly dark by the time we rocked up at the pub at 10.30, but we had done nearly 90 miles in 9 hours.  We’d not managed to find any chippies,  so time for a big pint of water (even I finished a whole pint of water before tucking into the beery refreshments) – and good news….the pub was open til 1am!  So we were able to enjoy the beer, the company of our friends, and a couple of games of pool.  Excellent.  (might revise the route home on Sunday though…)

What we learnt:  Add on at least 10% to the google miles, and avoid unclassified roads if you want to arrive in daylight (‘u’ roads not always shown on road atlases or signposted)

Part 1 Route planning, (Sat 16th May):
Planning hours: 2-3
Cups of coffee: lots!

It was a wet Saturday, so thought I’d make a start on the LEJOG planning. I settled down with a cup of coffee and booted up the laptop to search for a few blogs of previous trips, noting down ones with similar daily miles to those we’d planned…This was going to need a spreadsheet!

I started with a list of our dates, the YHA site, a road atlas and google maps to get an idea of miles. After a couple of hours and lots of cross referencing, I’d got some youth hostels located around 80 miles apart. This would take us up from Land’s End, through Cornwall, Devon, Avon, Worcestershire (where we could take advantage of bed and breakfast at my Mum and Dad’s), followed by a night at Em’s Dad’s (maybe we’d even acquire a couple of nice packed lunches as well – brilliant!), the Lake District and into Scotland. That was the first week sorted! Week 2 would take us up the west of Scotland, heading east past Loch Ness, and following the north coast up to John O’ Groats. Total mileage – approx 900 miles. Well, if we’re going to do a big trip, might as well go for the round 1,000 miles, (sorry Em!), so option 2 needed…

Part 2 Hostel booking, (Sun 25th May):

Planning hours: a couple
Trains booked: Leicester to Penzance..online ,with bike reservations (after several attempts!)
Hostels booked: 3 Scottish hostels and Scottish YHA membership! Best to start at either end and fill in the gaps later, giving the option to change our minds about the route!
Bottles of wine: 1

OK, so we’re up for some serious progress on the planning. I arrived at Em’s on Sunday evening for some food, a little glass of wine and to crack on with the planning. Mat had advised us the only site he’d managed to book online train tickets with bike reservations was National Express East Coast (thought they were coaches!?), Anyways, we worked our way through the booking stages about 5 times and eventually managed to secure the journey for us and the bikes – hurrah! So, onto hostels. We were struggling to find availability and on-line booking via YHA for Devon and Cornwall, so gave up (we’d have to resort to phoning them during the day – very inconvenient) and moved on to booking the final Scottish leg. Well, booking up either end first and filling in the middle bit later seemed more sensible. So we booked John O’Groats, Helmsdale and Carbisdale Castle. Would be nice to stay in a castle (still a hostel) and it would give us the luxury of 2 short mileage days at the end of the trip – marvellous! So a very successful start!

Part 3 Hostel booking continued…(Wed 10th June):

Planning hours: 2-3
Trains booked : 0 (Edinburgh to Leicester still coming in at over £100 so holding on for that one to come down.. ) I had previously managed to get John O’Groats to Edinburgh for around £13 each, by going into the train station and phoning Scottish Railways to confirm bikes – impossible to reserve online – very frustrating!
Hostels booked: 6 (+ 3 Em had phoned to book for first leg from Land’s End) so all sorted!!
Bottles of wine: 1

I headed round Em’s for tea, (and the customary bottle of wine to aid the stressful planning process) and we made great strides in our accommodation by completing the English leg of the journey and the first stretch through Scotland to join up the dots. We had to make a slight adjustment to our rest day as the hostel was full, as was the hostel with the hot tub (very disappointing), and B&Bs were coming in a bit above budget. So, rest day is now 1 day later than planned in Oban instead of Loch Lomond, but all accommodation is booked –much self-congratulating! And all in a couple of hours! Brilliant!

Hope know-one was worried we have been slacking on the training, just because we have been slacking on the blog!!! Although between Hel’s and I, we have struggled to cycle at the weekends, but have both once again been heavily involved in alcohol training!
Anyway at least Tuesday nights are back on. Despite smaller numbers than previous years, we have been back out cycling on a Tuesday night. This has probably been a summer past time for at least 5 years. We tend to meet about 6pm ish and head out into the county for about 25 miles and stop along the way for dinner in a local pub.

We recently cycled out to Mowsley heading out along The Great Central Way and towards Wigston, Countersthorpe and Saddington. Very nice and slightly more expensive than usual meal at The Staff of Life. Hel’s and I enjoyed ourselves but apparently we ‘were annoying’!! Stav complained we cycled too slow and talked too much……. he might be right about the talking!!!
Similar route the following week through Narborough, Willoby Waterleys and Arnesby and a curry. Not bad meal although one of the dishes looked like an ‘Uncle Ben’s’ cooking sauce!
Hel’s and I had a few navigational errors but were able to correct ourselves. Obviously Mat and Stav enjoyed this! They think we are going to zig zag up the country!