tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-39548333189258933612023-11-16T13:40:49.070+00:00The Piranha BrothersBPheasanthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05789261682093840738noreply@blogger.comBlogger364125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3954833318925893361.post-29702634904619947402014-03-11T20:56:00.000+00:002014-03-11T20:56:37.127+00:00Spiny Norman has done for the Piranha BrothersYes, a combination of violence and sarcasm were not enough to keep the twelve foot (or perhaps eight hundred foot) hedgehog at bay. As such, much effort has been spent over the last two dark rainy months of this particularly wet English winter making a new home for these tales of biking and travel. Expecting many more biking and travel stories to follow, you can now find them at <a href="http://www.bikingpheasant.com/">bikingpheasant.com</a>.<br />
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If you've followed these posts by email, you can subscribe to new posts using the widget on the left of the page. There's still plenty of formatting to do, but as the days are now longer & warmer it's no longer the priority that transferring all the content was (which, while a tedious job, meant that I got to relive the last six years of stories, riding and other adventures).<br />
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For those that have read much of the content here - thanks for the comments & feedback, any useful ones about the new site would be appreciated. After a six week break with not much to say, I've remembered I quite like writing - so looking forward to the upcoming summer.BPheasanthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05789261682093840738noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3954833318925893361.post-37265232216324406062014-01-26T12:48:00.002+00:002014-01-26T12:48:46.332+00:00Whitchurch, Watership Down & Basingstoke loops: Hampshire Off Road Cycle TrailsLooking for somewhere else close to home to string a big off-road loop together, I happened across the <a href="http://www3.hants.gov.uk/cycling/cycle-trails.htm" target="_blank">Hampshire County Council's page dedicated to off-cycle trails</a>. Almost two years ago (my last ride before shoulder surgery) <a href="http://www3.hants.gov.uk/cycling/cycle-trails.htm" target="_blank">I did the Whitchurch loop</a> & so had some idea of the terrain involved & what I would be getting myself in for - nothing horrific. I also remembered that some of the loops connected to each other. So with a bit of printing, I was ready to hit the <a href="http://www.hants.gov.uk/rh/cycling/whitchurch.pdf" target="_blank">Whitchurch</a>, <a href="http://www.hants.gov.uk/rh/cycling/watership-down.pdf" target="_blank">Watership Down</a> & <a href="http://www.hants.gov.uk/rh/cycling/basingstoke.pdf" target="_blank">Basingstoke</a> loops - I hoped that this would give me about eighty to ninety kilometres of mostly off-road riding through some nice villages & with a few more hills than last week's New Forest ride.<br />
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Being the least distance to drive to the loop (a shade under forty miles), I parked in the free car park in Whitchurch (Bell St, just west of the main junction in the village). The day was the pick of the weekend's forecast weather, so I was hoping to get around before the late-afternoon rain turned up. After all the recent rain, everything was sodden but it wasn't too hard going to start with. It was odd riding through villages & farms that I bothered to stop to take photos of two years ago. There wasn't the need this time.<br />
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The long downhill to cross the A34 was very tricky as it was extremely muddy, rutted & slippery. The trail actually crosses the busy dual-carriageway here - but there is a permissive bridleway along the edge of a field to an underpass. I thought this was a good idea until halfway through the puddle in the underpass. By the time I got off my bike, I realised it wasn't so much a puddle as a pond & I was standing in rather cold water up to my waist. Quickly hoisting my bike (large tyres sure help with buoyancy) out of the water I reassessed & ducked around to the right of the end of the tunnel & clambered up to the edge of the road through too much blackberry. End result was I had to ride the wrong way along the edge of the road, & my shorts were soaked. None of this was a problem - the largest inconvenience being that the maps in my pocket were now soaked; they were still readable, but required a little more care in folding & unfolding. My advice whatever the weather - see if you can cross A34 through the traffic - there is a gap in the median barrier; it'll save a tedious detour & perhaps getting very wet.<br />
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Soon I was climbing up to Watership Down & new trails. At marked point 11, I continued straight on Wayfarers Walk (instead of turning left on Meadham Lane) as this provided more bridleway & less road. It was muddy & slow. I was about halfway through the ride a little way into the Basingstoke loop, this is graded as moderate (not strenuous) so there's a bit more road & it was nice to get away from the mud for a while & the path crossed the Test and railway numerous times. Rejoining the Watership Down trail at Ibworth, the next section after Bailey Hall Farm was truly horrendous energy-sapping claggy mud for a mile and a half. Not much fun, but all ridable.<br />
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Stopping in the village of Kingsclere I had a few energy sweets (I ate very little on this whole ride, which is rather unusual) before heading off on the road towards Sydmonton & to finish the Watership Down loop & rejoining the Whitchurch one. I turned left before Sydmonton to miss out points three to seven on the map - because I don't like repeating bits if I don't have to & the wind was really picking up & a big black cloud was making its way ominously from the south east. Up on the ridge, the wind was rather extreme - I'm never a big fan of having to pedal downhill. Turning on to the Caesar's Belt of the Portway (part of the old Roman road that used to run from London to Weymouth - so it's dead straight), I turned in to the wind & it was a hard slog. Thankfully the rain that fell was only a light drizzle for a few minutes - not enough to put a jacket on.<br />
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There was a few miles of road back in to Whitchurch where I could load up the car & get out of the rather muddy clothes. A good day ride with plenty of mud to burn a bit of extra energy - and at eighty-five kilometres, my estimation proved correct.<br />
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<iframe frameborder="0" height="548" src="http://connect.garmin.com:80/activity/embed/435443113" width="465"></iframe>BPheasanthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05789261682093840738noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3954833318925893361.post-28047331685516152772014-01-21T16:58:00.001+00:002014-01-21T16:58:07.205+00:00New Forest cycle tourNot so long ago I stumbled across the <a href="http://www.forestry.gov.uk/pdf/new-forest-cycle-code.pdf/$FILE/new-forest-cycle-code.pdf">new Forestry Commission map of cycle routes in the New Forest</a>. I printed a couple of copies & put them to one side, not really thinking too much of it. But over the last few weeks successive people have come into my office & pilfered copies - so I keep printing more. Finally I got around to studying it a bit more closely last week & realised just how extensive the network really is - there's not much coverage in the corner of the Forest I live in, so I've never really investigated before.<br />
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With no real plans for the weekend, Sunday looked the better of the two days to be in the sun so I started to loosely plan an all-day ride. As it was, Sunday was a glorious sun-drenched day so I headed out early to make the most of it. The first part getting to the marked trails was ridiculously muddy & proper hard work - just as well it's flat; even so, it wasn't long before I had to shed a layer.<br />
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Mostly on the cycle trails, with a small amount on quite roads (except for crossing the very busy dual-carriageway A31 near Rufus Stone), I made steady progress and within a few hours I was pretty much on the other side of the Forest. This was not somewhere I'd ever considered riding before, so that was good going - and at sixty kilometres - about halfway through what I thought would be the day's distance.<br />
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There's never a shortage of nice pubs serving food on such rides, so at about one o'clock I happened on the Old Beams Inn & stopped long enough to actually take a photo. This one had the Sunday carvery going, which is quite popular; after only eating half a Clif Bar since setting out a huge plate of roast meat & veges really hit the spot. Pleasingly, I didn't get a stitch as I rode off. <br />
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While the first half of the day was mainly off-road, I'd planned the second half predominantly on-road as I was keen to get down to Christchurch or Highcliffe & see the sea. Heading south on the edge of the Avon flood plain, there was still an awful lot of surface water from the last weeks of rain on the lanes to ride through or avoid. I had a quick peak at Highcliffe Castle (didn't think to get the camera out) & enjoyed the miles of cliff top riding from Barton-on-Sea east towards Lymington as the sun slowly sunk. With just quiet country lanes left, the last twenty kilometres wasn't really as much of a struggle as I thought it would be. A great day out, not really rushing & with plenty of general exploring. While 125 km ranks as my longest ride in a day, it was nowhere near the hardest & I haven't suffered since with aching muscles - so that's a bonus.BPheasanthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05789261682093840738noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3954833318925893361.post-84102343369775632952014-01-12T16:57:00.000+00:002014-01-12T16:57:16.944+00:00The Purbecks, again.With the promise of a whole day of no rain, it made sense to use the money to drive over the Swanage & deliver my front wheel to the bike shop rather than post it. Of course, this gave the opportunity to ride more hills than there are at home. Scrabbling all the Swanage trails I could find together on my GPS, I was hoping I could get about 80 km done in six hours.<br />
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It was sunny, chilly in the northerly, proper muddy and all good fun. The cake & pasty stops in Corfe Castle were as good as always. Strangely on the Coast Path I bumped in to a couple of riders coming the opposite direction - I recognised them as I rode past, I rode most of my <a href="http://nobodyexpectsthe-s-i.blogspot.co.uk/2013/07/just-riding-mostly.html">first MTB Marathon</a> with them in Shropshire last summer. Fifteen minutes of catching up ensued before I did another loop & ended up back at the bikeshop for much talk about bikes (what else?).<br />
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<iframe width='465' height='548' frameborder='0' src='http://connect.garmin.com:80/activity/embed/428243207'></iframe>BPheasanthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05789261682093840738noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3954833318925893361.post-59306330284478867492013-12-29T21:14:00.002+00:002013-12-29T21:14:33.984+00:00Spam, egg, sausage & spam<div style="text-align: left;">With a name such as the SPAM Winter Challenge, I could hardly miss this for the obvious Python connection.</div><br />
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Now that that's out of the way, I may continue with a brief summary of what was clearly the last bike event of 2013 for me (I've managed seven this year, significantly more than any other year since I left NZ). Just over an hour's drive north up on Salisbury Plain, a few of the Combe Raiders were coming across from Somerset for this event that tries to deal with the Christmas excesses. With all the storms & rain that we've had over the last week, it was just as well this was supposed to be a course that deals with all sorts of weather well. <br />
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It's been a very mild winter so far, so it was with some surprise that I had to scrape a frost off my car as I set off this morning. This did mean that it was a wonderfully clear day - ideal for a ride. Driving up the A360 it was clear that the event was in the middle of the largest MOD training area in the country - there were signs for tanks crossing & signs warning of unexploded ordnance frequently. Unusually, the race briefing warned us to ensure we didn't ride into any tanks or stray off the trail and do a commendable impression of jumping high into the sky & scattering in thousands of pieces. Eventually the others made it from Somerset - some not quite in the knick of time for the 10 am start.<br />
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The first quarter of the fifty kilometre circuit was definitely the best. I really should learn to get a reasonable position mid-field at the start of such events - battling through a surprisingly large field up a long & slow climb is tedious. After that climb there were a few dives down off the ridge & back up again - mostly on rough muddy doubletrack through fields, with a bit of singletrack. The mud was pretty gloopy & horrendous for sticking to everything, but not too difficult to ride through (it did end up taking over an hour to clean my bike properly once home). We then found ourselves on the road for about twenty kilometres as we rode through the army land - boring, but preferable to being blown sky-high. It was a perfect day for riding: extensive views over the beautiful Wiltshire countryside, still, and not too hot or cold (about 5 ºC).<br />
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The strangest part of the day was riding through the middle of a fake-village. There were dozens of house-shells - they seem to have walls, roofs, floors, fences and little else. Clearly these are used for urban warfare training. The only real thing in the village was the church, which had parishioners walking to it; there were a lot of people around. [A little research shows that this was the village of Imber - it was evacuated in 1943 for the war effort & the villagers have never been allowed to return as the MOD continues to use the land - a lot like <a href="http://nobodyexpectsthe-s-i.blogspot.co.uk/2013/05/ssuk-2013.html" target="_blank">Tyneham</a> which I happened across during another biking weekend in May. The church is no longer in use, but the roads that we were riding along are open occasionally so the public can have a look around.]<br />
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As this was the last event of a year of much biking, I was pretty keen to see how quickly I could get around the course. So I only stopped for forty seconds on the whole ride to get some food out of my pack; also, this meant I didn't even carry my camera - so I only have my memory of how splendid the countryside was. After passing plenty of birdwatchers, derelict tanks, garrisons & barracks we finally got off the road. More short steep ups & downs later we were back along the ridge looking north for a while - I'm a little disturbed at my ability to recognise a cement works from a long distance. I shouldn't have been as surprised as I was to ride past a huge hole in the ground shortly after - the limestone had to come from somewhere after all.<br />
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We rejoined the two shorter courses for a while before diving off the ridge for one last really steep nasty climb. With a nice bit of singletrack in some woods, the car park & therefore finish line was tantalisingly close for much too long. But it was worth getting to the finish line for the cake alone - a local hospice was fundraising and there was a plethora of cakes on offer, there was so much choice it was overwhelming. So not the most interesting course, but a great day out on the bike to end a pretty big year of riding for me - & a good chance to catch up with mates too. I was happy with finishing in 2:40, without really pushing myself just not stopping for chats, photos or much food.<br />
<iframe width='465' height='548' frameborder='0' src='http://connect.garmin.com:80/activity/embed/421246033'></iframe>BPheasanthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05789261682093840738noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3954833318925893361.post-41438157383418574732013-12-18T23:10:00.000+00:002013-12-19T18:13:45.415+00:002013 - a lot more biking than the previous year<div style="text-align: left;">
After reading last year's Christmas letter, I can see just how different 2013 has ended up being. The main driver for that is that my shoulder is completely normal after last year's surgery & rehab (so much so that when people occasionally ask after it, I'm always slightly taken aback). That has meant that excessive travelling fell by the wayside as I spent much time biking. Before much biking, there was last winter to get through - I escaped to Egypt for sun at Christmas last; <a href="http://nobodyexpectsthe-s-i.blogspot.co.uk/2013/01/pyramids.html" target="_blank">Christmas morning at the pyramids</a> was certainly unusual. A country still in a state of upheaval & flux, it was a fascinating trip.</div>
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I moved into a new role at work about a year ago, which meant quite a few months of learning plenty while still trying to tidy up things in my previous position. Along with my car comprehensively failing its annual inspection & many problems with the replacement, what turned out to be some of the best concentrated biking I've had was a welcome change.<br />
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After a couple of days having a look around Chicago, I met Megan, Alex & their son, Finn, in Utah. We went to mountain-bike mecca Moab and did little except camp, <a href="http://nobodyexpectsthe-s-i.blogspot.co.uk/2013/04/moab-riding-begins-again.html" target="_blank">ride bikes</a> (a lot) and eat. As on my last visit, the scenery was stunning and the riding exceptional. <i>STOP PRESS - Megan has just made a rather fun video that makes me yearn for sun, rocky trails, & great riding - much more interesting than me prattling on about Moab.</i><br />
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<a href="http://vimeo.com/82235481">Biking Moab 2013</a> from <a href="http://vimeo.com/user4904156">Megan Dunn</a> on <a href="https://vimeo.com/">Vimeo</a>.<br />
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The summer was bookended by two big trips biking - Moab being the first. That meant that I travelled very little during the summer - but that worked out well as we actually had a cracking summer of weather in the UK & the riding was plentiful. Preparing for a three-day stage race in September I entered a number of longer-distance events around the south-west UK & Wales. This being about the only photo of I have me "racing" - on a strangely scorching Shropshire day:<br />
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The other bookend event for the summer was the three-day <a href="http://nobodyexpectsthe-s-i.blogspot.co.uk/2013/09/rift-valley-odyssey-day-one.html" target="_blank">Rift Valley Odyssey</a> in Kenya. Partly an excuse to get back to Africa & visit Adrian and partly a nice big riding adventure to train for & achieve, I was pleased to return to Africa - it's a fascinating place after all. The summer of preparation did me well & the only real difficulty in the 5500 metres of climbing over three days and 260 kilometres was a bit of digestive trouble at the top of a huge, hot & humid climb halfway through Day Two - not sure if it was the heat, too much food or the anti-malarial tablets; anyway, I survived the remainder of the day on next to no food and recovered enough that the last day (eighty-odd kilometres) was easy.<br />
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I was too busy riding to get many photos, but I quite like these two taken while riding along:<br />
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The second week of the trip was spent in Tanzania with Adrian, Carmen & their two children. As they'd only just moved there, it was a relaxed week as they settled in a bit more and I recovered from the big bike ride. Adrian & I did grab the chance for an overnight trip to a relatively close <a href="http://nobodyexpectsthe-s-i.blogspot.co.uk/2013/10/tarangire-np-camping.html" target="_blank">national park</a> - there were many more elephants around than I saw on my last safari four years ago; an excellent end to another fantastic trip visiting Adrian & Carm.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgVVCsfGZVoR9qFdT41g73nwgyK0AuA3Nsah6BPjgqvxIuUJoQ-A98FMHV-t0aBIuqszdPTEiG9gM-XSd5KrZLZ7sAVZuFS7KwepcWxJF_NAn9bZ6xSo_g3KpZdqERTVK2rmo5dmgbSWPIF/s1600/IMG_1155.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgVVCsfGZVoR9qFdT41g73nwgyK0AuA3Nsah6BPjgqvxIuUJoQ-A98FMHV-t0aBIuqszdPTEiG9gM-XSd5KrZLZ7sAVZuFS7KwepcWxJF_NAn9bZ6xSo_g3KpZdqERTVK2rmo5dmgbSWPIF/s320/IMG_1155.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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Many months before, it seemed a good idea to book a trip to New England in the fall - after a particularly busy return to work, it wasn't seeming so smart. Nonetheless, I was pretty sure that I'd enjoy a short road trip around the north-east of North America. With little biking, beautiful autumnal colours, nice cities (Montreal & Boston particular favourites) and absolutely fabulous food it turned out to be a very relaxing trip which was well worth it. Although the photos don't really compare to Utah and Africa - here's one of Ottawa:<br />
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Shortly after my return from Canada, all medium-term plans got thrown to the wind as it was revealed that the plant where I work would close next year. It was a sudden, but not altogether surprising announcement; things are becoming clearer now & I'm looking forward to a 2014 that will be very different to what I was expecting. As far as I can tell, I'll have work for about half the year - during which I will frantically save & prepare for extensive time biking in places yet to be decided. Mum, & probably Adele, plan on visiting for a cousin's wedding in May - so I'm well looking forward to that.<br />
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Merry Christmas & may the new year be a great one for you. BPheasanthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05789261682093840738noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3954833318925893361.post-87552662473280438062013-12-16T18:11:00.001+00:002013-12-16T18:11:13.056+00:00Christmas RidesIt's been a bit quiet on here recently - mainly because me riding pretty much every day for the last four weeks is not all that interesting for anyone but me (& the odd other bike nut). I've upgraded the wheels on my Surly Ogre to Stans Arch rims & tyres to Nobby Nics - it's a marked improvement in weight, grip, reassurance, acceleration, rolling resistance &, most of all, fun. The following week there was a rather chilly night spent bikepacking out in the New Forest just north of Burley somewhere.<br />
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Then Christmas ride season began - first up with the biggest group of Combe Raiders I've ever seen:<br />
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This on the strangely misty Quantocks - & quite damp under wheel as well. Dave got stuck on a stick:<br />
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Much to my surprise, I won the hill climb (by getting the furtherest up a rather steep & technical ascent) - I was well pleased with my giant certificate (that's a large & very good paperback on the left).</div>
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After not really earning it from a less than twenty kilometre ride, it was off to a nearby pub for the award ceremony & an awful lot of food. Great time had by all - although I had to go for a harder ride the following day to get the most out of my two hundred mile round-trip.<br />
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This weekend past I managed two more Christmas rides - and associated meals of course. The Vindaloo group of the local MTB club (which I ride with if I'm around every second Sunday - so hardly ever over the past two years) had their Christmas ride & curry planned very local to me on Friday night. The bikes decorated with Christmas lights and wrapping paper and the costumes made the whole thing seem a lot more festive than the Combe Raiders event. It was only a short local ride, but it was a nice warm, dry evening & there was plenty of good food.<br />
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For some reason I thought it a good idea to ride my single speed twenty-odd kilometres to the Christmas ride & dinner for the whole club - this after seeing a rather dismal looking weather forecast. Anyway, it rained pretty much all day - but it wasn't cold. Annoyingly, my front brakes failed about thirty kilometres in - so I rode most of the day with rear brakes of dubious usefulness (just as well the Forest is almost entirely flat). Somewhere out near Burley & Picket Post our fearless leaders started to get a little vague in our route - just as we got out of the trees onto the heathland in the driving rain. Oh well - we made it back to the pub eventually for another huge meal. It probably was just as well I had to ride all the way home - wasn't really intending to do close on eighty singlespeed kilometres for the day, but I survived & really quite enjoyed it.BPheasanthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05789261682093840738noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3954833318925893361.post-32229536116427473132013-11-17T21:29:00.000+00:002013-12-05T19:28:38.672+00:00Overnight ride - trying out a lot of gear for the first timeFriday past I finally got around to trying out almost all the new kit I'd acquired over the summer on a rather easy overnight bikepacking trip with a couple of guys from the local club. For those not really interested in bikes, I didn't even take any photos as it was pretty much all in the dark - so sorry about that. I'll cover the ride first & then give some initial impressions of the new gear.<br />
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All week I'd kept an eye on the forecast for Friday night - as the weekend approached, the expected temperature kept dropping. So my bike was a bit more loaded than I initially thought it would be as I met Mike & James at Chilworth Arms for a quick pint before heading out into the winter's night. It's been about a year since I've been on a night ride, my single handlebar light set-up is adequate but nothing fancy. I'd forgotten how much fun night-riding is when it's not raining or ridiculously muddy. We mostly rode bridleways & farm tracks due north - connected by the odd country road. Being Hampshire, there weren't really any climbs of note, although the Beacon Hill downhill was enjoyable & comparatively long. The pace was nothing too strenuous, which I was happy to go along with as I got used to riding a much heavier bike than usual.<br />
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With an almost-full moon out I was loving riding through the countryside that could have only been English - reminded by the silhouettes of very cute villages; in the daylight it all looked very expensive, but in the dark the detail was lost & it just looked nice. By nine o'clock it was time to stop at our northern-most point, Crawley, and head for dinner at the lovely Fox & Hounds. For some reason the other two weren't content with a few pints and dinner - I wasn't prepared to try & keep up as the Jack Daniels & Coke and brandies flowed. It was all very enjoyable and I haven't been quizzed on so many details of New Zealand for a long time. Those drunker than me were quite surprised by the size of the bill, but that was eventually settled and as the bar staff declared we were quite mad, we rolled away at one o'clock - some in straighter lines than others.<br />
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The chosen camp area was about an hour back south (on a more easterly route - closer to Winchester) and somehow I (the only one who wasn't familiar with the area) ended up navigating. I'm not sure what the villagers of Sparsholt must have thought about much laughter when Mike managed to ride into quite a large & obvious hedge & then fall on the ground. We made camp at two o'clock and settled in for the night - I was declared soft for having a tent, the other two happy to sleep with no cover on a fine frosty night. Not surprisingly, we didn't stir until nine-thirty on a cracking Saturday morning. After a light breakfast & decamping we were riding shortly after the hour back to my car.<br />
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So a very manageable introduction to bikepacking that I thoroughly enjoyed - helped by some superb weather & good company.<br />
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Now for some quick thoughts on those items I was using for the first time on a bikepacking trip. Below is a photo of the set-up that is almost as I used on the weekend - the main difference being the dry bags were fully loaded due to the clear, cold night.</div>
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The thirteen litre dry-bag on the handlebars is secured to a <a href="http://www.wildcatgear.co.uk/shop/handlebar-systems/wildcat-gear-mountain-lion/">Wildcat Mountain Lion harness</a>. The dry-bag was packed to the gunwales with my tent & poles and winter sleeping bag. The harness held it securely, although on the return trip I had to tighten the straps as I must've repacked it differently. I did find that with the dry-bag so full, I had to lock the front fork out as the bag would rub on the front tyre if the fork compressed too far - I don't expect this to be a problem for most of my bikepacking in summer as the bag won't be so heavily loaded.<br />
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On the back of the saddle, the eight litre dry-bag is held in a <a href="http://www.wildcatgear.co.uk/shop/seat-systems/wildcat-gear-tiger/">Wildcat Tiger</a>. In the picture, it isn't loaded very much - but it definitely was for this trip. At first I thought that I wouldn't be able to fit the full bag in, & even if I could it would rub on the rear tyre. But some careful adjustment of the straps had the bag in the harness & securely held. I was very impressed by how stable the bag was - it didn't swing around at all; in fact, I occasionally had to turn around to check the dry-bag was still in the harness - so oblivious was I to its presence.<br />
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In the middle of frame is the custom-made (you trace your frame on to a piece of cardboard & send it to them) <a href="http://www.alpkit.com/shop/cart.php?target=product&product_id=16786&category_id=324" target="_blank">Alpkit Stingray frame bag</a>. I've had this for a few months, so know that it performs just as it should - for this ride I'd stuffed it full of all sorts of little things, I'll have to get a bit more organised for longer tours.<br />
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My water carrying for this little trip was courtesy of two bottles attached to each leg of my front fork - not shown in the picture (the bottles, that is). For this I've got two <a href="http://www.freeparable.com/monkiicage" target="_blank">monkii cages</a> mounted on <a href="http://www.freeparable.com/monkiicage" target="_blank">monkii clips</a> - as I've swapped out the rigid fork for a suspension fork there are no longer any cage mounts. The clips are secure and I don't have a problem carrying a full 750 mL bottle. However, while it is possible to carry a one litre Nalgene bottle on the cage, if it does get bumpy the bottle can escape - so it's worth securing it to the fork. I need to rethink this a bit. Also, while having bottles mounted on the forks is good for carrying water - it's no good for hydration while riding as it's a faff to have to stop to drink. So I need to get a bottle holder on the handlebars somewhere. I found on this trip I didn't drink at all while riding - that was OK as it was pretty cool, so dehydration wasn't a problem (the pub stops helped too). But in warmer conditions, this would be a problem.<br />
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I've also got a <a href="http://www.bearbonesbikepacking.co.uk/pages/contact.html" target="_blank">tiny meths stove</a> - it's only good for heating up enough water to make a cup of porridge or a hot drink. It's suitable for such a small trip, but I'll have to get around to making some sort of <a href="http://www.jureystudio.com/pennystove/penny2.html" target="_blank">penny stove</a> out of a beer can for larger cooking requirements.<br />
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I'd been eyeing up various lightweight single-person tents that I could easily carry on my handlebars for some time when <a href="http://evilmoose.me/" target="_blank">Megan</a> mentioned that she was keen on the Six Moon Designs - Skyscape Trekker. It ticked all the boxes I needed it too, so I rather hurriedly bought it (much to Megan's chagrin) and arranged to have it shipped to Boston during my recent visit - craftily avoiding high shipping costs & twenty percent VAT. It definitely is lightweight & the material is subsequently very thin - but I haven't torn it yet; most importantly, it's very easy to carry on the bike. I had one practice run a couple of weeks ago pitching it in a gale out in the New Forest - I managed that OK, so five pegs & two poles at two o'clock in the morning was a cinch. I did notice that my thermarest Neoair does tend to slide around a fair bit on the floor of the tent when I moved in my sleeping bag - possibly not helped by the slight incline I was on. It seems good so far, more nights sleeping in it will show if that's correct.<br />
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That's probably enough initial gear reviews for one post.BPheasanthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05789261682093840738noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3954833318925893361.post-47433861058914406712013-11-02T22:02:00.000+00:002013-12-05T19:44:00.140+00:00Through New York to NiagaraTime constraints dictated that I get back to Toronto in only two days, so the Friday was very boring driving much too far on I-90 (which I hadn't been on since Montana, Wyoming & South Dakota two years ago). The west of Massachusetts was much more heavily wooded & hilly than I was expecting. Still, state highways would have been preferred.<br />
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I stayed with a very lovely almost-retired airbnb couple in northern Rochester for the night. Just to stretch the legs I took the short walk down to Lake Ontario. I wasn't expecting to see deer roaming the suburbs.<br />
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There were still plenty of red trees around in the fading daylight.<br />
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I got down to the lake & this storm rolled in, so I retreated back to the house & had a big Skype chat with Mum - which after a week of meeting strangers was nice.<br />
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Once again, I managed to get fed not just breakfast (a delicious [goes without saying] bacon & egg roll from a food-van decades in business at the local Farmers Market), but dinner too from my hosts. But hoping to get to Toronto mid-afternoon via the Falls, I left pretty early & took the gentle drive around the lake to Niagara on a miserable-weather morning.<br />
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I managed to view the Falls pretty well from both the American & Canadian side - you definitely get the best wide-angle view from Ontario. On this particular day, the American side was good for feeling the Falls blowing in your face. Not much to say really as they're so well know - there's a lot of water falling a fair way & it's all very spectacular. I opted out of the Maid of the Mist boat trip for time reasons, plus I was getting plenty wet standing above plummeting water. <br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Looking down at all those that are about to get soaked through their matching ponchos.</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The sideshow American & Bridal Veil Falls.</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">I swapped photos with a couple of other tourists - it's a rubbish one of the falls & only slightly better of me. But oh well, I was there.</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The Horseshoe Falls</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Watching a fair current of water plummet into much peril.</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">There I am again - perhaps I'm trying to smile, it's a little hard to tell.</td></tr>
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The drive to Toronto started out in dire conditions & was much shorter than I thought. By the time I arrived the sun was out & I was back where I had been nine days before picking up Jane. What a completely enjoyable trip, I do so enjoy travelling in North America; although after the last two big trips (Moab & Kenya) had been MTBing focused, it was a little odd to have a less strenuous trip. At least I managed a fair bit of city-biking & walking - that helped to counter all the fantastic food, I suppose.<br />
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One last dinner out, this time in the old Distillery district - which Cat was keen to visit for the first time & with the largest collection of Victorian industrial buildings in North America, I was hardly about to say no. There was too much choice as far as cafes & restaurants went; we briefly contemplating skipping dinner altogether and just camping in the divinely-smelling chocolate shop. But we did find a very good brew-pub & an even-better-than-the-last pumpkin ale. I dropped Cat off at work and packed before spending a sleepless night lying on the lounge floor (I was determined to not have carried my sleeping bag & thermarest all the way for no reason) listening to the traffic outside.<br />
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I snuck out at awful-o'clock, returned the car & started the trip home - crossing pretty much the last thing off my food-to-eat-once-for-old-times'-sake list by grabbing some timbits for the flight home. They proved invaluable when I discovered them in my hand-luggage before setting off on the nasty storm strewn drive home from Heathrow.BPheasanthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05789261682093840738noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3954833318925893361.post-29954331384003427812013-11-02T22:01:00.005+00:002013-11-02T22:01:48.102+00:00BostonBoston also, like Montreal, is a city of charming neighbourhoods - so I made sure I found one on airbnb to stay in. As usual, my plan to see the city was to get downtown & walk a lot. The four kilometre Freedom Trail is very well marked (follow the red line on the ground) & starts at the large Boston Common & the Massachusetts State House. <br />
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I got a little distracted & wandered around the Beacon Hill neighbourhood for a while first. Even out in the suburbs in the dark of the previous night I'd noticed these odd fire call points dotted around - I suppose they're a bit like the police call boxes that were once more common in London. At over a hundred & sixty years old, it was the first system of the kind in the world - originally linking the various call points to the central Fire Alarm Office by telegraph signals. Quite ingenious, but I'm surprised it's still going as the call points were far enough apart to not really give any advantage over a phone.<br />
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I zigged and zagged a bit at the start of the Freedom Trail (which links sites that are connected to Boston's large role in American independence) as I stumbled across the shorter Walk to the Sea - which provided interesting titbits of Boston maritime history & also took me down to the water's edge. I wandered, soaked in the history & found a jalepeno & cheddar bagel - which I was most pleased with as that was my favourite when I made bagels, although I think I put more peppers in.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Old State House</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Old Customs Building</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Paul Revere's House</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">No building in particular</td></tr>
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There seemed to be this small baseball event called the World Series in town & Boston was pretty excited about it - with Paul Revere below getting the Red Sox treatment.<br />
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The trail ends at the Bunker Hill monument, which was the site of an early battle in the War of Independence. From what I could work out, it's a big monument to what was supposed to a strategically useful, but still big, defeat - the colonials held off the British a lot longer than they were expected to & therefore delayed them reaching some other objective.<br />
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Anyway, there are two hundred & ninety-four steps to the top, so I charged up them too quickly & then admired the cloudy view while I caught my breath - there are a lot of roof-top patios in the surrounding area that look fantastic for summer.<br />
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It looked like there were sufficient parks & paths to walk most of the way along the north bank of the Charles River to MIT - it also looked a lot shorter distance than it really was. <br />
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I then ended up on the other side of the river in amongst the crowds heading to Fenway Park for the first match of the series against the St Louis Cardinals. Having the city's Trip Advisor app loaded on your phone is always helpful for finding excellent places to eat - in this case a cafe in a large independent bookshop, the momos (dumplings) were superb. Dark & a little chilly by now I continued the walking alongside the fens (a type of wetland & that for which Fenway Park is named). I was rather tired when I got home after walking well over twenty kilometres in all sorts of different parts of Boston.<br />
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At breakfast that morning, my host told me that the Samuel Adams brewery tour was not that far away. Jamaica Plain (where I was staying) used have twenty-odd breweries - few remain. For some reason, I'd always thought Samuel Adams was brewed by a huge company - but the Boston Brewing Company had quite humble beginnings in the 1980s & might still claim to be a craft brewer, although when you're the (joint) largest American owned brewery it's a little hard to believe. The Boston site is now mostly R&D, but they do good little free tours. As far as manufacturing equipment goes, there isn't much to see - but the tasting of barley & hops was interesting to see how different flavours get into beer. And the last twenty minutes or so is tasting pitcher after pitcher of beer. Possibly, I should have gone on the tour after lunch - needless to say the rest of the day was quite enjoyable.<br />
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More walking that afternoon - more local this time as close by is the Arnold Arboretum (managed by Harvard). There were lots of trees to see & many nice streets to stroll down to get there. Although I did cheat a bit & get a Hubway bike (the Boston version of Bixi). There were a few streets near where I was staying that are still gravelled - very odd in the middle of a big city to find gravel streets.<br />
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Lunch was spent in Doyle's Cafe, which has a close association with Samuel Adams (being the first to sell the company's lager). It's all very old & a favourite haunt of Boston politicians apparently, the Kennedy family used to frequent the place. The kale soup was very good indeed, with a nice kick to it. So far I haven't mentioned all the Halloween decorations that I'd been seeing almost everywhere, as well the huge stalls selling pumpkins - mostly because I'm not really interested. But in what may be the best thing as far as I can see about the holiday, craft brewers like to put out a seasonal drink - & pumpkin ale is ridiculously good.<br />
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I rode down to the river, crossed it & was wandering through Harvard in the twilight. Lots of people around & plenty of impressive buildings, but not much to keep me from finding another bike & heading back towards Fenway. <br />
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I wasn't really intending going to see what all the fuss was about at Fenway, rather hoping to spend whatever excess USD funds I had on outdoor gear at REI. But they were so close to each other, it was worth a look. Plus there was a Chipotle - always useful.<br />
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That was about my time in Boston - I'm glad I finally made it to what is a great city to walk & eat your way around.BPheasanthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05789261682093840738noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3954833318925893361.post-12894322857270992142013-11-02T22:01:00.004+00:002013-11-02T22:01:34.310+00:00A province & five statesI could have easily driven from Montreal to Boston in a day, but where's the fun in sitting on the freeway all day when there hills & different New England states to explore?<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">I watched the sun rise across fields of wheat as I left Quebec & then wished I'd cleaned the lens.</td></tr>
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Getting off the Interstate to cross the border makes it all very easy & quick - in no time & six dollars later I was in New York. My stay was short lived as I quickly moved into the north-west of Vermont driving down a series of islands that sit in Lake Champlain. Vermont has the second smallest population of any of the states (only Wyoming has less than its 625000 people) and I was fast approaching the largest city in the state - Burlington, booming with just over forty thousand people. So there wasn't a lot of traffic around and the morning drive continued in its pleasantness.<br />
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There was, an odd round church:<br />
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A capitol building in Montpelier, a town not really much bigger than the one I grew up in in New Zealand. At less than eight thousand people its claim to fame is being the smallest state capital & the only one without a McDonald's.<br />
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Big old houses:<br />
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Covered bridges galore:<br />
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Whitewashed churches<br />
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A little covered bridge:<br />
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I was at my airbnb stay before lunch - my hosts were lovely & had a big old house & an almost-bigger attached barn. Even though I was only paying for the bed & possibly breakfast, somehow I ended up being fed lunch, dinner & breakfast. Jim was quite the chef, so the food & local amber ale was excellent for sharing many travel stories over. Generally I find that those that host airbnb have travelled quite a bit themselves and always enjoy talking about far off places - this trip in the north-east USA consolidated that thought.<br />
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After a bit of a nap to sleep off the early start & large lunch, it was time to wander around the village. In the next village I found the oldest military college, Norwich, in the country - which seemed a little out of the way. But as they have a lot of winter training, it made sense as one could tell as fall progressed the whole area was preparing for another huge winter of snowfall. I walked up a big hill on walking & biking trails that the college had built - the whole time views were promised by sneaking glances of an extraordinary vista; but as the light faded, they never really eventuated. Apparently I had a few more miles to go back into the hills before reaching the fire tower.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">All rather serene looking to be a military college.</td></tr>
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Within an hour of driving the next morning I was in New Hampshire. A state whose motto is Live Free or Die they are all for minimal interference from government. As such there is no state sales or income tax & incredibly, if you are over eighteen years old, there is no legal requirement to wear a seatbelt. That just seems a bit nuts, but I suppose it helps natural selection.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">I continued to take poor photos while driving slowly through villages</td></tr>
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My rather loose route of day was to avoid major highways again & aim towards an interesting-looking group of lakes in central New Hampshire. The largest of which is Lake Winnipesaukee - I got out to stretch my legs & walked up & back down a hill for the best part of an hour. I'm getting a tired of saying everything was pretty, even in the gloom, but it was and a good break from the rather easy driving.<br />
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Maine wasn't far away - so why not? Although I definitely got the feeling pretty much everything on the south coast had closed for the season. Shock, horror I stopped & bought some new clothes because I had the spare time & they were much needed - after a summer of riding, having to remove my belt for security screening now brings with it a much increased risk of finding jeans at my ankles. Soon I was following plenty of Massachusetts number plates & the spelling of the state was ingrained in my head.BPheasanthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05789261682093840738noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3954833318925893361.post-41347772878688530912013-11-02T22:01:00.002+00:002013-11-02T22:01:18.299+00:00MontrealMontreal had never really been much of a blip on my radar of places to visit one day. But the little I read about the city after deciding to include it on this little drive led me to believe that I would quite enjoy it - at the least, there would be good <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poutine" target="_blank">poutine</a> (which was on my quite long list of "things I must eat while in Canada & the States"). A city of neighbourhoods, with excellent food it sounded good fun to explore for a couple of days.<br />
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We easily found our way on to the island (curiously, Montreal is an island in the St Lawrence River - I did not know that beforehand) and then to the apartment. Apparently, our neighbourhood was good for food so we just wandered out the door to the end of the block to peruse the local haunts - Jane spied a good looking cupcake shop that was noted for a later date. What followed at a rather too-hip-for-me cafe was the best meal I've had in ages - scallops on a barley risotto with vegetables done to perfection.<br />
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It turned out that one of the biggest & best markets in the city was only a few blocks away, so we headed down there after breakfast Saturday. That probably wasn't the best idea as I was immediately hungry again - I shouldn't go into detail of the huge range of produce & meat that was on display. I managed to cross a bagel off the list; Montreal bagels are supposed to be a little sweeter than most - either way, it was better than I used to bake. I think we managed to sample half as many plums as we ended up buying - delicious & many varieties.<br />
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Jane was aware of the <a href="http://montreal.bixi.com/" target="_blank">Bixi</a> public bicycle sharing scheme in Montreal from a previous visit. I was familiar with the concept from London & other European cities - a bit of research shows that the London system is a Bixi system (the largest, with Montreal second) - Bixi being a company set up by the city of Montreal. Basically, there are over five thousand bicycles at four-hundred docking stations all around the city - for the measly sum of seven dollars for twenty-four hours, one can have have as many half-hour rides as desired (if you take a bike for more than thirty minutes, you get charged extra). As it turns out, it's an absolutely fantastic way to see the city. The bikes are very solid (tough, but pretty heavy), easy to ride, comfortable, internally geared (the range of three is plenty) & with a handy basket on the front. That is pretty much how we saw a lot of Montreal on the Saturday - interspersed by a fair bit of walking & eating too.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The local church.</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Not the kind of picture I usually snap while riding a bike, c.f. <a href="http://bpheasant.smugmug.com/MTB/130917-Brackenhurst-Rift/i-s7S8hNt/0/L/IMG_8820-L.jpg" target="_blank">this</a>.</td></tr>
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We ditched the bikes for a stroll, rather - a brisk steep walk, to the top of Parc du Mont-Royal - through plenty of leaves to kick around and brilliant colours.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">It got a little cloudier.</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Looking over McGill University to downtown.</td></tr>
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We spent a fair bit of time riding near water - either along canals or over the river. Montreal was the biggest industrial centre in the country until surpassed by Toronto in the second half of the twenty-century - strangely, I always find old silos & other industrial relics fascinating. As I write that, I realise that is a little weird - but think of the hundreds of people that used to work there making all sorts of things.<br />
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We went downtown for a little while, but I wasn't overly impressed as it was sort of European, but not properly so. The neighbourhoods were much more fun - so we walked back to where Jane stayed last time & found a great hot chocolate & more cakes. We returned to the same cafe for dinner - I got to have my poutine & it lived up to all expectations; I eat more meals without meat that I ever used to. I'm not sure this one really counted as it was probably so full of fat & such artery-clogging ingredients.<br />
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We worked out we'd biked & walked over forty kilometres the day before (just as well with all the food), so it was a little slower start on Sunday. With still some of our twenty-hours left on the Bixi bikes, we headed off to the botanical gardens in the autumn crispness. There were some cool lanterns in the Chinese Garden - although I suspect they are better at night. I narrowly avoided being eaten by a tiger.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">There were a few bugs too.</td></tr>
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I'm trying to remember what else we did on Sunday - but all I can remember doing is walking a bit & eating a lot: patisserie for lunch, we visited the cupcake store & then hit the market to find plenty of tasty fish, asparagus, broccoli, cherry tomatoes & bread for dinner. I'm not one to take photos of food, but I managed to nab these off Jane.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Mushrooms!</td></tr>
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Up much too early, the Montreal stay was over as I dropped Jane off at the airport for her to depart to her new life as an optometrist (that bit's not new) in small town Nova Scotia. It's not really far to the border & I was gone from Canada again by eight o'clock. <br />
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I had no idea that I'd enjoy Montreal so much - but I fear if stayed longer I'd eat well too much and put back on all the weight I lost over summer, plus some more. The whole time I was in Montreal however I did find something very disconcerting about it. It's so obviously North American with American cars, big wide streets laid out on a grid, Canadian brands and so on - but all the signs & speech is in French, everyone's better dressed & the food so good, it feels continental. It's very difficult trying to reconcile all this - will people get upset if I just assume they speak English (most seem to be bilingual)? Annoyingly, the rest of Canada seems to make an effort at being bilingual with their signs, but you get to Quebec & there is next to English on the major signs - that seems a little rude, so I suppose that fits in well.<br />
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Anyway, Montreal - well worth a visit for a few days at least, if not more.BPheasanthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05789261682093840738noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3954833318925893361.post-43523948017583495182013-11-02T22:01:00.000+00:002013-11-02T22:01:00.878+00:00A day in OttawaFirst priority in Ottawa was a trip to MEC (the big outdoors store in Canada) for Jane to buy useful things after Air Canada predictably lost her bag somewhere between Buenos Aires and Toronto. Usually I could spend ages in there, but the after a few minutes all the driving and the time-zone change caught up with me & I proper fell asleep in the car - which was just as well, as I had ages to wait. Our hotel suite was surprisingly massive with a full kitchen - much pasta & cheese sauce was cooked, slightly less consumed. For some reason, Jane thought it a good idea to bring a feijoa flavoured bottle of vodka all the way from NZ. But <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feijoa" target="_blank">feijoas</a> & vodka (!) - it smelt & tasted like I haven't had for years & remember fondly from growing up with many such trees in the yard.<br />
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A crisp fall morning arrived & after over-indulging in the breakfast buffet we set out for a fair bit of walking. Ottawa is a very nice capital indeed - with plenty of grand buildings, lots of parks and a great big river (that forms part of the border between Ontario & Quebec). Confederation Boulevard is a 7.5 km route around Ottawa & Gatineau (the adjoining city that is in Quebec - a bit like Buda & Pest, but you can't join the names together in a catchy manner) that links many of the capital's important sights & is used ceremonially for state visits. Being so, it makes a good easy walk around to see such things if one has limited time - we walked most of it, stopping off near the start to get tickets to a tour of the Parliament Buildings. Most notably on the walk, we saw a beaver - I'd only seen their dams before; this one looked a little lost in the Rideau canal's locks.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Parliament</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgy_x8kEyVDamKXFDD-rDDZl1ca23dM4_9bDjO-CEUGMXLupZ2-TSQHVeECykVr3uyaN04bhg86Jcpw5OJY5Rzl_As_VCryCN77av7vMYJekGs4SVgVvXBljzJXWkGmU5iNQEwPAdNSXeIW/s1600/IMG_8895.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgy_x8kEyVDamKXFDD-rDDZl1ca23dM4_9bDjO-CEUGMXLupZ2-TSQHVeECykVr3uyaN04bhg86Jcpw5OJY5Rzl_As_VCryCN77av7vMYJekGs4SVgVvXBljzJXWkGmU5iNQEwPAdNSXeIW/s320/IMG_8895.jpg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The Round Library (the only part of the centre block of the old parliament to survive a big fire in 1916) & Parliament across the Ottawa.</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Museum of Civilisation</td></tr>
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Back at Parliament a little early, there was enough time to sneak in to the Commons chamber while it was in session. I say sneak: we had to got through security & then still leave our bags at the desk. I've never been to a session of the Commons in either of the two countries I've voted in - so this was a new experience. It was a little underwhelming - of the 308 members that the Commons has at the moment, there were between twenty & thirty present. Obviously the debate wasn't really that interesting - something to do with drugs in communities if I remember correctly. Thankfully, we had a tour start-time to meet - so we exited.<br />
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The tour and guide were quite interesting with a good mix of history of the buildings & Canada as a country. Strangely, there were a lot of questions - we managed to get into the Senate room as it wasn't in session, that wasn't so interesting. Going up the Peace Tower (that's the big tower in the center of the complex), the elevator has small windows so you can see some of the large bells that form part of the carillon - which is a musical instrument made up of at least twenty-three bells that is played using a keyboard linked to those bells. I had previously heard the chimes on the hour & thought it a particularly musical bell tower - with fifty-three bells, it was not surprising.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Back across the Ottawa to Gatineau - we'd just walked across that far shore & bridge.</td></tr>
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Jane hadn't made it out to the rather large Gatineau Park on her previous visit & had wanted to, so after scoffing some more of the previous night's pasta we left Ottawa-proper and headed out for a very pleasant drive through many beautiful trees changing colour. Eventually, we got to Pink Lake (stupid bridges that go right over a rural road, but don't connect to it). Always nice to get out of the city for a brisk walk, we fair charged around with still plenty of time to marvel at all the shades of yellows, orange, red, green & brown - but I still didn't manage any decent photos.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Confusingly, Pink Lake is named for a family that once owned nearby land & in fact more likely to be bright green due to algae.</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgaejYYjJqJg7vWgPoaMdqr5vdAjFECGqe5N_rTurwRPY6sYIhGtsGrmhyC0a0W08NVzCS8YUFh7eitGkTYFuahWGixw2sb2j3EXrVctAIt1UspC1BDuIi5p2I_Q-lQY2e6keguWVPlKHGD/s1600/IMG_8940.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgaejYYjJqJg7vWgPoaMdqr5vdAjFECGqe5N_rTurwRPY6sYIhGtsGrmhyC0a0W08NVzCS8YUFh7eitGkTYFuahWGixw2sb2j3EXrVctAIt1UspC1BDuIi5p2I_Q-lQY2e6keguWVPlKHGD/s320/IMG_8940.jpg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Perhaps taking a quick photo is safer than texting - my poor attempt at capturing all the marvellous colours we were seeing.</td></tr>
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With just a couple of hours along the scenic route (north bank of the Ottawa) to go, we set off for Montreal. Just in case it wasn't clear - Ottawa was really nice. With no success in finding a short notice airbnb place for Ottawa, it was great to get notice on the drive we had a whole apartment to ourselves for three nights in nice a neighbourhood BPheasanthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05789261682093840738noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3954833318925893361.post-10724566930102131542013-11-02T22:00:00.002+00:002013-11-02T22:00:42.583+00:00Back in Canada!Back when I had a list of places I wanted to spend a week or so visiting before I eventually head back to New Zealand, Boston was high on that list. If one is going to go to Boston, one may as well get there for a New England fall - many months ago it seemed like a good idea to book a trip to the USA (the fourth in four years, who'd have thunk?) less than three weeks after getting back from the RVO & Africa. Along the way it transpired that it was much easier to get nice flight times in & out of Toronto than Boston. As I'd never visited eastern Canada while I lived out west in the Rockies, it seemed logical to tie such a visit in with Boston and make a mini-roadtrip of it - after all, driving around North America is such fun. Mid-year the list went out the window as I realised I wanted to ride my bike more...<br />
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Well, as I got back from the RVO & Africa and straight back into a demanding month-end at work and then got a cold - none of this seemed all that sensible. Not to mention two inter-continential vacations almost back-to-back seemed just a little self-indulgent - thankfully the spring & summer through which I took no time off work was a cracker and let me ride a lot. Consequently, & very strangely, I wasn't particularly excited by the prospect of more travel so soon - I managed to keep the trip pretty quiet by only letting on if asked rather direct questions that I couldn't worm out of - so I didn't have to talk about it & pretend to be wildly excited. Of course, through all that, even if I wasn't excited I knew I would love the trip and all doubts would disappear as soon as I landed in Canada - I mean, I've loved each of my previous American road trips & this would be same with Ottawa, Montreal, Boston & Niagara Falls being the main destinations to string together.<br />
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By some fluke of timing, very good friend of my sister & the family, Jane was due to land in Toronto for a year in Canada only twelve hours or so after my arrival. First store seen on landing at Pearson - Tim Hortons, of course. After deciding a Fiat 500 is a ridiculous vehicle for a American roadtrip & that I should upgrade to a small SUV, I was straight back to driving on the other side of the road. Once safely & comfortably ensconced in my airbnb room, it was time to head out & wander. I was not far off Lake Ontario, & like Lake Michigan earlier in the year, it's hard to believe a lake can be so big - or Great if you will (the five Great Lakes have a surface area less than ten percent smaller than all of New Zealand). I'm not sure if it's just a reflection on Toronto, but I don't have a single photo of the city. Nonetheless I was loving just wandering the city blocks, seeing buildings & stadia I'd previously heard about; being Wednesday night, half-price wings with yam (sweet potato) fries & a beer seemed entirely appropriate.<br />
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Picking Jane up from her friend's house (disturbingly both she & her friend though I sounded English, which is just weird - they definitely had Kiwi accents) we hit the road east with many hours to catch up on news as we got off the freeway as soon as possible to drive around the lakeside. Most facilities had closed for the season, but the Thousand Islands area was rather quaint. To officially be included in the group, an island must be above the lake level all year long, be more than one square foot and have at least one living tree - so there are some pretty small islands to see. What was surprising was just how small some of the islands were that had proper big houses on them. But I never quite captured those well when we were driving - so imagination needed below.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEikitICtwQ7Z2jZx0FE1X3UORv_NLmQ_A3SKwrmxnwnY8n2WNpFsU_xS3X1aOpXXI-4_vvpyIc-LUes3OLGorBS4rZCo8DverzWEUfpNkfzNOObiTeuNnOL2oZOsSwngwdAwjmbAsRRdl78/s1600/IMG_1358.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="239" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEikitICtwQ7Z2jZx0FE1X3UORv_NLmQ_A3SKwrmxnwnY8n2WNpFsU_xS3X1aOpXXI-4_vvpyIc-LUes3OLGorBS4rZCo8DverzWEUfpNkfzNOObiTeuNnOL2oZOsSwngwdAwjmbAsRRdl78/s320/IMG_1358.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Wow, there are photos of me on this trip - well, a few.</td></tr>
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The fall/autumn timing was already paying off as the countryside was littered with very pretty foliage in the midst of changing colour.BPheasanthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05789261682093840738noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3954833318925893361.post-79594074932026676012013-10-02T20:46:00.002+01:002013-10-02T20:46:12.971+01:00Tarangire NP campingAD was determined that my entire week in Tanzania was not to be spent relaxing around the house - & when someone is willing to take me camping and on a big game drive in an Africa national park I am hardly going to offer a dissenting voice. Tarangire National Park was one I had never heard of & AD had not been too - so that was chosen as our destination. A relatively easy (especially for me in the passenger seat) two-hour drive south-east later we were at the park gates around noon on Friday. Camp was quickly set up in the public campground and we set off for a game drive for the afternoon. The previously much-derided Range Rover came in to its own off road - very capable & very comfortable. As AD was driving, I became chief photographer - it sure was nice to have a proper big camera, even if my photography skills are rudimentary at best.<br />
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We couldn't believe how many elephants there were - hundreds! All the other usual suspects were present: giraffe (much darker than those I saw on my last trip), zebra, ostriches, big vultures, buffalo, water buck, various antelope, mongoose, monkeys, baboons. We finally saw a couple of lions nearing the end of the afternoon. It was more than fun to be two guys from NZ just driving abound a huge national park in an ageing 4WD in amongst so many animals & tourists on proper expensive safari trips. Enough talking, the photos are better (<a href="http://bpheasant.smugmug.com/Animals/130927-Tarangire-NP-TZ" target="_blank">more and better versions are here</a>).<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgpGnsE24uMdquQenvSfHNjTQfLXloRhbVZGiIGwE8TXcf6RVWsVKwMywwo9U5IfUlnSA3rrfXM2gbEjtc3BCtO_bsiK6-13nYqEcwsoMChTyO9-auEKiiNZhhBF5LrXKJyKc41FppfWt0I/s1600/IMG_1162.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgpGnsE24uMdquQenvSfHNjTQfLXloRhbVZGiIGwE8TXcf6RVWsVKwMywwo9U5IfUlnSA3rrfXM2gbEjtc3BCtO_bsiK6-13nYqEcwsoMChTyO9-auEKiiNZhhBF5LrXKJyKc41FppfWt0I/s320/IMG_1162.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Apparently a large herd of elephants came to pay our tent a lot of attention after we drove off.</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgcJbPYFRys5TvVgijb_2XRrjQAukgSrz0_O_wI6hnJRsNXwUeZPM-lm3tUERxnmQljTQl3i2Zd1hpwHwn8aba0_4JzgcKWeDaVFx3OQoCDaKs0net8t5LEH8FnazqDVeWsQwdIXTkAOTdE/s1600/IMG_1292.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgcJbPYFRys5TvVgijb_2XRrjQAukgSrz0_O_wI6hnJRsNXwUeZPM-lm3tUERxnmQljTQl3i2Zd1hpwHwn8aba0_4JzgcKWeDaVFx3OQoCDaKs0net8t5LEH8FnazqDVeWsQwdIXTkAOTdE/s320/IMG_1292.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">AD tried to take promotional photos, I minded the barbecue - sort of.</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Thankfully more large steaks didn't attract the lion(s) we heard a little distance from camp.</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgB65y-ugKW9XKxvxHsCKsKTNk96feOVFlaLC-nijfNwCHplTYgUfwVNkzk3Wf15yGItOEvAKOpo88djVL862vH3rwsBA-lhSAfVbsiJPNiz2LK_mAmc68sUThlGlLVilXZX-cp-anWY2BS/s1600/IMG_1301.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgB65y-ugKW9XKxvxHsCKsKTNk96feOVFlaLC-nijfNwCHplTYgUfwVNkzk3Wf15yGItOEvAKOpo88djVL862vH3rwsBA-lhSAfVbsiJPNiz2LK_mAmc68sUThlGlLVilXZX-cp-anWY2BS/s320/IMG_1301.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">So many large baobab trees.</td></tr>
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Up & decamped early, there was enough time to marvel at plenty more elephants before returning to Arusha. I hastily packed, said my goodbyes and started what turned out to be a thirty hour trip home (that's almost as bad as returning from NZ). It turns out carrying a Thermarest Neoair in your hand luggage is great for napping on boring airport (Nairobi) floors. Arriving home Sunday afternoon to the order of England, not too tired considering, it was hard to believe just the morning before I was out camping in a fantastic African park and seeing so much extraordinary wildlife. Thanks AD & Carm for an excellent African break.BPheasanthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05789261682093840738noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3954833318925893361.post-87414310315964356472013-10-02T20:08:00.001+01:002013-10-02T20:08:24.722+01:00A restful week in ArushaI'd previously vetoed the idea of returning to the <a href="http://nobodyexpectsthe-s-i.blogspot.co.uk/2009/11/masai-mara.html" target="_blank">Mara</a> or even climbing Kilimanjaro (not enough time & $2000 seems a bit much for a big walk) after the rather tiring RVO. The proposed Mara trip was originally to have been if Adele had joined me on this Africa trip, but as I have such great memories I didn't really feel the need to go back this time without her - especially as AD & Carm had only just moved to Tanzania the week before returning to Kenya for the RVO it seemed a little unfair to drag them all the way to the Mara when they should be settling into their new adventure.<br />
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So the thirty year old Range Rover (it sort of came with the business that AD & Carm have taken over) was loaded and we left for what was a six hour trip over the border to Arusha. Everyone was pretty sick of the Range Rover & all it's various quirks (the polite term) by the time we even set off, but it got us there OK. Unfortunately, being Mum to an almost two year old (Ethan/Bug - who it turns out really likes to dance to Lady Gaga) and a two month old (the very well behaved Chloe/Plum - who is already sleeping through until six am each night!), Carm got stuck in the back seat all the way - I tried, albeit not that hard, to get her to swap: to no avail.<br />
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African land border crossings are always so much more chaotic & fun (sort of) than just strolling right through as one does in most of Europe. The one at Namanga was no different. AD went through the drama of getting a private vehicle across the border (this seemed more difficult than getting a person across), while Carm & I tried to stop Bug running out into the melee of oversized trucks. I think I somehow got cast in the role of father to the kids as AD was off sorting out the vehicle - with the bonus that the border agent seemed to think I was a returning resident & therefore didn't charge me the $50 fee for a tourist visa.<br />
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It wasn't long down the road before discovering that while most of the Tanzanian highway was very good - although with that strange propensity for speed bumps in the middle of an otherwise fast open road (I think it must be the only way they have of slowing traffic down). If any work was needed on the road, a diversion would be put in place. I'm used to a diversion being routed down existing roads, but out in the country in Tanzania there are so few roads and so much land - they simply close stretches of highway miles long and build a temporary road (gravelled, potholed & bumpy to the extreme) parallel to the real road. It does tend to slow progress a fair bit.<br />
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Eventually we made it to the new home. AD & Carm have taken over a small business that runs safaris (there's a small fleet of safari vehicles, of various ages & conditions) and does bike tours in the wilderness (also a sizeable fleet of mountain-bikes). With two young kids in the craziness that is Africa it all looks very adventurous to me, but I'm sure they'll settle in and make a good go of it. I'm already starting to think about what escapade I can persuade AD to organise for us for a future visit.<br />
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After those four days of strenuous riding & the slow trip down, much of the week was relatively inactive and relaxing. But when you're somewhere like <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arusha" target="_blank">Arusha</a>, just driving into town is an adventure in itself. The week quickly passed with AD working but still around (the office being a minute's walk away), Carm juggling being a Mum & learning some of the administration of the business while I was/we were reading, entertaining children (the trampoline is a favourite already for Bug), holding screaming baby, playing games, quoting too much of The Castle & classic Big Bang, baking, eating (National Braai [South African for barbecue] Day was duly commemorated), making a slow start on the varied liquor collection that was left with the house, sleeping and just generally spending time in the company of good friends.<br />
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All I have to show for it is some rather average phone snaps:<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Keeping Bug occupied in the behemoth of a Land Rover (below) while Mum & Dad work.</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">This behemoth - used as a safari support vehicle.</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">It's much easier to be a millionaire in Tanzania</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Celebrating National Braai Day - an occasion I was previously unfamiliar with, but considering the massive piece of steak consumed, one I'm in favour of.</td></tr>
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BPheasanthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05789261682093840738noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3954833318925893361.post-33367507196333717842013-09-25T17:38:00.000+01:002013-09-25T17:38:06.135+01:00Rift Valley Odyssey - Day ThreeHuzzah - I slept reasonably well & managed to have the appetite for a reasonable, but not too large, breakfast before another seven o'clock start. With those things combining & a relatively short stage (only 77 kilometres, but with half the climbing of each of the other two days) it was a bit of a cruise for me. We started out on the road going west in the same way as Day Two - but kept going west instead of turning south into the big hills. The gentle climbing started at about the ten kilometre mark & it was only a shade under four hundred metres up over twenty-five kilometres - very civilized compared with the previous two days.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Sporting a new Combe Raiders shirt at camp.</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Stage starts weren't the most formal of affairs.</td></tr>
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There was a great little descent before the first feed station and then the long gradual climb through a large wheat farm started in earnest through an awful lot of mud. Cloudy again, the views afar weren't fantastic - but the acacia trees in the wheat fields were pretty nice against the dark sky. With the fast descent off the hills of wheat done, there was a cool bit through a canyon where we had been told the night before to not necessarily follow the trail on our GPS (the whole race was navigated by GPS - there were no signs or so on), but just make it to the bottom in whichever way we thought best. This was great fun as I cleared some nice technical drops and then bashed through some trees before it opened up & got fast.<br />
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The last part of the day before the road ride back to camp was through another conservancy - the usual suspects were all out: zebra, various antelope, monkeys, giraffes. Also we managed to startle a herd of wild buffalo - I wasn't quick enough to get a photos of these huge guys, & we were rather glad they didn't hang around. The day's ride was over much too soon at 12.30 - I felt I could go around again, but some of the team weren't so keen as we all suffered some degree of soreness from saddles. With a welcome back by the rest of the team's wives & children we settled in for some well earned pizzas.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Not too shabby considering I was riding when I took this.</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Pretty happy to have that finisher's medal around my ncek.</td></tr>
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So that was my RVO experience - a great time (vomiting aside) and one which I was adequately prepared for as my legs didn't exactly suffer. My knees ached a little at the end of the first day and the beginning of the second, but considering all the climbing were pretty well behaved. The weather was mostly great for riding (the exception being the downpour at the end of Day Two) - pretty cloudy, not too hot, no huge winds to battle; unfortunately this meant that the panoramic photos are not great - but as I've already been to Kenya & seen plenty of wildlife, taking photos wasn't really a priority of the trip. Well pleased with the event & how I survived it.<br />
<iframe frameborder="0" height="548" src="http://connect.garmin.com:80/activity/embed/379574827" width="465"></iframe>BPheasanthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05789261682093840738noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3954833318925893361.post-78867918706814356702013-09-25T17:26:00.000+01:002013-09-25T17:26:49.294+01:00Rift Valley Odyssey - Day TwoConsidering the big day previous, the night's sleep was once again quite broken. But up anyway at 5.45 for breakfast, some bike tinkering and a seven o'clock start on the second day of the RVO. The day started off pretty flat as we took the road around the lake for about fifteen kilometres before turning left and the climbing started in earnest. There was the odd flat section & short downhill respite, but generally it was solid climbing - over 700 m to 2700 m in about seventeen kilometres. It was all ridable apart from one short section near the top that was too steep & technical. But it sure was hard work with the sun beating down. AD seemed to find some legs from somewhere and rode like a champion.<br />
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The feed station at 2700 m was welcome and we rested there a little. The food was perhaps a little too good as it would seemed I ate too much as something very odd happened as we started down the monster downhill that we had very much earned. It may have also been a very common reaction to the anti-malarial tablets I had been taking - but as the descent opened up & I bumped around a bit more, I started to feel decidedly nauseous and queasy.<br />
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For the first time in more years than I can remember, I was vomiting; once that was over we set off again. Not to last long however, as as I waited for Bobby (he was a little hesitant of excessive speed - not surprising as the mechanics could do nothing for his air bubble-ridden rear brakes overnight) I had another good effort at reintroducing my food to daylight again. As we had over 760 m to drop in sixteen kilometres, I was at this stage beginning to wonder how I was going to get down such a fantastic downhill (i.e. quite bumpy & fun) when I couldn't hold my stomach down. But a combination of not having much left in my stomach, taking smoother lines & taking it easy waiting for Bobby (Sean & AD blasted on ahead in my hour of need, the cheek) and determination saw me to the bottom of the rather fantastic downhill no more the worse for wear.<br />
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It was still pretty warm & the lack of food intake (what energy I had consumed was mostly no longer with me either) made any climbs a little more challenging than they would have otherwise been. At the final feed station I managed a couple of slices of apple and a gel - enough it turned out to get me through the last fifty kilometres of what turned out to be one of the tougher days on the bike I can remember (not due to the terrain, due to the food issue). Most of the rest of the way was fairly easy valley floor through Hells Gate on gravel road, but there was one nasty shock at the end - a steep 250 m climb to overlook the lake beside which we were camped. After all of the rest of the day, it was pretty unrelenting - but we had to make it to the top as big storm clouds were rolling in.<br />
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Just as we did make it to the top, the storm broke and what would have been a fairly difficult start to the downhill (very deep & loose gravel) just became more unpleasant as we got absolutely soaked dropping 330 m to the road. It was fun enough after a kilometre or so, and then all the rain turned the hillside in to a myriad of streams that we followed down. As we neared the field at the bottom all those streams had combined into an instant raging torrent that we had to cross - as the motorbikes were behind us, we let them go first to gauge the strength & depth of it. It definitely wasn't ridable, but it looked OK to walk. An incredibly strong current didn't quite wash us over a newly formed waterfall, but did soak us to above our knees and completely fill our socks & shoes with stones & silt. After stopping briefly to reinflate Bobby's rear tyre (his tubeless worked as it should on the climb) we made it back to camp, food (of which I forced myself to eat a vegetarian pizza) and warm-enough showers before the heavens opened again.<br />
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With the stomach issues and that nasty last climb, this was definitely the hardest of the three days for me - as much climbing as the first day, but in twenty or so less kilometres distance and noticeably warmer. For the first time in days, I slept rather well (considering I was camping) that night.<br />
<iframe frameborder="0" height="548" src="http://connect.garmin.com:80/activity/embed/379573319" width="465"></iframe>BPheasanthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05789261682093840738noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3954833318925893361.post-91503517574642069342013-09-25T17:20:00.001+01:002013-09-25T17:20:41.396+01:00Rift Valley Odyssey - Day OneSomething to do with the anticipation of a big event I'd been waiting months for meant once again I hardly slept. We all made it to the eight o'clock start - although it was touch & go for Bobby (the fourth of our group), with his real wheel only coming back from the mechanics minutes beforehand.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Bobby, AD & Sean sporting their Boys on Bikes for Babies shirts, me representing the Combe Raiders</td></tr>
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For some reason, faffing most likely, we rolled out of Brackenhurst (on the same start course as the prologue) near the rear of the field. Annoyingly, my rear tyre had another tubeless issue of not sealing a puncture two kilometres in - something similar happened only a month ago on Dartmoor. We tried pumping it up, but after two stops to do that AD & I let Bobby & Sean ride ahead while we quickly fitted a tube. When I return to the UK I must sort out my rim/tyre combination for tubeless - what I'm running now clearly isn't working as the tyre is too loose on the rim.<br />
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As we had to get to a certain park gate by eleven o'clock and with fifteen minutes lost to three tyre stops we had to pick the pace up a bit. That part of the park required a motocross escort leading groups of riders through due to elephant activity (we saw none, just had to avoid many large droppings). Our pushing the pace as we steadily climbed to 2400 m continued for about half to an hour, until I worked out that we should make the cut-off comfortably. AD was pretty exhausted by the end of the day, which I may well have had something to do with.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Another rickety bridge crossing - not quite the Bridge of Death.</td></tr>
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Getting to the first feed station and park gate with ten minutes to spare we relaxed and refuelled while the last of those to make the cut-off ambled in down the road. It would seem that Bobby & Sean had carried on through the park in the previous group without us. There was a misleading downhill before the climbing for the day started proper - the sun came out & it was pretty hot as we climbed 350 m up to over 2700 m overlooking the Great Rift Valley. By now we'd reunited our little group at the second feed station; higher up things cooled a little as we got into more cloud - but that did rather spoil the view, just as well I knew what the valley looks like from the last visit.<br />
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With a fair bit of ridge-riding above the valley through little villages, we eventually plunged down on a gravel road with the race organiser's warnings of fast uphill motorcycle taxis ringing in our ears. Inexplicably an air bubble in Bobby's rear brakes manifested itself approaching one tight corner (he lost all rear brakes) & he completely wiped out - thankfully the only real damage being a rather cracked helmet. A new section for the race this year was Dead Drop, which started off with an all too brief rocky downhill before turning right and following the top of a canyon down to the Lunatic Express railway line - it was OK, but I found it didn't flow well.<br />
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What followed was the toughest climb of the day, the first section was steep and very technical - I rode most of the first half & then found I had to dab every so often before the trail started traversing the hill rather than going straight up it. We climbed & climbed & finally it was time to go down the Lunatic Express downhill - easily the best of the day down a huge open hill to the valley floor. We hit the valley floor eventually and followed the rails to the final feed stop of the day. <br />
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With only twenty-five kilometres across the valley floor (with the odd climb & down), we set off - I hung back with AD trying to motivate his wary legs with the draw of a rather yummy (as far as gels go) rhubarb & custard gel. Just as we approached camp we finally started to see some wildlife in Hells Gate National Park (it has geothermal activity, just like Hells Gate in NZ) - giraffes, various antelope, baboons and so on. With an excellent little downhill strewn with babyhead rocks to finish we were at camp. I was pleased with how I survived an almost ten-hour ride (total time), 100 km & with over 2000 metres of climbing. However, I didn't realise how tired I was until I sat down & tried to eat a pizza - pretty exhausted. Strangely, I couldn't really eat all that much or even finish a well-earned beer - I wasn't expecting that.<br />
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<iframe frameborder="0" height="548" src="http://connect.garmin.com:80/activity/embed/379571537" width="465"></iframe><br />BPheasanthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05789261682093840738noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3954833318925893361.post-55787942542114528242013-09-25T08:36:00.000+01:002013-09-29T18:02:52.829+01:00RVO acclimatisationFor over a year, Adrian had been trying to convince me to come back to Kenya to ride the <a href="http://www.riftvalleyodyssey.com/" target="_blank">Rift Valley Odyssey</a> - a three-day 250 km stage race down into the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Rift_Valley,_Kenya" target="_blank">Great Rift Valley</a>, across the bottom & up the other side & back to camp. He and a couple of mates rode it last year - which I was quite impressed by as they seemed to start mountain-biking just to do so. As since my last visit AD & Carm have got married & had a couple of kids, the 2013 RVO seemed like as good a reason as any to come back & visit - plus it gave motivation to all the riding I've been doing over summer 2013.<br />
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As it transpired, the timing didn't work out all that well as two weeks before the event AD & Carm moved south of the border to Arusha, Tanzania. So when I flew into Kenya I had a day or so staying at Brackenhurst (a large bible college complex just north west of Nairobi that serves also as the Kenyan base for AD's company, until recently their home & also the start of the RVO) resting from the travelling, assembling my bike, getting my lungs slightly used to the 2200 metres of altitude before AD & Carm turned up. I also manage to slip in the shower/bath & bruise/crack a rib that was to trouble me for the next week or so - lack of adhesive ducks.<br />
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It's nice turning up in an expat community where everyone is really friendly & very well travelled - my first trip overseas in five months, it's cool to hear of new places to go & see. AD, Sean (also riding the RVO with us) & I managed a nice little very early Tuesday morning ride around the local teafields - with over 400 m of climbing in less than 15 km, it was bit more than I was used to around the flatlands of home & it gave my sea-level lungs a bit of a workout. Later that day I managed a second ride with another guy, Dave, a bit further afield (30 km in total) to a couple of waterfalls & through more teafields. My lungs were slowly getting used to the thinner air - but it was still worth resting Wednesday.<br />
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Most of the international entrants in the RVO turned up Wednesday evening & there was a social prologue ride on Thursday to help with the high altitude. I had a miserable night's sleep previously & with all the rain I heard while lying awake I had decided to give the prologue a miss as I was in a foul mood & thought I'd just end up slipping to a big crash - not much use before a three-day event; also all my teammates had wimped out citing being too busy at work. But a bit of light broke through the clouds at just the right time twenty minutes before the start - so I hurriedly got ready & rolled out with everyone else.<br />
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It was time on the bike off-road so predictably I quite enjoyed myself - even if the almost 50 km & 1200 m+ of climbing was probably a bit more than was sensible before the upcoming three days. A nice big lunch in quite a colonial setting was enjoyed by all. That evening we were around at Sean & Tesni's (Tesni runs the baby orphanage that the other guys were riding for - they ended up raising $US10K!) tweaking bikes for eight o'clock start. Thankfully I managed to cure the horrendous creak from AD's bottom bracket - I'm pretty sure I would have had to rip my ears off if I had to ride next to that for even half of the 250 km.<br />
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BPheasanthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05789261682093840738noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3954833318925893361.post-74011378316129603982013-09-05T20:48:00.002+01:002013-09-05T20:48:17.602+01:00Hound Tor return - in the sunJohn kindly proposing a big Combe Raiders ride was enough to get me to Somerset for what was otherwise a free weekend - I still need to get longer rides under the belt before the end of the month, while looking after my knees. With just three of us signed up for whatever ride it was going to be, it was going to be faster (fewer stops) than other CR rides. With an all day pass from home, John was keen to head back to Dartmoor and ride a route I led eight of us on back in March - <a href="http://nobodyexpectsthe-s-i.blogspot.co.uk/2013/03/a-dartmoor-hail-ride.html" target="_blank">last time the weather was atrocious</a>, so I could see some of the point in going back in nice weather at the tail end of summer.<br />
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After dropping into the bottom of the valley, there's a big climb to get the legs & blood pumping. It wasn't long before I was wondering how I survived on a singlespeed last time - the larger group & cooler weather probably helped. Dartmoor has a bit of a reputation for quickly turning into desolate isolation if the weather turns, so it was odd to see it on such a lovely day. Oddly, within an hour of each other two of the three of us riding tubeless tyres got punctures that didn't seal - I put a tube in, John just kept pumping his tyre up rather often.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">We had to ride through a herd of these guys, thankfully they didn't object.</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Grimspound</td></tr>
</tbody></table>We eventually arrived at Hound Tor, which is a much bigger & impressive pile of rocks than the photos below show. The Hound of the Basket Meals food van was back in the car park - this time we had more than tea. One cheeseburger just served to remind me that I was actually hungry - so much to the others' later envy, I had a second.<br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh9s3V7FkSb-4E8fmOYJg7Xvqyqu3nsA0GdV6cXJ_cGOJNAtVdZ0k7j0mP3jWreOLy7ML85H96Fp8Pd4WkHlc9jZQiUqhq_Z3HJsh5Hl4anl9btGdaqnIGIsVNkwPhp1LUMum-J75dVoGU/s1600/2013-08-31+12.55.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh9s3V7FkSb-4E8fmOYJg7Xvqyqu3nsA0GdV6cXJ_cGOJNAtVdZ0k7j0mP3jWreOLy7ML85H96Fp8Pd4WkHlc9jZQiUqhq_Z3HJsh5Hl4anl9btGdaqnIGIsVNkwPhp1LUMum-J75dVoGU/s320/2013-08-31+12.55.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgotNu8GcQGd_rAjSaSwkxw9ogkFNxPJJMX3cOq4lCZKkpDj3hMadxQDO5fFWAyLdTs2gqyAVBJslvqzHXQxS-0V9EV1J4L4GcygrQmdAtTKuzTDC1BMKV9qZEjcWsWrQ_xdX0jynUZ_zc/s1600/IMG_8748.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgotNu8GcQGd_rAjSaSwkxw9ogkFNxPJJMX3cOq4lCZKkpDj3hMadxQDO5fFWAyLdTs2gqyAVBJslvqzHXQxS-0V9EV1J4L4GcygrQmdAtTKuzTDC1BMKV9qZEjcWsWrQ_xdX0jynUZ_zc/s320/IMG_8748.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">John & Hound Tor - after we escaped from the man running after an escaped kite</td></tr>
</tbody></table>Before long we were back at the van & with John phoning home to see if we might have another hour or so out & getting an affirmative - we tacked on a bit more trail that I'd loaded on to my GPS. With a fair bit more climbing, a nice flowing bit of woodland trail and then an unexpectedly long hike-a-bike to more good views - this was the highlight of the day's riding for me.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgseJWB8VxEdv88mCbaINqzNCPI_uvRLkfRD_Imh0-snO6lqSlimyp5Y-M_3ea0oA8R0ZhYGISAFBIPB0h4ZUfWZUK7YDkGZ1eV4CLXs4pvf4-Ee5SYXhg5rDHIZBm1KBVRwGzKZviiSGM/s1600/IMG_8752.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgseJWB8VxEdv88mCbaINqzNCPI_uvRLkfRD_Imh0-snO6lqSlimyp5Y-M_3ea0oA8R0ZhYGISAFBIPB0h4ZUfWZUK7YDkGZ1eV4CLXs4pvf4-Ee5SYXhg5rDHIZBm1KBVRwGzKZviiSGM/s320/IMG_8752.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Just nice countryside.</td></tr>
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg2vB6kSYALezBehE6xJZ7mzpJ6-V4ZJqd0Dt4op0irBKVuIz_C9Dz812aAgAndju3eCiiFNMqoqop6R9YA_w3NlzKw1V_CqfKZZ2BVWkj4UC6o9HE7v-u-IllDEpalXqskqWBLSz-C78Y/s1600/IMG_8753.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg2vB6kSYALezBehE6xJZ7mzpJ6-V4ZJqd0Dt4op0irBKVuIz_C9Dz812aAgAndju3eCiiFNMqoqop6R9YA_w3NlzKw1V_CqfKZZ2BVWkj4UC6o9HE7v-u-IllDEpalXqskqWBLSz-C78Y/s320/IMG_8753.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><iframe frameborder="0" height="548" src="http://connect.garmin.com:80/activity/embed/368125172" width="465"></iframe>BPheasanthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05789261682093840738noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3954833318925893361.post-452513073845615762013-08-27T22:05:00.000+01:002013-08-27T22:05:20.244+01:00Kentish long-weekendAfter a big weekend of riding the previous week, where I managed to pull a muscle in my knee on the Saturday making Sunday's large singlespeed ride rather painful, it seemed to a good idea to leave the bike(s) at home for the last long weekend of the summer. The physio sorted out my knee quickly, but recommended I do some form of exercise other than biking - a thought that hadn't crossed my mind recently. So I went for a run & pulled a muscle in my foot - I promptly gave up running.<br />
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Not taking bikes, meant that the four of us could all fit in the same car as we travelled to a quaint 15th century cottage we had rented for the weekend - our base for a friends' wedding. It's quite fun staying in a house that is more than twice as old as the country you're from. Happily, I also had a long weekend for my birthday for the first time in my life - a rather dismal day weather wise, we pretty much spent the day eating well too much. We also managed to fit a visit to Canterbury Cathedral in (<a href="http://nobodyexpectsthe-s-i.blogspot.co.uk/2009/09/ipswich-canterbury-most-cyclists-i-have_21.html">I'd been before</a> with Trish a few years ago, so as the weather was pants I didn't really take many photos). Eventually we settled on a huge roast dinner and if that didn't fill me up - the two birthday cakes certainly helped.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjgeMdfeiDCtHM0-bE8ECvgv-FhTrbr1eeXQ-SF4XOYP_QLkz57eYAXg7wm1dgvlvuoxdRYxC2gSTM34oCYOVdKYCjAZrg7SeRZGl7h4Wygsaa6AovXs4TsAHtyZb9fVLObAY-WcaW0-kM/s1600/IMG_8729.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjgeMdfeiDCtHM0-bE8ECvgv-FhTrbr1eeXQ-SF4XOYP_QLkz57eYAXg7wm1dgvlvuoxdRYxC2gSTM34oCYOVdKYCjAZrg7SeRZGl7h4Wygsaa6AovXs4TsAHtyZb9fVLObAY-WcaW0-kM/s320/IMG_8729.jpg" width="240" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Plenty of exposed beams</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj06gDq5Fe9E-5Wymr5zp9aL2hFpR5_rk-5retv2E8o15LQH_JcrD8ATRahBa1VQphfVyHCk98C-M4JhhXCntPMvUZLWrCSbkr5F2v-QQ4rL9nr7-tYc_wx-FeCdWx48m87i8J3vol9ll8/s1600/IMG_8730.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj06gDq5Fe9E-5Wymr5zp9aL2hFpR5_rk-5retv2E8o15LQH_JcrD8ATRahBa1VQphfVyHCk98C-M4JhhXCntPMvUZLWrCSbkr5F2v-QQ4rL9nr7-tYc_wx-FeCdWx48m87i8J3vol9ll8/s320/IMG_8730.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Kings Head Cottage - plenty of room for us all.</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg2JYoUCbE2K-hwi_bY08KuqVrdttNaCcQvP4j7BseR_0sfEkrdwqus-j3ekTelxvi-Aw63LXQWNYvOQ8sM8mdLslZOZ3Fr9UTHJxIe9hovJdL6y0CYZ37D6wFFYiNJU0IJoFoMF_wMgoM/s1600/IMG_8731.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg2JYoUCbE2K-hwi_bY08KuqVrdttNaCcQvP4j7BseR_0sfEkrdwqus-j3ekTelxvi-Aw63LXQWNYvOQ8sM8mdLslZOZ3Fr9UTHJxIe9hovJdL6y0CYZ37D6wFFYiNJU0IJoFoMF_wMgoM/s320/IMG_8731.jpg" width="240" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Across the village green.</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhCUtxCIxyQ673t8UncRpSxLX-gosgjAeRc512RF_6OljRn7J9NmiOmzPycEgigFHg777xYPsn8ql7uz95pnsCm2KiioO9e7VVa8dkJvtwmDkUZVxba4hrJ68eLW1tzXlhfyczxFBM7wdY/s1600/IMG_8732.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhCUtxCIxyQ673t8UncRpSxLX-gosgjAeRc512RF_6OljRn7J9NmiOmzPycEgigFHg777xYPsn8ql7uz95pnsCm2KiioO9e7VVa8dkJvtwmDkUZVxba4hrJ68eLW1tzXlhfyczxFBM7wdY/s320/IMG_8732.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">One of the older houses in Chartham.</td></tr>
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Thankfully, the wedding day had considerably better weather than my birthday. Laura & Luis got engaged before I started working here in the UK, so it was good to see all the plans that we've heard so much of come to fruition. The service was all very traditional (dearly beloved, have & to hold etc.) and quite good fun, I still can't sing very well though. On seeing the wedding car, below, I immediately had to get a few snaps for Uncle Geoff back in Australia - I'm pretty sure Bentleys of such age are his favourite.<br />
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With a bit too much time to spare between ceremony & evening wedding party, we went down to the white cliffs at Dover in our gladrags - where we picniced on the beach, mucked around, went to the pub and then wandered a bit on top of the cliffs.<br />
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After the speeches was the dancing for the night - a <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C%C3%A9ilidh" target="_blank">céilidh</a>. Basically a gaelic folk dance, it reminded me of the (awful) folk-dancing endured at primary school - but it was miles better due to there being a good band, a caller to tell me what to do and no longer being scared of girl-germs. But I still had little idea what I was doing - but it really didn't matter as plenty others didn't either. A huge pig-on-a-spit topped the night off nicely; amusingly the happy couple drove off in a tuk-tuk.BPheasanthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05789261682093840738noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3954833318925893361.post-92115135526984782482013-08-07T21:51:00.004+01:002013-08-07T21:51:55.849+01:00BlaenavonI managed to get my tent packed up before the rain rolled in for what transpired to be a utterly miserable day in the Welsh valleys. Just as well the nice bike ride was on the Saturday and I'd set Sunday aside for a couple of industrial museums close by in Blaenavon. While not nearly as extensive as the fantastic museums at <a href="http://nobodyexpectsthe-s-i.blogspot.co.uk/2013/05/ironbridge.html">Ironbridge</a>, there was enough to keep me interested to want to wander around in the driving rain for a few hours.<br />
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First up were the ironworks, of which there were the hearths of the a couple of blast furnaces, a couple of old casting halls, the remains of lime kilns & charging floor, and the shell of a huge balance tower (a water operated lift for lifting carts of pig iron ten metres or so). The audio explanations dotted sparsely around were excellent in explaining what it was like for those iron workers. The site is of note for the pioneering of basic steel-making which enabled high phosphorus ores to be used. <br />
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A little down the road is Big Pit, an old underground coal mine (of which, there were of course many in Wales once upon a time) that is now the National Coal Museum. It closed over thirty years ago and opened shortly after as a coal museum. The big attraction is the chance to go down a coal mine. It's not far, less than a hundred metres down. As it's still regarded as a mine, our small group donned hard hats, miners' lamps and emergency gas mask before we could enter and gave up any item containing a battery, matches, lighters etc. The tour was very well done and most informative - nicely it hasn't been sanitised too much for the public, so there's plenty of opportunity to bump one's head or fall over in the dark. Not quite as much fun as my previous trip underground in to a fully operational pit under the Waikato River back in NZ - but interesting all the same.<br />
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So I only managed a few pictures of the cage and winding mechanism - with the weather, they're really quite poor.<br />
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Back above ground there are a few things to look at - the restored bath house that the miners used has some good exhibits in. A good visit & nice to be out of the rain.BPheasanthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05789261682093840738noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3954833318925893361.post-16851915411488894262013-08-07T21:27:00.001+01:002013-08-07T21:27:19.696+01:00MTB Marathon again - Crickhowell - Brecon BeaconsWith a not too unpleasant illness from, I think, a dirty Camelbak tube earlier in the week, I was just aiming to finish another 75 km event (this time in the rather hilly Brecon Beacons, South Wales) without coughing up too many pieces of lung. After the four hour drive I was just in time to put up the tent in the event village and settle in for the night with a good book before a huge thunder storm rolled through.<br />
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Excessive amounts of rain in the early morning also slid away over the horizon and the event started with the threat of showers. This round of the series (there are four, I did the middle two) was supposed to be longer & with more climbing than <a href="http://nobodyexpectsthe-s-i.blogspot.co.uk/2013/07/just-riding-mostly.html" target="_blank">the previous one I did</a>. But I expected it to be somewhat easier as I had a new bike, many more gears and, most importantly, it wasn't 30ºC with the sun beating down.<br />
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To get out of the village up the valleys there was too much road for my liking, but eventually we got off road and there was a steep, rocky climb - my valiant (or so I'm saying) attempt to get up it was thwarted by too many people in front of me walking. Eventually the course opened up and all of a sudden twenty kilometres were gone and I was at the first of the legendary feed stations (so much home-baking & other goodies, I probably spent too long at these just eating). More climbing, this time on gravel, and then the course split and the lesser distances were away and it was blissful solitude on the trails.<br />
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The next climb was long, very technical and just kept going. In the perfect riding weather (mostly sun, a breeze, 20ºC and an occasional bit of drizzle), this was a very pretty climb up a long valley. Of the 8.5 km, I managed it all apart from a few metres choosing the wrong line through the rocks. Near the start of the climb a large dam loomed large above us, I was surprised when we kept going past it. Over 300 metres ascending, there was a wild descent (20+ % in places) on which I found my forks had too much air in them - never mind, I survived. I also stopped briefly for some photos as it was rather pleasant.<br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgN0F1V_J1jxGQUCe0B5-dKX_Eacbd8m5NviZp6PUqfacZkuLFIorOwwR8Mg2GLQRqD_GDo4oA87frj5cUvepoNKPCjjIt2gUp7LDq7nWM6FHHXWXbvLeovQVYdwBaaqXTWsOGIP7E2LoM/s1600/IMG_8705.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgN0F1V_J1jxGQUCe0B5-dKX_Eacbd8m5NviZp6PUqfacZkuLFIorOwwR8Mg2GLQRqD_GDo4oA87frj5cUvepoNKPCjjIt2gUp7LDq7nWM6FHHXWXbvLeovQVYdwBaaqXTWsOGIP7E2LoM/s320/IMG_8705.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>Back in the valley, it flattened out a little going down to another feed station - conveniently at the bottom of what turned out to be the biggest, hardest hill I've been up in ages. Good training for the RVO hopefully. The bottom was super steep & rocky, but as we rode through the stone wall (it was gated, my bike is not magic - well, no more magic than bikes are in general) it was the beginning of an interminable granny ring grind on grass. Good fun slowly hauling others in - the tail wind as we traversed helped. Time for a couple more photos before traversing into the massive head wind on the other side of the hill - never that much fun having to work downhill. <br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjPfRgi1i-s9OHnMWF6nm4DZ9UFIb-iuEUGv0BTCdQOovgjV9XuhDv4xlWGYlvcKGvfoipzvZOtzIPXgQIAy_6hShHVTRhKUxClw0Xml9LFPhj4wutfr0sDyoi0i96GNOwzxES1ah0VFN8/s1600/IMG_8708.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjPfRgi1i-s9OHnMWF6nm4DZ9UFIb-iuEUGv0BTCdQOovgjV9XuhDv4xlWGYlvcKGvfoipzvZOtzIPXgQIAy_6hShHVTRhKUxClw0Xml9LFPhj4wutfr0sDyoi0i96GNOwzxES1ah0VFN8/s320/IMG_8708.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj7NqrLuqYlFCtKoaWSXP7X8WX2gz9_-kh4cTLclMz-vzE-zbh24k6BHnpsyEQEP_P_ecSBwBV2heM00YYynPZH6dngJ2d0wn_1bJuciURUcaA3OxBuLOomio0aTQekdcxk7_tgMac6vRA/s1600/IMG_8709.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj7NqrLuqYlFCtKoaWSXP7X8WX2gz9_-kh4cTLclMz-vzE-zbh24k6BHnpsyEQEP_P_ecSBwBV2heM00YYynPZH6dngJ2d0wn_1bJuciURUcaA3OxBuLOomio0aTQekdcxk7_tgMac6vRA/s320/IMG_8709.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>It was pretty much all downhill from there, so pleased to get back just over five hours (including all the food stops - yum, Welsh cakes). Once again, it was disappointing that the distance & elevation gain was somewhat less than expected. But a great day out & a very enjoyable ride in another national park previously unvisited by me.<br />
<iframe frameborder="0" height="548" src="http://connect.garmin.com:80/activity/embed/353407754" width="465"></iframe>BPheasanthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05789261682093840738noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3954833318925893361.post-59753959916519476922013-07-24T21:21:00.004+01:002013-07-24T21:21:46.931+01:00Ogre Quake sort of weekendAfter a good couple of months of waiting, my new bike was finally back in stock so I headed off to Swanage Friday afternoon to pick it up from <a href="http://www.charliethebikemonger.com/index.asp" target="_blank">Charlie the Bikemonger</a> - purveyor of all sorts of interesting & niche bikes and associated things. Unfortunately for my arms & downhill speed, the suspension fork is still to arrive - so fully rigid on a 29er it was for the weekend. The <a href="http://surlybikes.com/bikes/ogre" target="_blank">Surly Ogre</a> is not particularly fancy (I don't think I've ever had a fancy bike - money seems to get spent on travelling to interesting places), but it is extremely versatile. I've bought it for its ability to carry loads off road - sturdy is a good word, heavy not so favourable - and still be useful for riding fun trails while hauling <a href="http://www.bikepacking.net/" target="_blank">bike-packing</a> gear (pretty much light camping gear) between overnight stops.<br />
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I stayed the night at cousin Pamela's in Poole, always fun, before heading off too-early Saturday for the Quantocks in Somerset. I was to meet people I met at last week's event, but having to repair their broken bikes before an Alps trip put paid to that. As it happens, riding by myself worked out well as I could stop whenever I needed to & tweak things on my bike & get it right. The Ogre climbs well, as I expected a hardtail 29er to, but I got quite a nasty shock at the start of some of the descents - so bumpy, looking forward to the Reba fork turning up. Noticeably cooler than the previous two weeks (we're officially out of the heatwave now, but it's still pleasant) it was easy riding and I managed to tackle the infamous Chimney without incident. With no one to wait for, I ignored photo stops.<br />
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John & Anna weren't home when I arrived, so I wandered downtown in the sun for some lunch. On the way back I got to call 999 for the first time (I think I've managed only one 111 call back in NZ) - such excitement. About halfway back I noticed a lady pull to side of the road & stop with quite a bit of steam coming out from underneath the bonnet/hood of her car. It seemed a lot of steam really, so much so that I started to think it was smoke - I crossed the road and standing downwind it was easy to tell it was smoke. As I chatted to the driver about what to do, really hoping she wouldn't try to open the bonnet/hood, a small lick of flame poked its way out; calling the fire brigade was a logical progression. Seven minutes later with the road closed, an engine arrived - by which time the whole front of the car was on fire, as well as the road beneath, a tyre had exploded & the windscreen sported a large hole. The flames were quickly extinguished & the poor lady had the rather soggy remains of a car left.<br />
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The inaugural <a href="http://www.quantockquake.co.uk/" target="_blank">Quantock Quake</a> was on Sunday - thankfully the start was brought forward two hours to nine o'clock to miss the heat of the day, this worked a treat as it was cool until the sun broke through at about ten and things got rather warm. Apparently it has been many years since a MTB event was held on these hills due to previous associated incidents - so it was officially not a race, but a sportive (although we all started at once). It was a well run & fun little event - only just over eighty riders - & I got to ride parts of the Quantocks I've never before. Six of us Combe Raiders were there looking rather swish in our shirts - those, not our supreme riding, attracted plenty of comments. I got home fifth in the not-officially-a-race, so I was quite pleased with that as I was really slow downhill trying not shake to pieces but quick enough uphill to regain time lost. John did rather well and got back second, a good fifteen or twenty minutes in front of me.<br />
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By the time we got back to John & Anna's it was proper baking (for England) and a good opportunity for a barbecue. The rest of the afternoon was spent eating, cleaning bikes a bit (no water needed, for a change) & entertaining the twins.BPheasanthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05789261682093840738noreply@blogger.com0