It's that time of year again, time for the South of Bucks Winter Warmer, 200Km of chilly Audaxy fun and what's not to like about that?
As you can see from my previous efforts it's not a bad little ride this. I'll admit that it's not particularly scenic, as it sticks mainly to the bigger roads in case it's icy, but at the same time it's quite a fast run out, although a lot of the road surfaces leave a lot to be desired, as do the antics of some of our fellow road users! The forecast for the weekend hadn't looked too promising though the week, with a band of heavy, slow moving rain forecast right across the route when I checked at the start of the week. By Friday things had improved a bit and it looked like it might only rain in the morning and to that end I'd packed for every eventuality when I'd set off in the van Friday night. It would seem that the weather gods have been smiling on me this weekend though, as the forecast rain appeared earlier than predicted and I'd woken a couple of times in the night to the pitter patter of raindrops on the van roof. But, by the time I'd got up, had some breakfast and got ready to go, the rain had stopped and the still dark skies appeared to have cleared, with the promise of a better day than forecast.
Leaving Beaconsfield at 07:30 it was just starting to get light, but the roads were still surprisingly busy for that time on a Saturday morning, possibly not the best sign of things to come, especially when this time last year we were on the cusp of lockdown 2 and the few of us that rode had the roads pretty much to ourselves.
Heading South towards the first checkpoint at Winnersh, the low laying sun reflected heavily of the still wet roads, making it hard to see at times and heightening my senses, listening intently for every approaching car. Have they seen me with the sun in their eye's through their still un-misted windscreen? Listen, tense, relax as they come past! That's still a million times better than rain though and I'd rather spend by time squinting because of the sun than squinting trying to keep the rain out of my eyes! The first legs a pretty quick one on flat roads and it wasn't long before I was through Winnersh and on my way towards the second stop of the day at Alton. I must confess that this isn't a great bit of riding, there's a long stretch down the A331 after Reading, which has possibly the worst road surface known to man and is a real rat run of fast twisty corners, with what feels like an almost constant uphill gradient. Between the car drivers in a rush to get nowhere and the draggy road surface, it's a real slog and seems to go on forever. It clearly doesn't though, as by 10:30 I was rolling into Alton with 40 odd miles under my belt. A quick stop for proof of passage and off again, heading nearly home, or within 5 miles of it anyway, on familiar, quieter roads. This is more like it, although by now the wind had got up and was trying it's best to blow me back from whence I came, with a icy chill to add to it's efforts, a theme which remained for the rest of the day.
North now, heading for Pangbourne, with it's quaint little toll bridge over the Thames and lung busting climb on the other side. Slow and steady's the key to this one, as it seems to go on forever, getting steeper towards the top, before settling down into a long uphill slog for a couple of miles to take you up onto the higher ground on the edge of the Chiltern Hills, before dropping straight back down again with some outstanding views off towards Didcot and Oxford in the far distance.
Next stop the M40 services at Wheatley and the requirement to get a receipt as proof of passage. Luckily a large chocolate muffin comes with a receipt, as does all manner of other chocolaty goodness. Well, come on, if you can't treat yourself half way round a 200Km ride, then when can you? From Wheatley it's on to the old A40 for a few fast miles, made even faster today by that cold wind that's still trying to find it's way through every little gap in my clothing, but is now thankfully on my back for a while. It's only fast until you hit the next big climb up to Stokenchurch with it's communications tower, towering over the surrounding countryside though. I'd imagine that there were some fun and games going up here back in the days when this was the main route into London. Old Austin's, Fords and Morris's crawling slowly up the hill, overheating and stuttering as they went, intermixed with Steam wagons and heavy transport crawling slowly up in their lowest gears. It's a far nicer place today, now the majority of traffic's been moved off onto the M40, and whilst it's long climb on tired legs and achieves a fair bit of altitude, it's a nicely surfaced bit of road at a steady gradient. Eventually though it's over the top and the chance to pick the speed back up for the run into Marlow and the final checkpoint of the day. A quick pause in Marlow to sort out my lights and get ready for the last leg, it's only 15:30 but the night is starting to draw in, and it won't be long until it's proper dark, and I'm soon off again. One more real killer of a steep climb and it's all over bar the shouting and the run back to the start. Just the small matter of trying to get across 4 lanes of fast moving traffic in the dark to contend with to get back to the van and the chance of a brew and warm up. Another one done then. Just shy of 130 miles in a smidge over 9 hours and most importantly I didn't get wet. Granted it was a bit chilly, but what do you expect, it is the winter and the UK's not exactly known for it's high temperatures is it!
We seem to be a bit short on the pictures front this week, mainly due to the fact that I couldn't be bothered stopping and fighting my way in and out of my multiple layers and gloves when I was out and about Audaxing on Saturday.
So instead, I'll share a few shots from my run in to work on Monday morning. Now I don't know what the weather was like by you at the start of the week, but "The Emma" had been half jokingly telling me that the forecast was for snow on Sunday all of the week before, whilst I'd been saying "yeah, right, snow at the end of November. Whatever!" Well, imagine our surprise when I looked out just before bed on Sunday night to rapidly settling snow. That put the cat among the pigeons at bed time I can tell you. Bicycles and snow don't go very well together, so a quick reshuffle of kit, resetting of the alarm and change of commuting plans ensued. Even if the snow had disappeared, the wet roads were likely to be icy and I'm too old to break a hip falling off my bike on ice! Luckily for me, there was still an inch or 2 of snow when I got up at early O'Clock and I'll tell you for free, there's nothing better than running in the snow!
And finally, as they say on the news. "The Boy's" finally passed his driving test and as a first car, that's reasonably priced to insure, my little Peugot seemed like an ideal Christmas present and the first steps on the road to motoring and freedom for him.
I know it's a good little car, it's had pretty much everything that can be done to it fixed or replaced over the past few months, so it should be reliable and get him around without too many problems. I'd rather give him something which I know the history of and know that I've worked on and had a good look over too, rather than just buy him something which I know nothing about. So with a tear in my eye, it's gone to it's new home. He came up from the depths of darkest Wales on Friday afternoon to get it and drove it the 130 miles back home again, no mean feat when you only passed your test a week ago! A real adventure for him and if you can do that, well the worlds your oyster, for want of a better saying! That's left me without a run around or project though. I did go and have a look at an overpriced 206 in Reading this afternoon, but judging by the amount of oil in the coolant the head gaskets shot and I'm not paying the sort of money they were asking for it, for a car that needs an engine rebuild. Desire to have an ongoing project or not! So, if anyone's got an old run around that they want shot of let me know. I've not got the patience for chasing around after dreamers and blaggers, so hopefully something local will come up in the next few weeks. Watch this space!
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Paul PerrattOld enough to know better, young enough to still feel invincible, stupid enough to keep on trying the same thing again and again. Cyclist, Gardener, Runner, Hiker, Cook, Woodworker, Engineer, Jack of all trades and master of none, Anti social old git and all round miserable bugger. Archives
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