You'll all be pleased to know that after last week’s little car fixing interlude, normal service is resuming this week. Although, if your only here for the adventuring you'll be disappointed to know that there's probably going to be a bit more fun (or not as the case may be) with cars to come, as “The Boy” has been up this week to drop off his little run around, which possibly needs some work to get through the MOT and has some weird and wonderful intermittent noise to investigate.
As we all know, you can't fix something that's not broken, and when I drove it the other day it sounded fine, so we’ll have to see where that one ends up. I've also got a few other “Project” related things in the pipeline over the winter months, which will no doubt keep me busy and give me something to bore you all with! Please stick around though, because there's still plenty of stupid running and cycling adventures to come and I'm sure that even when there's nothing specific going on it won't take long for me to get itchy feet and find my own outdoors fun.
So, what have I been up to this week then? Well, for a starter’s you'll already have seen the back end of last week’s post covering pottering with “The Emma's” Peugeot, which dragged into Saturday this week.
Sometimes I wish that I'd never started a job and that was one of those. A simple Wishbone replacement actually turned into, Wishbones on both sides, both inner and outer Steering arms and a L/H Shock Absorber, Drop Link and Upper Shock strut mount. On the positive side though, once I'd finally finished swearing, being able to drive it without a million clunks every time you hit the slightest ripple in the road was a very satisfying moment. Looking at the cost of the parts alone, I would think that having that lot replaced by the garage would have cost more than the cars worth. It’s still a brilliant little car though, and original and un-tampered with examples are getting rarer, so in my opinion it’s well worth saving, plus I got the satisfaction of having fixed it myself, and I know that now it's actually right too! Other than swearing, I did manage to get a few running miles in on Saturday morning. Nothing special, just 7 road miles around home, but if I'm honest that made quite a nice change. The route I ran is one that I used to do almost daily at one time, but probably haven't done for at least a year, and it's surprising the things that change in that time. A new house extension here, a few changes to people’s gardens there, the never-ending roadworks, and the ever-changing trees and vegetation that cover our roadsides, yet we normally barely even notice, all of which help to take your mind off the task in hand and give you something to look at and think about as you pass by.
A couple of hours on the Allotment in the morning got a few more of the little Autumn jobs done too. The Tomatoes have reached the end of their productive time, so they all made it to the compost heap, leaving one side of the greenhouse empty for the first time since last winter.
I must say that they've been really productive this year, providing far more tomatoes than even I could eat through the summer months, and I'm going to miss the taste of homegrown tomatoes through the dark winter days. A shop bought version just can’t compare! The continuing warm spell has done wonders for the Chillies too and I'm now inundated with hot red chillies and I picked the last of the bell peppers too, which I'm sure will find their way onto the dinner table at some point next week. There's still plenty of other veg still on the plot to see us through the winter and some still to reach maturity (Sprouts), with loads of Beetroot, Leeks, Parsnips, Kale, Cabbages and Chard still growing strongly and a couple of Pumpkins and Squash which should keep for a couple of months in a cool dark place, so I don’t think that were going to starve.
Before I move onto this weekend’s main event, I just wanted to share this picture that I took on the way to work one morning in the week. I'm often treated to a beautiful sunrise on my morning cycle commute, but the sunrise below actually made me double back (uphill) to get a picture. As always, the camera doesn't do it justice, but it looked like the whole world was on fire just over the horizon.
I think you'll agree that sights like that more than make up for the effort of dragging myself onto the bike every morning, and the odd morning when I get rained on!
Right, odd jobs done for the time being, lets get onto the important stuff and a bit of Audaxing.
The clocks changing signify only two things in my life, a week of being tired, miserable, confused and hungry at the wrong time, and the Petworth start or end of Summer time 200 km Audax’s. 200 km of Audxing fun, starting and finishing, as the name would suggest, in Petworth. Now, I’ve done both of these rides a couple of times before, (start and end of summer) so I’m not going to go into loads of detail, if you want the "nitty gritty" have a look here (Start of Summer). But I will say that I was looking forward to this one. I mentioned at my last outing that it’s not the best or most inspiring route, but it does have some interesting (read big) climbs, and takes in some nice country lanes, whilst still managing to cover plenty of faster roads which helps to keep the average pace up and stop it becoming a slog fest. I’ve not been out on the bike properly for a few weeks either, which always helps with the enthusiasm.
Waking up in the night to the sound of rain on the van roof wasn’t the best of signs, and when I woke up properly at 05:00 (nice one changing the clocks) it was still raining! Not to worry though, we weren’t scheduled to start until 08:30 so there was plenty of time for an extra brew and for the rain to stop.
Except it didn’t. By 08:30 as the bold and the brave (stupid), gathered in the car park ready for the off, the rain was still falling heavily enough to put a dampener on proceedings. Not to worry though, you can only get wet once, and with a promise from the organiser that it would stop raining at 09:00 we were off. Heading first to Liphook then on to Petersfield, before the long, steep, climb for a crossing of the South Downs at Harting Down and the run down to the coast at Chichester, before looping back for lunch at Petworth. The morning progressed without comment, and as promised at bang on 09:00 the rain stopped, leaving a cloudy and overcast, yet unseasonably warm and humid day, which required a rapid removal of my rain jacket to avoid being boiled alive. A strong head wind on the exposed run down to the coast made for some hard going, but by 12:00 I was back at the halfway control tucking into a plate of beans on toast, ready for the afternoon’s fun. The afternoon loop doesn’t have the long steep climbs of the morning, but does seem to be relentlessly rolling, which keeps the legs working and stops you getting cold. Out from Petworth again and back down to the coast at Shoreham, again into that niggling headwind, before a U turn to head up to the motorway services at Pease Pottage and then a final run back to the start in time for tea and medals. The afternoon progressed nicely with only the rare sighting of 3 horse riders dressed up in Halloween fancy dress proceeding sedately up the road, to break the monotony. And an obscure conversation with a motorist as I stood at the petrol station in the services astride my bike in full cycling kit, who stopped specially to ask if I knew where he could charge his electric car? Errrr no, I’ve come on my bike, why would I know about car charging? Unfortunately, the rain returned as darkness descended (in the middle of the afternoon, thanks again clock changing), but by that time I was less than an hour from the finish, so getting wet wasn’t too much of an issue. And as I said earlier, it’s still unseasonably warm and the rain hasn’t got that icy cold edge to it that it will have in another few weeks, so even that did little to dispel my good spirits. Just after 17:30 and in total darkness (oh how things have changed in those few short months since the longest day back in June) I was back at the start, tucking into a slice of cake and a hot brew, with another 130 miles to add to the year’s total. Not a bad day out then and only another 146 days until the clocks go forward and I can do it all again.
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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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