Glanced at the weather forecast on Thursday night and was pleased to see that only a light wind was expected for Friday. Not only that but it was due to change direction at about 4pm, so that I could have a light tailwind both ways, at least some of the time.
I decided to take Friday off and have a run out eastward. I haven’t been over that way for a while, mainly because of westerly winds. It’s not a lot of fun fighting a headwind to come home. I decided to tick Rutland off the neighbouring counties list.
Unfortunately the forecast had changed by Friday morning, so that the wind was due to change direction at about 6pm. I needed to be back by 6. But the expected wind velocity was light enough that I didn’t think a headwind on the way back would be too bothersome.
I set off at about 10:20. I couldn’t set off much before then as I had to hang around in the house to get some BSP gig tickets, available from 10:00.
I wrapped up decently warm but was a bit too cold for the first hour or so. Later in the day with the sun out I was a bit too warm. So I probably got the clothing balance about right.
The most recent Rutland route takes the usual route over toward Lincolnshire until Six Hills, when it plunges south-east through Asfordby, Kirby Bellars, Great Dalby and Little Dalby. This was the first time I’d turned along the B676 at Cotes without having ro roll through water running across the road, although the fields around there are still waterlogged.
I stopped at a little shop in Asfordby to get a few supplies, including a four-pack of AA batteries. The pair of AAs in my DAB had conked out about 15 minutes earlier. Annoyingly I went through the first pair in about an hour and five minutes and the second pair lasted about the same time. Supposedly Panasonics, and bearing the legend “Power your day!” on the packaging. Not really. I’d expect a pair of the cheapest Tesco AAs to last at least five or six hours in that particular DAB. Quite annoying as they cost me £2.58 for the pack of four. I have to wonder if they were counterfeit. I could get a pack of 12 Duracell alkaline AAs for £5.99 from Amazon, and a pair of those gives me about nine hours of 5 Live.
Normally I would take spare batteries with me but I’d put a fresh alkaline pair in just before setting off, which would normally last over nine hours. I can only guess they were part-depleted. I do leave half-empty ones lying around my mancave sometimes. Clearly I need to sharpen my battery management skills.
I’d forgotten that the road down to Rutland from Six Hills was so hilly. A bit galling to be descending a series of long inclines, knowing that I’d have to push back up them. But it wasn’t too bad. Quite nice to do that run again. One thing it does have in its favour is that it’s extremely quiet, or at least it was yesterday.
Got to the Rutland sign by about 2pm. I penetrated Rutland for half a mile or so then turned back the way I came. Not long after reaching Zouch on the way back I could see clouds in the distance, spilling rain onto the Leicestershire landscape. I got caught in it about an hour from home, for about 25 minutes. Thoroughly unpleasant, prickly cold rain.
Anyway .. just Lincolnshire left to do now, this year. But I’d quite like to add a new non-neighbouring county to the list – Gloucestershire, maybe?
An enjoyable run out, but probably not the best use of a day’s holiday really. I should probably have kept it for a long, sunny day when I could set off earlier and come home later than was possible this time.
71.32 miles, 263 done this month.