Lovely afternoon again, warm and sunny. I set off with the intention of doing a Twycross Bypasser at 1552. There was a fair old breeze coming from the north-west and a Twycrosser (or Bypasser) mostly takes place to the south-west so not ideal, but I was looking forward to the cosy familiarity of a frequent ride as a sort of warm-down from Wales.
However, unaccountably, I forgot to take the turn to Norton on the road down to Twycross, so I continued all the way down there. I did the detour to Orton from there, though.
Went right down to Mythe Lane and across Atterton Lane, to the A444, which I took all the way up to Gibbet Lane. I don’t usually do that long a stretch of A444, preferring to turn for Bosworth or Shenton more often that not. But it was fine.
I was listening to Marr on LBC, sitting at the bench next to the Gibbet Post when news of Javid’s resignation came through. He’d already been trying to get maximum mileage out of the Pincher story, but now he was beside himself, like a schoolboy who’d won a big bag of sweets. When it turned out that Rishi had thrown in the towel as well, I hoped he’d brought a change of underwear.
He did his best to paint the situation as the government collapsing, as if two cabinet ministers resigning on the same day was unprecedented (it wasn’t).
Ten minutes later he and his guests (none supportive of the PM of course) were discussing the possibility of a Labour / Lib-Dem coalition changing the voting system to keep the Tories out of power for “a very long time”. Twenty minutes after that, Heseltine was on, and the words “if Boris goes, Brexit goes” came out of his mouth.
We see you. It’s not subtle.
It did occur to me, as I glanced at the Gibbet Post, that it might be quite nice to see Sav or Rishi chained to it, post-mortem. Dishonourable, dishonest men, just positioning themselves to avoid the fallout if the media take the PM down. Nothing more than that.
Anyway – back up through Ibstock and home on 32.62 miles – which takes me to 2901 this year.
Although it was ultimately successful, I made a bit of a dog’s breakfast of my mission to Wales and back in 2017 by taking a bike pump that I hadn’t tested properly. Ever since, I’ve wanted to have another crack at it.
Today looked like the day, weather-wise. I was going to set off at about 0700 but I woke up at 0345. I was out of bed half an hour later, and I set off shortly after 0500. Fairly cold at that time of the morning, but I was wearing tights and a few layers on top. Once again the fields were swathed in clouds of mist, illuminated by the early sunlight light bright cotton wool. So pretty. And as you’d expect, the roads were so quiet at that time on a Sunday morning. I only saw two moving motor vehicles over the first six miles.
Unfortunately, from the fourth or fifth moving motor vehicle that I saw this morning, a young man leaned out of the passenger window and shouted WANKER! at the top of his voice as it went past, at considerable speed. This is why I’m glad we don’t have a second amendment, because I’d have been taking shots through their rear window with one hand while steering the bike with the other.
I’d picked out a different route from the first Wales trip over the first 15 miles or so. I’ve done that stretch of roads before, but not for ages. I don’t really get why it fell into disuse .. in recent years typically I’d go through Coton or Harlaston but this route, through Lullington and Edingale, is much better. Better roads and less hassle while still being quiet and scenic. But there are so many different options that it’s hard to remember them all and I don’t go that way so often, anyway. I’ll make a note, though.
Really nice to reacquaint myself with the roads to the west of Stone, that I’d only ever done once before. I remembered taking pics at the same county boundary signs for Shropshire and Cheshire.
I arrived in Wales at 1159. The morning sunshine had given way to grey skies by this time, and the rain started. Although there is a “Welcome to Wales” sign I was rolling past it as some speed, so I didn’t stop there. I settled for this one, which is much the same pic I took in 2017, but with a different bike.
I checked my rear tyre carefully here. I had no particular reason to think that it might be punctured. It wasn’t. But I spent an unhappy 20 minutes or so in the same spot five years ago, after realising that I had a puncture and my pump didn’t work properly.
The rain followed me back into Shropshire, but it was very light and only lasted 15 minutes. After that it was dry all the way. Result! I’d fully expected to get rained on a few times, though I knew it would be dry after 5pm.
One minor glitch – the road had been closed off near Audlem on the way back for roadworks, but I was able to get by on the pavement.
I’d expected to be taking my tights and fleece off after 40 or so miles, but it wasn’t that warm until 2pm-ish and I didn’t bother taking them off until I only had 35 miles to go.
One really annoying thing – the A51 had been resurfaced after Stone, and it was an awful surface to ride on – coarse gravel that had been sprayed with tar. This was definitely the finished article, because it had fresh white lines on. After I’d put up with it for three miles it I started to worry that I’d have another twenty miles of it, but fortunately there were only five miles of it in total. It didn’t seem so bad on the way back, probably only because I knew when it would stop.
The lady in the petrol station where I bought some snacks and coffee on the way back recognised me from a similar shopping trip in the morning. “Have you been cycling all this time??”, she wanted to know. I’d been in there at 0800 and it was about 1600 at this time. I told her that I’d set off at about 0500 and still had another 30 miles to do. “You’ll definitely sleep tonight”, she suggested. And I think she’s right, actually I’m half asleep now.
Strange to go past the power station at Rugeley with the cooling towers gone. On the outbound part I took a wrong turn and went through the town, rather than past the power station.
The way back was a breeze, with a bit of a tailwind, nice afternoon sunshine and plenty of gently descending flat bits.
Saw a couple of Spitfires, late in the day – or perhaps the same one, if it had looped round. I heard that distinctive Merlin engine growl and looked up to see the unmistakable shape. Not exactly air display altitude, but very recognisable.
I listened to LBC first thing in the morning and that was really good actually, though why people are taking part in a phone-in show at 5 in the morning on a Sunday is beyond me. Later, a bit of 6 Music and Wimbledon / Silverstone on 5 Live. Then Reacher. I’d only meant to listen to an hour or two of it but I found it really compelling and listened for about four hours, right until the end.
Really a nice, nostalgic ride out and glad to have finally ticked the Wales box again. Back on 142.7 miles. Fourth 100 miler and fifteenth Fondo of the year.
