Conditions were forecast to be near-perfect yesterday – sunny, warm, a light wind coming from the east, increasing in intensity later in the day. And intermittent cloud cover in the early afternoon. The plan was to set off early and cycle over to the flat bit of Lincolnshire. Not as far as Sutton Bridge, my usual destination over there, but into the Fens for a couple of miles.
I woke up at about 0620. I contemplated getting up there and then, but I asked Alexa what the current temperature was first. Eight degrees. So I went back to sleep. Unfortunately I didn’t wake up again until 0830.
I set off at about 0925. Still not quite warm enough for minimal clothing, so I had a long sleeve second layer on. But the temperature was forecast to rise quite rapidly, and it did. I stashed my long sleeved top in my camo bag, along with a torch and spare batteries, in a hedge near Waltham after 32 miles. Actually I regretted doing that twenty minutes later when the sun disappeared into clouds. But not for long, fortunately.
Stopped at the village store at Buckminster for more fuel after 39 miles. About 9 miles later, I failed to take a left turn after Castle Bytham, which is exactly what I did last time. Rather than backtracking to the usual route, I consulted the map on my phone and decided to keep going. I was effectively on a detour that would only add about two miles. However when I did meet up with the intended route at a crossroads I failed to realise I’d done so, and kept going for about a mile until I reached a village called Toft. It was nearly 1500 now. I’d done 57 miles. It would take me another half hour at least to get to the part of the Fens that I was aiming for. So I decided to turn for home.
I came back via the originally intended route, mostly. Once back in Leicestershire I came back through Wymeswold and Rempstone rather than Stanford and Burton. Back half an hour after sunset on 111.41 miles.
That was probably my last chance this year to pedal around the Fens for a bit so that’s a bit of a shame, but I did enjoy the new stretch of road in Lincolnshire. And I especially enjoyed gliding along the long flat stretch from Eastwell to Six Hills in the afternoon sunshine with a bit of a tailwind. The traffic was a lot quieter than I expected for a Friday. Lovely.
I listened to 5 Live. And I was going to continue with my Alastair Reynolds audiobook but I had such a faff finding the point where I left it in the excessively long chapter that I was about 2/3 of the way through, that I decided to give up on it there and then and I started a new book, a brilliant Vietnam war memoir that I read in 1984 called Chickenhawk.
So that’s a wrap for August, 651 miles. I want to do 400 in each of the remaining four months, and if I do I’ll have done 5979 miles. So I’ll aim for 6000 in 2024.