A pretty nice day apart from a fierce wind and a threat of showers, so I abandoned my desk rather early and mounted a bicycle, in the hope of getting a fondo in.
I had the idea of going south at first, but I developed an urge to do a Bypasser. Could I somehow extend a Twycross Bypasser to the requisite 62.14 miles? Well I thought it would be fun to find out.
After Norton I thought of going over to No Man’s Heath, from where I could join the Lower Westbound route. I did that. After King’s Bromley I’d done more than 27 miles thanks to indulging a part-Bypasser and I decided to keep on going south past King’s Bromley Wharf rather than turn off for Abbot’s Bromley. Again, just in a spirit of adventure really. The headwind was shocking at this point and I was riding directly into it.
After about three miles I turned back, but I took an unfamiliar left turn shortly afterward to go exploring. This took me to Handsacre and I followed a sign from there back to King’s Bromley. However just to keep things interesting, from there I came back via what I might term the “Disused Lower Westbound Route”, through Barton under Needwood and Coton in the Elms. I remembered why I don’t really use that route now, it’s gritty and climby in places.
I stopped for food at a village shop in Yoxall. Nice place, very nice sandwiches. I wonder if I could fashion a useful route that goes through Yoxall.
After Netherseal it was apparent that I still had a few miles to make up so I came back a slightly indirect way after Measham, and detoured via Ibstock. The sun had set by this time, and I’d deployed lights.
However .. just as I was coming into the village, a friendly motorist emerging from his car flagged me down. “Did you have a red light on the back of your bike?” he wanted to know. Indeed I did, but not any longer apparently. “Because I passed one flashing on the road back there”, he continued. I thanked him, put a spare rear light on and went back a mile or so to look for it, but I didn’t see it. Ah well, it was cheap, and obviously a bit useless. The rubber strap was still attached, but the main body of the light had fallen off the mount.
Back on 64.27 miles. If not for backtracking to look for a missing rear light, I’d have been back in just over fondo distance so I’d managed the distance quite nicely.
Lovely out there apart from the wind, and obviously that only bothered me over the first half of the ride. Spring-like. I did get rained on, but only for five minutes. This was the first time I’d been out on the S Works since September and it zipped along beautifully on the way back.