Big Sky Riding

Saturday just past and I was back in the Dales, only about two months after EDD but a completely different weather experience. This is what I love about Dales mountain biking:



Bone dry trails and fantastic views. In fact, I think that was probably the first time I had actually ridden some of those trails in the dry, for some reason we seem always to tackle these grassy, limestone infested trails in the winter wet, complete slogfest then.

I managed to clean the evil climb out of Littondale up to the road skirting PenYGhent for the first time ever, pretty pleased with that, normally I just either don;t have the legs or spin out on some greasy bit of limestone. The lovely cheese and pickle sandwiches I'd just troughed at the pub were the deciding factor I'm sure.


The visibility was just awesome, this was the kind of view I knew I was missing in all the clag of the EDD:



A great ride and just occasionally on the descents I thought my descending mojo was really coming back, ear to ear grins at the bottom of every single one...hopefully I'll get it fully back before our trip to Switzerland in September.

Another Dales Ride

I headed back over to the Dales on Friday, this time to ride from Horton over to Bainbridge and back, primarily to ride all the way down the Roman Road. There was however the small matter of riding up Fleet Moss and pushing up onto Horsehead to deal with...

A complete contrast to the last time I was over there, gorgeous sunshine and very little wind. My new Garmin had arrived on Thursday so route plotted on that and on a map, navigation simple again. Set off riding up the way I had descended last time at a nice easy pace. Had to stop to wait for some sheep to pass. At least I stopped, the two walkers I had just passed kept walking which only succeeded in chasing the sheep all the way back up. I'm sure the farmers were impressed.

The climb was fairly straight forward until the rubbly section, which seemed very bad. I kept pedalling but going nowhere. I don't know if it was as bad as that when I came down it and the water was just hiding everything. If that was the case then I was very lucky to get down it riding so slowly.


Up onto Birkwith moor, a really nice track to ride in this direction and all the water splashes were back to normal and rideable. My legs were not particularly sprightly I have to say but fresh legs are a luxury (so I told myself) and just kept pedalling. I was slightly worried that I seemed to need my first butty after about 6 miles, quite early really as apart from waiting for the sheep I hadn't stopped. I obviously hadn't eaten enough after running the night before.

I had energy drink too but I really needed some solid food. It wasn't long before I was heading for Fleet Moss. I had taken the hardtail out as the Titus has been having all the fun lately...actually the gears are totally shot and I hadn't had time to sort them out. However, the front brake was playing up, has been for a while. It was giving its little chirp which is really annoying but I was also slowing down on any downhill sections rather than speeding up.

After the first steepish ramp after Oughtershaw I decided that climbing Fleet Moss with a partially applied front brake wasn't my idea of a great time. I pulled over into a large layby and had a serious look at the brake. Tried pushing pistons back though they seemed ok, it still touched the disk. I tried shimming it with the barest of shims but that pushed it too far over. After a good faff it had freed enough to continue (i.e. the fluid had cooled down).

The squeak came back eventually but I was quite near the top. I'm glad I've come down it as it's a deceptive sod, gets harder the further up you go, the last switchback I took wide! Cracking view down the valley though, so nice to be able to really appreciate it.

Across the top then down a bit towards the start of the offroad section of the Roman Road, passed a couple of recumbents climbing up as I was dropping. A bit of climbing first, actually a bit more than I thought, a bit of rolling along before the long, fast drop into Bainbridge.

Nothing technical but very fast, the kind of track where a full suspension could get up to quite silly speeds and get you into trouble, my hardtail tried a few times too. It seemed to go on forever, then had a fair old road descent into Bainbridge afterwards. I rolled into Bainbridge and sat in the sun for a while and ate another butty, I was about half way but the worst climbs were still to come.

The climb out wasn't too bad, would have been better without brake faff but as I couldnt't be bothered to stop all the time I only did something when it was really starting to bind. It was a pretty gradual but steady climb up onto Stake Allotments. One loose bit of track to work hard on but rest of it was fine. I'd never been up here before and on such a glorious day it was lovely cruising. Nothing technical just vast open space.

I really enjoyed tootling along here, however it would be pretty bleak on a minging day. About half way along I found a nice big puddle and got a handful of Yorkshire's finest gritty mud and smeared it all over the front disk, sorted it out for ages. To cap off a fab bit of cruising a fast, lumpy drop to the road. Excellent. Then a long fast road drop down towards Hubberholme. I pass the recumbents going up again, except this time I realise they are hand bikes...my word they were working hard up that hill.

It wasn't lost on me that all this long descent was heading for a massive up, I could see where I needed to get to and it was high. I stopped at the bottom of the bridleway to Horsehead for my last butty before beginning the push up, I knew it was going to be a push.

Bits of the bottom section were actually rideable, it was very steep and grassy but if you had the legs you could get up some of it. If I had had fresher legs then I would have tried a lot more and only succeeded in tiring myself out. It got pretty unrideable for the rest of it and it just went on and on and on and on...in the hot sun. It took a long time to push up, added an awful lot of time onto a ride which had already had its fair share of faff with brake fiddling and a leisurely lunch stop.

The top eventually came and the view was enough to put a smile on my face again.

Next the descent to Halton Gill which I have seen raved about. I wasn't that impressed to be honest. Ok it was fast but it only had a couple of lumpy corners for interest and it was over far too quickly. The Dales is packed with good fast descents that don't need an epic push to get to them. So I probably wouldn't bother again.

The bridleway along Pen-y-Ghent on the other hand was fantastic fun. The grassy slog of a climb was hard and my legs didn't want to ride it all but once onto the flatter bridleway with all the tricksy rock my legs suddenly kicked into life. I loved it, even the really boggy stuff had dried out enough that only a few sections were too soft to get through.

Time had seriously gotten away from me, the light was definitely changing, think it was getting on past five:

It wasn't as dark as that picture suggests but the light was changing. The July weather had made me forget that I didn't have July levels of daylight. As I got to the end of the fun track and joined up with the last wide track back to Horton my water ran out - timing. My forearms were feeling pretty sore from all the pushing probably so I did the last drop to the car pretty fast in an attempt to not use the brakes much. There were a couple of surprises I have to say but I got away with them.

The benefit of it being late on was that I only passed one walker the whole way down. Back to the car, clean bike, head home, order takeaway, fall asleep after managing to stay awake for Rebus. A longer day than I really thought, glad I didn't leave it much later in the year though I now have plans to do a Horton Bainbridge ride without the push up Horsehead.....

Dales Ride (Horton - Hawes - Horton)

I'm behind with my blogging got quite a few started posts but haven't finished them! This is for last Fridays ride, 30th of August....

Being on call for the bank holiday weekend meant I was pretty limited in what I could get up to, I have to be able to log onto the systems within an absolute max of an hour so I am kind of tied to my laptop. However, on call doesn't start til 5.30 pm on Friday so I had the day free, albeit with a time limit of sorts.

Plan was a 30 mile ride in the Dales, one I have done a few times before though not for a few years, one that is very rideable and should have few navigational challenges (though I always seem to be able to make one). Forecast was appalling I have to say, heavy rain, gales....still decided to go. I plotted the route on the Garmin, printed a map out from Memory Map, marked the route on it and laminated it.

A bit of discussion with Jez about the exact route showed that I had picked up the bridleway out of Burtersett which would be a push at the top at least, possibly more. We normally head up the road a bit and pick up the Roman Road further down. Rather than faff around and change the map etc I just thought I would remember it wasn't that difficult a detour.

Friday dawned, I had prepped everything the night before intending to get away at about 8:30 am. The rain and wind had other ideas and it lashed down, if I squinted really hard and stared across at my neighbours palm tree it looked like some tropical storm. No point getting drenched so I stayed in the house, made another coffee and waited.

As suddenly as it started, rain stopped, sun out so car packed, coffee taken with me before I had time to change my mind. I got off about 9:40 am soon on the A59 heading for Horton. I impressed myself by remembering the way to Horton (I'm normally a passenger and retain nothing of the journey) and parked up in the lay by just outside town. Noone else there and it was getting on for 11am, an indication of how crap the weather was.

It wasn't raining there but it was threatening so I put full waterproofs on, the strong wind was cold so it helped keep the windchill off. Off through town to start climbing first on the road then on the Pennine Way. The first 9 miles of this route are basically uphill to Dodd Fell. Pretty easy riding and I was sheltered from the wind and apart from a brief shower was missing the rain.

Steady plugging away to the junction of the Pennine Way with the footpath to Old Ing. I got the map out rather than just follow the Garmin. Only a choice of two possible tracks and I chose the wrong one, luckily it said it was a footpath. The embarassing thing was I put some thought into that decision.....

Onwards and I could hear this roar of water and I eventually got to what must be Calf Holes where a torrent of a stream suddenly dropped down a large hole underground. Not a day for caving then.

I passed a few walkers here and there on the continued climb and jumped out of my skin twice when I opened a gate to find a bunch huddled behind the wall on the other side having tea breaks. The second time I was giving myself a running commentary...well no one else to talk to! The wind was pretty noisy so don't think they heard me.

Nearing the top of the climb I joined then end of a tarmac section of the Roman Road, this was a cut off point I could ride from here across to the top of Fleet Moss and then head back but I felt fine and carried on towards Dodd Fell. Just leaving the road I soon realised how much I had been sheltered from the wind up to now as all of a sudden I was getting the full force of it as a crosswind, with a slight tailwind bias. Which was great until the track changed to two ruts.

Under normal conditions they are fine, wide enough to easily ride but definitely noticeable ruts and the wind was doing its best to try to throw me against the edge of whichever rut I happened to be in. It was hard work keeping control of the bike, the wind was so strong I had a Vulcan death grip on the bars, was leaning over against the wind and could only concentrate on the foot or so of track in front of me. Slow progress.

I missed the turn for the grassy bridleway down to Hawes I was having to work so hard against the wind I just didn't see it or notice the Garmin but I realised quickly when I started losing height. The track I was on apparently becomes an unrideable rubble strewn mess so I had to push back up as I couldn't get going against the wind. Onto the grassy bridleway, I rode a short section, then it became very narrow singletrack with a drop to one side that just wasn't wide enough in the scary strong wind.

After a bit the track became a lot wider and riding recommenced. The descent was very, very wet and muddy. It was the kind of bog that's quite deceptive, you roll through a few sections that are surprisingly firm then just when you get confident your front wheel sinks past the hub and you stop dead. By the time I got to the bottom I was sprayed head to toe with mud and grinning.

A fast drop down on the road, even against the wind and into Hawes and I had lost all the height I had gained earlier. It was like entering a parallel universe in Hawes. The sun was come out and everyone was wandering around in shorts and t-shirts eating ice cream having a jolly old time, even the wind seemed to have dropped down. There I was cycling through town in full waterproofs and covered in kack.

I forgot all about my detour and blithely followed the Garmin and my original route onto the bridleway at Burtersett. Having now swung round I was right into the wind and the bridleway was steep. I ground up in granny gear fighting the wind, I did well for a while but eventually it started to get difficult. The bridleway had a lot of loose stone on lower down and the wind kept blowing me across the track into it where I spun out due to the low gear I was in. Eventually I was pushing more than riding then I remembered I wasn't supposed to be coming up here, oops. Decided just to keep pushing up.

I pushed most of the rest, even on a less ferociously windy day it would be a challenge and some of the top section impossible with rocky steps and MotoX damage. Its one to be tried as a descent though, one day. Eventually I reached the top and joined up with the Roman Road. I took a leaf out of the walkers book and hid behind a wall for a food stop. Ominous black clouds were massing but I had been very lucky with the weather so far.

Back on the Roman Road and some easy riding was made very, very difficult by the stupidly strong headwind. Just as well the track was wide as I was being blown all over it. I joined up with the road and headed up to Fleet Moss where the wind was just getting silly. I tried to take some pictures of the black clouds I was avoiding but the wind was so strong I couldn't stand still and I did think that perhaps bringing a bike up here in this weather wasn't one of my best ideas, none of the shots were really sharp.

I did wonder if I was going to have to pedal down Fleet Moss? I had to wait a bit as flock of sheep were driven across the road, being sheep they were jumping around everywhere so I waited til most of them were across before heading off.

The wind was really scary heading down Fleet Moss, I was being overly cautious and the wind was wobbling the front wheel then it seemed to really catch it and I was pushed right across to the other side of the road. I let out a massive girly scream before deciding that speed was the order of the day and got down as fast as I could.

I always find it interesting which bits of a ride stick in my memory and which bits don't, I had pretty much remembered everything so far but I appear to have a complete blank about all of the tarmac section of Langstrothdale, which is not short.

I had forgotten it is mainly uphill, undulating but uphill. I really don't remember the limestone pavement, I love limestone pavement, I think its unlikely it has been placed there recently. I had forgotten how long it goes on for too and was convinced I had missed a turning. My luck with the weather finally ran out and the rain started. A brief shower at first which gave me an excuse to stop and take some pictures of the pavement. The wind was right in my face so I turned my back to it for a bit, the rain stopped and I got going again.

Then the rain lashed hard, I sheltered behind a building for a bit but it was only getting me cold, I only had about 6 miles to go. Off tarmac, onto fire road then off onto more interesting track (which I did remember), normally quite fun when its not a river and today it was a river.

Actually, more of a stream as the streams were now rivers. There are about three water splashes along the Birkwith moor track which were now pretty deep. I tried to ride the first one thinking that I could see the bottom so it should be ok, it was a lot deeper than I thought and I stopped dead against something. Luckily managed to get feet down before toppling, pretty cold!

The other two crossings were both very deep at the rideable parts so I walked though them, I was pretty wet by this point anyway. The track was quite sketchy and most of it wasn't limestone, what limestone there was was treacherous. The back wheel was slithering all over the place, I tried to avoid steering as much as possible which made for riding through some very deep puddles.

I know the last drop down to the car has quite a few rubbly sections on in, not as bad as I remember it but still difficult due to the water hiding everything. The sun had come out again and was shining off the surface of the water so I could only see the odd rock sticking up out of the water. If I picked up too much speed the water thrown off the front wheel blinded me. I pretty much got away with riding slowly but its not the best way to get through rubble.

Back at the car with a pretty clean bike but very muddy waterproofs, hosed the lot off with the Dirtworker before heading off home hoping not to get stuck in bank holiday traffic. All I can say is that I was glad I wasn't trying to head into the Dales.

Bit wet and windy in the Dales today!

I am on call this weekend so today was my only real chance of getting away somewhere and I wasn't going to let a bit of wind and rain stop me! I did a 30 mile loop in the Dales from Horton over to Hawes and back again.

Even with getting blown sideways more times than I can count, even with "riding" (that will be pushing actually) on the bridleway out of Burtersett that I wasn't supposed to take, even with the headwind/crosswind from hell , getting blown right across the road in a most terrifying manner when coming down Fleet Moss, almost falling off in deep river crossings where there should be shallow fords, rivers for trails and wet limestone as slippy as ice I had a great ride.

More later.

I think I love my waterproofs.

Gargrave Ride

We got over to the Dales today for some MTBing. The plan was to ride out of Gargrave and over Stockdale lane. Its been a while since I've done this ride, its about 21/22 miles with a reasonable amount of climbing (including some grassy slogs) and slimestone to slide around on.

I felt ok setting off, on the Titus again. The start has lots of wide track and generally climbs upwards, nice to warm the legs up which still felt a little sluggish, they did get a lot better later. There was a slog of a grassy climb to contend with, made harder by the fact it was so wet. When we came on this climb a couple of years on the tandem we managed to dig our own trench trying to ride up it(and then got stuck in it) the ground is so soft.

After this there was some undulating along some cow trodden field. It was interesting to ride as there were some sections that looked really soft and sticky that I thought would get stuck in but I managed to ride ok but others that looked fine but in fact were really soft and I got bogged down in. Everyone else was the same and I do quite enjoy this as it was patchy, its less fun when its long stretches though it does nothing for average speed.

Stockdale Lane was fun as usual, its been a while since I've had the delights of greasy limestone but it was good for my rapidly disappearing bike handling skills. A good fast descent off the other side, feeling a lot more confident than of late and the Titus making light work of everything.

We didn;t have much stoppage time at all, couple of food stops but that was it. On the way back towards Gargrave I was thinking to myself that I had managed not to fall off - so I fell off!

Another silly fall, I was holding a gate open for the others and as I set off I hadn't quite got my left foot back in the pedal when the front wheel slid on some greasy rock and I lost balance. I put my foot down onto another slippy rock and it slid off onto......nothing. The track was built up at that point and I toppled off the side and fell about a foot and half onto some rocks, bike on top of me. Ouch!

It hurt straight away, I had landed on my left leg and my hand was a little sore. I collected myself then picked myself up and got going again. I caught up with the others, though none of them realised the track was built up like that. Complete numpty moment.

We got back to the van too soon, I was pleased I was feeling relatively good still. A quick survey of the damage: The Garmin has a few small gouges out of it (screen is ok) and I had a bruise right in the IT band of my left leg, with a graze right through the middle of it. The bruise was well formed already so its going to be a corker. This evening its currently about 12 centimetres long and about 7 at its widest point.

Tuesday 24th June: Walk in the Yorkshire Dales

Distance: 7.9 Miles Time: 2:50

Jez and I decided to go for a walk to test out his knee. Rather than do a long Lakes walk we decided to do something in the Dales, not very high or long. Jez fancied walking up the steep side of Pen-y-Ghent again, the last time we did it a few years ago it was completely covered in snow and a bit scary really, I had also hurt my right hand from (I think, memory hazy) falling off my bike on ice on the way to work, I trapped a couple of fingers under the bar when I fell and broke them. I wasn't able to hold on to the rock very well and that made me less than pleased.

We planned to walk from the layby from Horton-in-Ribblesdale up to Pen-y-Ghent by the steep side then descend back to Horton via the easier route. It is a stiff pull straight up from the car but it was nice to not have to wade through snow drifts. It is an easy path to the start of the steep path but this time the lack of snow made for fast progress, I wouldn't even describe it as a scramble really though there was a woman struggling a bit with it. We asked her if she was ok and she said she was fine, just a little slow. We got to the top fairly quickly and stopped for a brief time on a cairn. The last time we climbed up here we were chased down rapidly by the miserable weather. It was warm today, cloudy but at least no driving wind and snow.

As we'd got to the top quickly we decided to head over Plover Hill first and drop down to the bridleway that skirts the bottom. The walk over to Plover hill was on unsurfaced moorland track, thankfully it was generally dry with a few very boggy patches, best avoided in the wet. We were both getting peckish but hadn't bothered packing any food at all as we hadn't intended being out for that long (silly) but Jez found some fusty jelly babies in his bag, they took a bit of chewing but at least got the blood sugar up a bit. The descent off Plover Hill was entertainingly steep with a bit of a sheer drop at one point, I was glad it was dry as the limestone would have been pretty slippy in the wet. We picked up the bridleway which has been "improved" in places with a lot of surfacing. It would be a boggy mess otherwise though it still retains some interest and some damge from motocrossers as well. Jez and I both thought it would be good to take a bike along it at some point (some route planning needed to incorporate it into one of our other rides). It was an easy amble back down to H-i-R though we arrived back to find the caff closes for the day on a Tuesday. Typical!

We bought some emergency rations (pasties basically) from the former post office to stave off starvation.

Photo of Ingleborough, quite murky though: