Suffering

The forecast promised a perfect day for a long bike ride and I desperately needed to get some miles in before my trip to the Pyrenees with Forrest. I didn't have a firm idea of a route, only that I needed distance and climbing, but I soon settled on going over by Cray and all the way down Bishopdale to West Witton, then the vicious climb to Melmerby and up Coverdale to the top of Park Rash and Kettlewell. I've done it the other way but I'm pretty sure never before in this direction.

It was a little disconcerting to see 'Road Closed' signs at regular intervals all the way from West Witton. I usually reckon on being able to pass by on the bike but have come unstuck on a couple of occasions recently. Mile after mile passed, mostly into an ever-freshening wind, which definitely wasn't in the forecast, and the warning signs continued without any sign of the actual road works. A couple of farmers in tractors told me the road was closed too. I'll be fine, I said. They looked skeptical. I have to admit that I suffered along Coverdale into the wind, possibly like I haven't suffered in a very long while. I'm not bike fit and my legs started tired from a fair bit of hard running in the previous few days. Descending into Kettlewell I was committed to overcoming whatever kind of obstacle I was due to find. There was no way I was ever going to cycle back around. It's a very long way!

As it turned out, the road works were within a few yards of the village but totally impassable. Something like an eight foot deep trench in the road, gated from wall to wall with absolutely no way past. I knew at worst, though, it was only going to be a matter of getting my bike over a few drystone walls. As it happened, there was a gate nearby and I only had to carry the bike a few hundred yards, contouring around a steep rough pasture before finding another gate back to the road. A visit to the shop to stock up on fluids and a few bars, and I was good for the last 20 miles home, which wasn't as tough as I'd feared, although I did literally crawl up the final hill home with nothing left in the tank. I console myself with the thought that every year I have to have a ride like this to find my cycling legs. It's just that it usually happens in April, not the second half of June. For the record, it was 74 miles and 6,600 ft of climb.