Two rides this week, but one hardly counts, because I cut it short in a hailstorm of mythic proportion not even a mile out of the village. So no report for that one.
Ride 1 – No fun riding in a hailstorm. Maybe later
Ride stats: 1.3 miles; 128 ft; 00h 09m 01s
Ride 2 – Fair weather cyclist
An early start nearly faltered in the same place as yesterday’s ride, because I’d forgotten my helmet. As a baldy that’s notmally an easy thing to notice, but it was only 4° outside, so I was wearing a skull cap. So having climbed the hill I turned back home to fetch my lid.
The 10-12mph westerly made for easly riding towards Bishop and I headed straight through town and out on the bypass towards Shildon. I had no plan in my head of where to go, but I wanted to get through the first half hour with the wind, so my legs got going, so I kept going East.
The road up towards Shildon has a cycle lane right next to it, but it’s the safe routes to school type and, as is common in county durham, it’s littlered with broken glass, bits of metal and other rubbish from the road. I stayed on the main carriageway and got a couple pointed of reminders that it was there from motorists climbing the hill on the road’s  w-i-d-e carriageway.
A right turn took me up Bruseelton bank and past Brussleton Incline, the route of one of the first railways in the country, on my way to join the Roman road at Royal Oak. The road runs straight down through Piercebridge to Scotch Corner and drops nearly all the way. So quickly after I found myself in Melsonbly, munching flapjack and plotting a route to Barnard Castle.
I needed 60 miles from the ride to make sure this wasn’t the first week of the year I failed to make target – so apart from mechanical failure, I was going to keep going all day, if I had to – and wanted to have hit 25 before turning to Barney, but I was sitting on 20. I’d have to do some route wiggling, if I was going to make 60.
Into the wind I headed for Forcett and Caldwell before pickjng up NCN 165 and followed it across the old suspension bridge at Whorlton and all the way to Barnard Castle.
Espresso, flapjack and some water at No 3 cafe got me ready for the homeward trip. I needed to find 25 miles from an 18 mile trip.
I retraced my path to the top of Whorlton, then broadly followed the W2W back to Bishop. A quick loop round south church and I thought I had enough to head straight home.
Ride stats: 60.8 miles; 2,374 ft; 04h 06m 40s
Week’s total: 62.1 miles; 2,502 ft; 04h 15m 41s