A Ride From Lordstones.

Mountain Bike Ride.

The Pensioner.

Monday 23rd March route

Hoping I’d recovered from Friday’s sufferfest, me and The Pensioner met at Lordstones for what would hopefully be a substantially gentler ride, at least the weather was more promising. Gentle wind and fairly sunny. The start of the route was less amiable, straight up the Gliding Club track on Carlton Bank, although the Gliding Club has now gone, I suppose it will always be the Gliding Club track. I can remember when it was a popular venue, gliders being launched by a tractor which dragged them along a roughly made runway until they had enough speed and height to jettison the tow rope, a quick think back brings me to the unpleasant realisation this would have been between forty to forty five years ago. Am I really that old? I can remember exploring the caves at Thackdale (actually an old jet mine) and the crags in Snotterdale and Scugdale with gliders banking and cruising overhead: it does not seem that long ago.

We cruised up that hill like two lumbering B52 bombers as opposed to lightweight gliders sailing on thermals but we made it without too much distress. The view down the Raisdale Road opening up as we gained height, Cringle Moor and Cold Moor to our left, the bulk of Carlton Bank at our right shoulders. We made our way to Faceby Plantation via a track of dubious legality, then followed the bridleway across a field and onto an unusually dry Bank Lane. Entering Faceby I was harassed by a very small dog with the attitude of a much larger canine, luckily it’s aggression was purely verbal. Oddly enough it completely ignored The Pensioner, perhaps some doggy sixth sense realising it had met it’s match in the snappy-tempered curmudgeon department.

Continuing on road for a while, we passed through Swainby, climbing gently into Clain Woods and through the fields to Cowshit Farm, or Harfa House to give it it’s proper name. It will always be Cowshit Farm to us after The Ginger One’s unsuccessful negotiation of the slurry filled farmyard some years ago, bringing up the rear, as we all watched his shaky progress, he stalled and put his foot down, plunging his bare leg calf deep into the stinking ordure. Much to the amusement of those spectating. At the end of the track, we lounged in the sunshine, taking on a bit of energy and daring to think spring might have sprung. Tarmac took us to the end of Scugdale and the hideous push/carry up the bridleway from Scugdale Hall to above Barker’s Crags and eventually Brian’s Pond. A touch more uphill over the moor and we were soon taking withdrawals from the Bank Of Gravity, retracing our tyre tracks down the Gliding Club track at a significantly brisker pace than our ascent. All today’s tracks had been gloriously firm, with very little mud and only the occasional puddle, conditions could not have been better. Of course Eeyore the gloomy pensioner had to put a dampener on it. “Aye, it’s alright now, wait until the summer comes and it all turns back to mud. We always have a drier spring than summer.”

Weatherman He Speak With Forked Tongue.

Cyclocross Ride.

Alone.

Friday 20th March ride.

Perhaps the wisdom of undertaking this ride after riding for three days previously may be lacking  but if the weatherman had not spoke with forked tongue, it surely would not have been quite as harsh. The return leg was due to be against the wind, fair enough, the 6 mph wind forecast would not have been a problem, the reality was somewhat more brisk.

Things began well enough, tarmac from Kildale to Bank Foot Farm, followed by the drag along the old rail track to The Incline. The Incline, an innocuous name masking the horror entailed in the ascent, especially with cross bike gearing, needless to say, it was not long before resorting to pedestrianism became necessary, twenty minutes or so of slogging against gravity brought the welcome sight of things levelling out. A short breather, to grab some snaps and then I remounted and rode along the old railway track to Rosedale, the track weaves sinuously for six miles across the moors, cunningly contouring the land to stay level, a testament to the skills of the navigators of long ago.

Rejoining the road at (thankfully) the top of Blakey Bank, the tarmac was followed past The Lion Inn, in a generally downward direction to Castleton, the alleged 6 mph wind trying to push me sideways across the road into the path of oncoming sheep and the occasional vehicle. A brief climb out of Castleton, I was only ascending as far as the bridleway leading through Danby Park to Danby village, some resurfacing work to the track made this a pleasant proposition, not the mud-fest it would have been a few weeks ago.

A left turn in Danby, bypassing The Stonehouse Bakery (now there’s a first) and a steady plod up the hill to the oddly named off-road track, Robin Hood’s Butts, oddly named but not all that unusual as it occurs twice more in North Yorkshire and can be found nationwide, generally describing Bronze Age barrows. Turning into the track also meant turning into the wind, seemingly roaring unobstructed from the North Atlantic, at least quadrupling the weatherman’s optimistic 6 mph. Shedding gears, I rode on grimly, hunkered down on the drops, picking lines through a track seemingly constructed from building detritus, dreaming wistfully of the 140mm of suspension travel on my mountain bike. The bus shelter with it’s Karl Striker mural (Teesside’s very own Banksy) eventually hove into view, bringing with it the promise of tarmac and downhill respite from the agony, by now most of my body had pain somewhere; arms aching from the battering they were taking on the rough tracks, back and neck aching from being on the drops, legs aching from pedalling for the fourth consecutive day. The road did not bring much relief, the majority of the downhill sections had to be pedalled and between Commondale and Kildale there is still a fair bit of climbing to be done. This may have been a relatively short route at 31 miles but I felt as though I had rode double that distance by the time I arrived breathless and sweating at Glebe Cottage for much needed sustenance.

Sutton Bank Revisited.

Mountain Bike Ride

The Pensioner. The Fireman.

19th March route

Ten days after doing these two loops, I revisited them with more companions but less rain. The Blue being so enjoyable, The Pensioner and The Fireman were dragged along to sample its delights’. After the initial section, which is most like a conventional trail centre, we passed Dialstone Farm and left the official blue route for a while, heading directly to The Escarpment, rather than meandering through some fields to rejoin The Escarpment further on. Some racehorses were being exercised on the gallops adjacent to the track from Dialstone, riders stood in the stirrups, atop massive beasts, thundering along, except for one, which brought up the rear at a more leisurely pace; this one was immediately christened The Pensioner.

We followed The Escarpment to High Barn, the track now predominantly dry and rolling well, dropping down into the quarry from High Barn is, without a doubt, the highlight of the route. So good we did it twice, the second time for the camera. The continuation, through fields is still enjoyable, on open singletrack, descending to the bottom of the woods at Holme Hole, unfortunately the point where the route re-ascends to The Escarpment, starting with a test piece rocky step up in the woods, which The Fireman cruised, before turning to a long fireroad drag. Would you believe one of The Pensioner’s least favourite bits of track on the whole North York Moors? Fire road continues until the first zig of the zig zags which has a short steep bit but regardless of curmudgeonly comments from the back, it’s a fairly painless way of gaining a lot of height. Before too long, were retracing our tyre tracks back along The Escarpment and joining The Cliff Trail which runs alongside the footpath over the top of Whitestonecliffe, passing a yellow bike frame hanging from a tree as a reminder of North Yorkshire’s part in 2014’s Tour De France.

After a short pause to get our breath back we took ourselves down the Green route, essentially the start and finish of the route we had just done. Worth doing again though, if only to get our mileage total into double figures. Then a couple of laps of the skills loop before the main event of the day - the cafe. According to Strava, that slightly dubious repository of cycling records, the fastest time for the skills loop is 16 seconds - or about 4 times faster than we could manage, kind of puts it into perspective.

Into God's Waiting Room.

Mountain Bike Ride.

The Pensioner, Uncle Ian.

18th March route

The recent weather trend has been misty mornings and sunny afternoons: today was no different, consequently me, The Pensioner and Uncle Ian met at a misty Sheepwash in anticipation of a sunny afternoon and we were not disappointed. Some unremarkable pedalling took us to Silton Woods for the downhill track, which we rode with all the skill and dexterity which might be expected from a trio whose combined age is 176 years. Big air, phat air, tail whips, railing berms, not a trace of any of that. Some more rather shoddy looking woodwork has appeared on the track, despite the best efforts of the FC who regularly dismantle what they view as death traps. In our, undoubtedly geriatric, opinion, we would like to see somebody ride this particular jump and live. Moving on, we made our way to Thimbleby Woods and the bottom bridleway, ignoring the dire warnings from The Pensioner regarding the unsuitability of said bridleway for riding a bike along, although he may have couched it in less elegant terms. Unfortunately, he was correct in all he said, the surface not being tough enough to withstand the hooves from our equine brethren, had suffered badly, morass would be too kind a word for it. One best left to the horsey types and they are welcome to it.

Some tarmac riding took us through Thimbleby and Osmotherly, after which we proceeded sharply uphill - much to The Pensioner’s disappointment -  to Scarth Wood Moor. A quick breather at the gate, then we promptly lost all that height again blasting across the moor. And it was worth every second of ascent, this section is mainly paved and practically mud-free, so we were able to “put the throttle down”, The Pensioner leading the way, mainly because he swerves about so much nobody is brave enough to overtake. Too soon, it was over and we rejoined the road to take us back to Sheepwash.

The problem with Sheepwash is the lack of a post-ride cafe, The Boot Shop Coffee House in Osmotherley is only open towards the weekend, the other cafe in Osmotherley is open so infrequently and the owner so unwelcoming that we boycotted it years ago, the cafe in Swainby closes between half one and three, which is generally the exact time span when we require food. A short drive to a nearby garden centre cafe was the prefered option. As The Ginger One once stated in his usual coarse and brutish manner (he’s from Darlington and all efforts to civilise him have failed) “Garden centres attract old people like shit attracts flies.” This particular establishment seems to exert a gravitational pull which sucks in whole care homes. The Pensioner remarked without a trace of irony “It’s like Zombieland in here, full of people just like me. I fit right in.” How he could say that as he walked purposefully amongst the beige shufflers, the only pensioner in the place dressed in Lycra and covered in mud, probably gives a good illustration of the inadequacy of his eyesight. And obviously, what are old biddies to us are hot chicks to The Pensioner, as he cast somewhat myopic flirtatious glances around God’s waiting room.

Across the river on The Transporter.

Cyclocross bike ride.

On The Transporter to Hartlepool Marina.

Alone

Friday 13th March route.

The warm weather off late has reverted to cold, grey and drizzly but not having had a leg over a crossbar three days something had to be done. A BNQ (before nights quicky) which generally involves the just me and the cross bike, today was no different other deciding to ride to Hartlepool via The Transporter bridge. For those who are not aware The Transporter, generally abbreviated to The Tranny, is basically a small car park hung beneath a bridge structure, with side compartments for foot passengers and cyclists, at set intervals it crosses the Tees from Middlesbrough on the south bank to Port Clarence on the north side and back. Recently reopened following a lengthy overhaul, it's a popular route to and from Middlesbrough, omitting several miles of driving. The sides of the gondola have been replaced with clear glass, giving foot passengers and cyclists an uninterrupted view of the river. The structure is often utilised for zip lines, abseiling and bungee jumps for those of an adventurous nature. More information regarding this most iconic of Teesside structures may be found here.

My route began with another local landmark, Newport Bridge and followed the south bank off the river, predominantly on a riverside track, to The Transporter. After a brief wait, we were loaded up and crossing the river at a stately four miles per hour, taking in the view, the modernist Temenos sculpture contrasting with the rotting hulk of an old floating nightclub, both set against the backdrop of Middlesbrough's Riverside stadium. In other directions, industry still lines the banks, slowly returning jobs to the area, although nothing like the glory days of the shipyard.  When I left school there were three choices for most people, ICI, British Steel or the shipyard, promising jobs for life, all now nothing but memories.

The road through the marshes at Saltholme is busy and exposed to the wind, utilised by a lot of heavy goods vehicles and riding is not a pleasant experience, especially into an uncharacteristic north easterly. A brief stop at Greatham Creek to check out the seals, laid on the mudflats or leaping through the water like dolphins, another of Teesside's success stories. A breeding area for over 80 seals, numbers which have increased steadily since the late eighties when the first seals arrived after an absence of over a century. The Teesmouth nature reserve, of which Greatham Creek is a part, is amazingly popular, predominantly with bird watchers despite being a most unlikely nature reserve, surrounded by chemical works and the remnants of heavy industry.

Thankfully leaving the main road just after Graythorpe, I took the bridleway crossing the golf links, a solid but rough and bumpy track made, like a lot of this area, from slag - a stony waste product from the steel industry. I can still remember seeing lorries loaded with slag, still hot and steaming, tipping into the estuary at low tide to form paths and dykes between the sand dunes. The much more amenable riding on the promenade from Seaton Canoe to Hartlepool Marina was against a headwind but returning the same way would give me the benefit of a tailwind. A quick breather at the marina and I was on the return leg, up Seaton Lane into Hartlepool, then Greatham and the bridleway past the sewage works into the outskirts of Billingham on a mixture of cycle tracks and quiet roads. A couple more miles on the road, passing the chemical factory which gives me the money and the time off to be able to idle days away riding bikes around the countryside, and I was home.

Sutton Bank Quicky

Mountain Bike Ride

All alone

9th March 2015 route

Like most people of my generation, my only knowledge of philosophers is gleaned from the Monty Python song. One line stuck in my mind as I drove along the A19, “John Stuart Mill, of his own free will” Of my own free will I was heading south, into a low pressure system which was heading north, widely forecast to bring heavy rain and gale force wind. I could have done a local ride from home and been safely back on the settee before the weather crapped out, or even more wisely, I could never have left the settee. It was not as if I would be letting anyone down because it was to be a Billy No Mates ride. Perhaps I felt a need to up my quota of suffering, maybe I wanted to get reacquainted with my 29er, fresh and raring to go after finally having a new Hope stainless steel BB fitted or was it simply my stubborn man-brain refused to formulate a new plan? Whatever, a quick spin around Sutton Bank blue and green routes and back in the cafe before the rain started, plan A. And it almost worked.

Being alone would be a good time to explore the bridleways and tracks leading from The Escarpment without the usual chorus of moaning and wailing about losing height and having to climb back up and the mud and puddles and slippy roots. All the type of challenges normally encountered winter mountain biking in North Yorkshire, which, apparently, are all my fault anyway. Arriving at the car park, the weather was quite bright, if a bit windy, my quick start was immediately thwarted by a couple of pensioners who were regarding the pay and display ticket machine as though it was some sort of alien being, freshly landed from the outer reaches of the cosmos and existing on a diet of pound coins. After twenty minutes or so of hard staring, they were eventually released from it’s force field and I was able to feed the droid four shiny tokens in return for a scrap of paper which was then almost blown from my grasp.

The first turn of the pedals coincided with the first spot of rain, hmm, one of those days eh? The first section, shared by all three routes, goes through Hambleton Plantation and is a pleasant start, slightly downhill at first and nicely surfaced, plus quite sheltered. Even when it climbs back up to rejoin the road, it’s not too bad. Back in the real world, it was blowing hard but the rain was still meagre. A combination of road and track brings all the routes out at Dialstone Farm, where the Blue and Red trails part company with the Green Cliff Trail. I stayed with the Green trail, the meandering route used by the other two trails, through open fields was not for today, or any day really, being not a patch on the exemplary singletrack along The Escarpment - a definite contender for one of Britain’s best tracks . Where the Green heads left and back to the visitor centre I went straight on to join The Escarpment, riding north with the wind at my back all the way to High Barn, rejoining the Blue route near Boltby Scar. At High Barn, where the Blue route doubles back on itself and drops down through a quarry on nice singletrack, the rain began to up it’s game and it the coat had to be put on. The drop down through the quarry and onwards towards Hesketh Grange is a lovely bit of riding and it’ll be even better when the tracks dry up a bit, typical Blue route standard, flowing quite nicely. Unfortunately unsurfaced, like the majority of the Sutton Bank routes, anyone expecting another Glentress or Hamsterley is going to be sorely disappointed but we rode most of these bridleways long before they were joined up and graded so our expectations are more realistic.

The long climb back to The Escarpment, shared with the Red Route, begins at the end of the this section, it is not too bad, gaining height steadily without too much lung busting or anal breathing. A bonus this ride was the lack of muttering from the back. Of course, once on the top, the return is south, into the full force of the wind and it’s new best mate, rain. A pretty comprehensive drenching ensued as I took the new cliff top track back to the visitor centre.

Reluctant to call it a day after a mere 9 miles, despite the weather, I stoically returned to the Hambleton Plantation start and commenced the Green route, even though I’d already done every part of it in the preceding hour. Sheltered in the woods, I took the opportunity for a bit of selfie filming before retracing my tyre tracks to Dialstone Farm and back along the Cliff Trail. Then I had a couple of laps of the skills loop before retiring to the cafe, much to the bemusement of the few visitors sitting in their cars watching the rain.

Another Decent Day At Danby

Mountain Bike Ride

The Pensioner, The Bread Lad, Uncle Ian.

4th March route

Forty eight hours have passed since the start of the previous ride and the weather has moved on two months, if it was not for the bite of the wind it might have been May. Nothing out of the ordinary today just one of our usual loops from Danby, unfortunately beginning with a road climb up to Clitherbecks Farm, my legs feeling the effects of pedalling over three hundred miles in the past twenty nine days, three hundred miles of mainly mud and snow, every turn of the pedals my thighs felt as though they were on the verge of exploding.

In contrast to Monday, the off road sections were almost dry, about typical considering gone to the bother of fitting mud tyres to my bike. The first offroad section despatched, we took the tarmac option up to Danby Beacon, details of it’s role as a wartime RAF station can be found on the ever reliable Hidden Teesside site. (And in more detail on this website) We didn’t linger long at the Beacon as the wind sought to infiltrate our clothing and chill our bone marrow. The wind was also not kind to us across Roxby Moor, the normally fast and flowing track through the heather seemed sluggish today, or maybe it was just me. After High Tranmire Farm, the track drops steeply to cross what the OS map rather optimistically calls a ford at Hardale Beck, then rises equally steeply, a Strava segment known as The Slagbag. This is usually approached in the spirit of Homer Simpson, “If something is too hard, it’s not worth doing.” but today I gave it a go, having the benefit of a granny ring and almost made it, if it had not been for a pesky pensioner blocking the way and causing me to spin out on some muddy grass. The bondage sheep has gone from above Green Houses and there are lambs in the lower fields, a sure sign Spring is upon us. After a group discussion as to the remainder of the route, taking into account wind direction, hills, cafes and other factors, which mainly consisted of shrugged shoulders and a lot of “I dunno, what do you think?” We headed down Lealholmside and dropped through fields from Rake Lane to the underpass at Underpark Farm, where we collected our second flock of sheep this week. To sheep we obviously must look like the sort of blokes who ride around the countryside carrying turnips.

Reaching Lealholm, we paused for energy bars and minor mechanical adjustments before a road drag through Houlsyke eventually took us to Duck Bridge and another pause before the climb up to Danby Castle and the equally draggy road toward the major climb of New Way. Thankfully, we turned right just before New Way, riding, carrying and pushing our bikes up the bridleway onto Ainthorpe Rigg. The Bread Lad has obviously been raiding Lance Armstrong’s bait bag because in an unprecedented performance he rode without stopping from Duck Bridge up to the point where the bridleway becomes unrideable. Many theories were postulated for his sudden burst of speed ranging from marital demands to overactive bowels but he insists he was merely “feeling good”. And so to Ainthorpe Rigg, no longer the multi-lined, gully-ridden delight it so recently was, drainage work has replaced the gullies and drop off’s with an, at times, vague track crossed by drainage ditches. It is still rideable for the most part but only a pale imitation of what it once was, hopefully more traffic will consolidate the ground and redefine the track. As if that was not bad enough, we missed The Pensioner falling off - again.

All that remained was the fast as you dare road plummet through Ainthorpe and back to the ever welcoming calories of The Stonehouse Bakery. The sky had remained blue all day, shame about the wind but for early March - not a bad day at all.

Spring Has Not Sprung

Mountain Bike Ride

The Bread Lad, Rod.

2nd March 2015 route

Twenty four hours after being at Highcliffe Nab with two youths and a pile of climbing gear, I was back with two slightly older youths, all of us on bikes, the excellent track I’d promised them now resembling a luge course from the winter Olympics. How had a bit of drizzle developed into six inches of snow? The second day of March, the day after the beginning of Spring or almost three weeks until the beginning of Spring, depending which newspaper you read, either way it was most unseasonable. After a pitiful attempt to descend the luge track, using bikes as expensive Zimmer frames at some points, we filled in the remaining hours until we could justify a visit to the cafe exploring some of those likely looking tracks, often spotted but never investigated. Our time could definitely be considered an investment for the future, we found some tracks which will be brilliant when the mud and slop dry out, let’s hope it is not too long before the leaves appear on the trees and start sucking the soil dry.

An enjoyable hour or two was spent in this manner, slipping and sliding through the woods, saving stuff for better days to prevent it being trashed by being ridden in a swampy state. Procrastinating or just downright chickening out of sections, steep mud, wet roots, tree stumps, brambles, wrong tyres, wrong bike, puddles; every excuse in the book was trotted out. All this enjoyment had to be paid for and the return to Kildale up the road from Hutton Village, followed by The Unsuitables, then Percy Cross Rigg was suitably expensive in leg and lung power. A quick digression about the wartime building passed on Percy Cross Rigg, variously described as an air raid shelter or observation post, a little research on the excellent Hidden Teesside website, tells us it was a Starfish Decoy site, to fool Luftwaffe bombers during WW2. The descent down to New Row, which has now been christened Yellow Brick Road by Strava sectionistas, gave us a last bit of enjoyment, the shelter from trees meant it was largely clear of snow, merely a little greasy.

At the road junction, a herd of sheep must have imagined we were three wise men bearing turnips and within seconds an ovine stampede was heading our way, flocking to the gate as more and more joined in like a crowd of One Direction fans hoping for a glimpse of  their youthful idols. Three mud covered men on the verge of middle age, with not a turnip between them, must have been quite a disappointment, they stood at the field gate bleating their disapproval not realising how lucky they were that the Ginger One was not with us. Darlington boys and their predilections for shapely ewes are an unfortunate fact of North Eastern life.

As we replenished our barely depleted calorie reserves in Glebe Cottage, a blizzard appeared out of nowhere, we were unconcerned, being practically back at the cars. The weather could do its worst.