Four Rides In Four Days

Four Rides In Four Days.

24th January, Danby with Olly and Trainee#2. Route

25th January, local ride alone. Route

26th January. Hamsterley Forest with Rod and Trainee#2. Route

27th January. Guisborough Woods with The Breadlad, Oz and Rod. Route

Another month: another ten day break. How do day people manage to have any sort of meaningful existence? Some of us managed a quality quadruple of rides, taking advantage of cold and dry weather, which made a change from arriving home dripping with mud.

Our first ride began in Danby, our first visit this year. Only Olly and Trainee#2 turned up, not strictly true because Oz turned up too but in a car park a mile or so away, which we have not used for about 15 years, phone signal not being one of Danby’s strong points, his desperate missives were lost in the ether and went unheeded. After waiting half an hour, we hit the road, pedalling upward, out of Danby, toward Clitherbeck, where we went offroad onto a thawing track, breaking ice on the puddles. Another steady pull on tarmac took us to Danby Beacon and a quick breather to take in the view, prior to entertaining ourselves on the sublime singletrack cutting through the heather across Roxby Moor. Still in reasonable condition despite a damp winter, it was over too soon and it was not long before The Slagbag reared up in front of us, its’ shaded flanks still sheathed in ice. A determined effort saw it despatched (by some), we continued over the moor, dropping down to Green Houses, briefly rejoining tarmac before the tedious gravelled ascent of Lealholm Rigg back to Danby Beacon. Trainee#2 was less than enamoured with the route so far, misguidedly imagining he’s in Southern California (where all mountain bikes are designed to be ridden) not North Yorkshire (where mountain bike genocide occurs by erosion). Morose mud-plugging and annoyed ascending equalled pouting pedalling. It was a grand day too, blue sky and ice-breaking through the puddles. The descent which followed, down the moor to Oakley Walls, is usually rutted and muddy but okay if you stick to the righthand side, however, it looked as though a phalanx of four by fours had taken their perverted pleasure at the weekend and the track was trashed but worse, thawed. To say some falls occurred is like saying America’s new president has been in the news a bit. By the time Trainee#2 caught up with us his pram was bereft of toys and his dummy was covered in sheep shit and heather. Most importantly, the rest of us had enjoyed the track in a strange perverted way. A more amenable downhill brought the smile back to his face and all that remained was a little tarmac bashing before we were sampling the myriad delights of The Stonehouse Bakery.

A lone CX bike ride for the second day of riding, on tracks local to Billingham, doing a bit of filming to show the area is not all steam and industry. Bits of rural singletrack, farm roads and the soulless fantasy land of the Wynyard estate, million pound dormitories fronting empty streets, barely ever a soul in sight, never a kid playing in a garden or someone washing a car or leaning on the fence chatting to a neighbour. Some serious mud about today, away from the tarmac and gravel, a field near Thorpe Thewles, the usually decent track had seen the ministrations of a tractor wheels and my poor little bike wheels struggled to force through the mire. Reaching a better track on the Castle Eden Walkway, things were not becoming any less arduous, then I noticed the back tyre was actually flat - as well as being covered in mud. Handfuls were scraped from the tyre before taking it off, finding a thorn the size of a weapon, fitting another tube, inflating with a gas canister (I’m a process operator, manual labour is frowned upon by the union), then struggling to refit the wheel for some reason, not having my glasses made it difficult to see the fine details of what was going on. Eventually it slotted into place and the ride recommenced - for about two hundred metres, by which distance the tyre (or albatross around my frigging neck, as I now thought of it) was flat again. Bollocks. The whole pantomime recommenced, a genuine new tube fitted this time, last gas canister utilised and I was on the way again. At the end of the track, braking at the main road it became apparent that a) the road was not that busy and b) there was no longer a rear brake on this bike. Somehow one of the brake pads was no longer in the caliper, lost in the mud somewhere no doubt. Straws, camel’s backs and all that, hunger gnawing, an executive decision was made and the most direct route back to my kitchen was followed.

Third day in a row saw us at a sub-zero but curiously frost-free Hamsterley Forest, apparently we’re experiencing cold but dry air which explains the lack of the white stuff. Another trio ride, me, Rod and Trainee#2, happy to be on man-made tracks. Our usual winter Hamster’s Hot Lap commenced, Pike’s Teeth, 500 feet of ascent in a mile to reach the start, a good warm up is one way of looking at it; a lung-searing purgatory the more realistic view. A bit of Rocky Road, Oddsox with it’s massive berms before it plunges into the dark woods where Trainee#2 stalled, hit a tree root and some rocks and came up with the best excuse for poor performance ever heard in the history of mountain biking:

“My gloves are too thick.”

This is on par with amatuer snooker player, The Ginger One, blaming his lack of prowess in a game against two neophytes on the cloth, the cushions, the chalk and his opponents not playing properly.

A change of gloves fixed the problem for Trainee#2, a change of hobby did likewise for The Ginger One. Unfortunately Trainee#2’s run of bicycle-related bad luck continues, pedalling up the aptly named, Cough Up A Lung Lane, his bike coughed up a crank arm, exposing a definite lack of dexterity in the one-legged pedalling department: socks were probably too thick. Some bodging with Allen keys and multi-tools occurred and the crank arm was reattached with all the skill and expertise of an industrial fitter - slacker than a bag of bolts. Undaunted, Trainee#2 and his loose crank made their way to Section 13 and proceeded valiantly (and probably in breach of several elf and safety regulations) down most of the south side downhill tracks including the jumps and we only had to stop twice to fettle the crank arm again.

Another cold one, for the fourth day of riding, although not to The Breadlad, freshly returned from -20 deg C in Bulgaria where he’d been for a skiing holiday. A slightly nippy Pinchinthorpe could not compete but we still shivered and complained bitterly. Joining The Breadlad and me were Oz (who managed the right car park on the right day at the right time - result) and Rod. All the tracks today nicely frozen, not icy enough to be slippery but firm enough to take out the slop. No real plan had been formulated, other than visiting The Elephant’s Hole, at the top of Cliff Rigg Quarry. The weather was splendid, cold but sunny unlike the grey shrouded Teesside we’d left behind. Several trails which would normally be left until the dry days of summer were ridden with varying degrees of competence but maximum enthusiasm all round. Some bits were even tried twice, something we believe the young people call sessioning, just like us to be getting down with the kids. Eventually hunger called for a time check, despite the brief distance covered, it was well past our lunch time and a return to the cafe (via another track or two) was wholeheartedly agreed upon. The Branch Walkway Cafe is warm and friendly, filled with all manner of delicious comestibles and refreshing drinks - if it had a settee and an alcohol licence we’d probably never leave.