Autumn In August. Round Up And Video

Autumn In August

 I guess 2020 will be a memorable year, for obvious reasons to do with the pandemic but to me it’ll always be the year autumn started in August. There have been two named storms, Ellen and Francis and plenty of unnamed freak weather days, mainly cold, wet, windy or any permutation of the three. A few hot days sneaked in but were generally followed by several more days of grim and grey to stop us getting too excited. Even I couldn't be bothered with getting soaked some days, although, of course, I only stayed in out of deference to the mountain rescue team, which is as good an excuse as any. So this month’s ride total only came to a meagre thirteen,that’s worse than someone who is employed - well apart from the people employed at my old workplace who probably don’t even manage thirteen rides in a year. Here are the last two rides of August which haven’t been blogged yet.

Video here

Whinlatter, North, South and Blue.

It’s about time we had a blast round Whinlatter and the weather gods were kind to us, after a few days of this month’s typically mediocre weather, a sunny and windless day presented itself. Me, Olly and The Breadlad met in the overflow car park, Whinlatter is proving a popular destination for furloughed layabouts to idle away the hours, the sooner they are back at work the better, leaving more space for us professional idlers to move in and they don’t get much more idle than a retiree, a shift worker and a student. We embarked on the north loop first, local expert Olly leading the way, zipping along while me and The Breadlad followed at a more sedate pace, getting used to the slippery rock and wet roots again. It may not be raining today but the trail kindly saved some of the previous days’ water for us and soon we were back to the days before potty training because who puts a mudguard on in August? The trail was, as usual, excellent, culminating in the Big Dipper/Grand National sections, a set of bermed zig zags, going from forest to open moorland and back again several times. 

From the finish we jumped straight onto the south loop, slogging upward, ever upward to a brief rest at a fire road before more of the same, up the top section, recently upgraded as a black route to take into account the trail erosion and newly exposed bedrock. The south loop descent is usually considered to be the better of the two Altura trails, downhill all the way, no sneaky uphill sections to spoil the flow. The uphill climbing and the summit midges are soon forgotten as the varied sections of trail speed under our tyres. We returned to the car park because Olly, local hero that he is, had called at the butchers in Keswick en route to provide us with the finest cycling nutrition known to man - pies. The Car Park Full sign was prominently displayed at the entrance, which is odd because the overflow car park was only about seventy percent full, plenty of spaces about, I suppose they had their reasons. Pies demolished, we warmed down with the blue Quercus trail, which has a couple of nice flowing sections and the climbs are not too arduous. 

Which only left coffee in the sunshine, sitting at a table on the decking, reaping the rewards of Boris’s Eat Out To Help Out scheme, which meant our goodies were half price, which was just as well, as it went a small way to alleviating The Breadlad’s trauma when it came to the most gruesome part of the ride - paying for parking. The Breadlad, being a committed trail burglar, would prefer to park anywhere in the vicinity rather than splash the cash but the free parking spots are being whittled away and his usual time constraints preclude parking at Luchini’s View and pedalling up the pass. I daresay people have walked to the electric chair with less reluctance than The Breadlad approached that pay station; like the person heading for the electric chair, he was praying for a power outage but it wasn’t to be so and his card entered the slot, damp with bitter tears of frustration and injustice. 

Last Ride As A 60 Year Old.

And then Storm Francis came howling in, followed by a bikeless trip away, more bad weather which meant a whole week gap between bike rides - unheard of this year. The gap that is, not the shit weather. But it was time for my last ride as a sixty year old and the weather has managed to improve a bit, odd because it is also a Bank Holiday. Me and Rod met up in one of our usual Bank Holiday parking spots - a layby above Danby and made our way uphill to Robin Hood’s Butts, which we followed partially, turning off onto the Sis Cross bridleway, in soggy condition today but still a pleasure, skinny singletrack, slicing through the heather in a fashion the groomed pistes of the trail centres could never emulate. We reached the road above Danby and decided on our next objective. Rod fancied the Trough House track, followed by the Birk Carr singletrack, which would involve a lot of climbing but it wasn’t as though we had anything better to do. 

And climb we did, out from Danby, up and over Ainthorpe Rigg, followed by the brutal tarmac of New Way, until the gate to the Trough House track appeared on the horizon. A beautiful track with spectacular views down into lumpy fields like ruffled green baize of and moguls of heather and grass, contouring around the head of Fryupdale, unfortunately suffering from the curse of the lockdown gravel; has Boris been giving out free gravel to kickstart the economy? At the end of the Trough House track we turned onto the Birk Carr singletrack, a trail of two halves; firstly a genteel plunge through heather to a gate, where the character changes to overgrown, steep and muddy. Rod’s idea had been to get the track ridden before the winter weather spoils it - about two months too late by the look of the encroaching vegetation and mud-covered rocks.

 Discretion may have become the better part of valour at some points and we made it to the bottom unscathed, if somewhat damp and mud-splattered. Tarmac took us back to Ainthorpe Rigg, where our earlier route was reversed, giving us a pleasant downhill return to Danby. From Danby, a steady plod through Danby Park and a last bit of uphill tarmac saw us back at our layby, ready for a tailgate picnic in the sunshine. The next time leg is cocked over crossbar, I’ll have reached the ripe old age of sixty one, which, at one time, would have been considered old but now it is just the final approach to middle-age, preparation for golden years of unconstrained leisure time and the headlong rush to appreciate the disposable in disposable income. In the game of life, if you check out with cash left - you’ve lost.

Ellen's Tail End.

 Didn’t Fulfil Its Early Promise.

Open the curtains to blazing sunshine, some light cloud moves in during breakfast, the world becomes totally grey as the car is loaded up, the beginning of the rain is synchronised with our first pedal strokes. And, would you believe, stopped when we rolled back into Great Ayton after our ride. Me and La Mujerita had a little leg stretcher from Great Ayton to Guisborough Woods, climbing gradually to Highcliffe Nab, bypassing many of Guisborough Wood’s finest trails owing to La Mujerita’s well documented singletrack aversion. Perhaps a shoe shop at the end of each trail might help or a Cadbury’s Creme Egg for every dab-free descent. Today was just a fire road adventure, with side orders of drizzle and wind to add a bit of spice to the day. But a ride is a ride and always better than the alternative - which is not having a ride and all the associated adult responsibilities that could potentially entail. Better to be out in the wind and rain than joining the zombies trudging around garden centres and shopping malls, I think being impaled through a kidney by a brake lever would be preferable.

How Many People?

What a difference a day makes, as the song says. Same start, same woods, different companion, improved weather and the whole of Teesside (well the portion who can tear themselves away from daytime TV) are crammed on top of Roseberry Topping like penguins on a shrinking ice floe, heads swivelling in unison to watch me and SuperBri pedalling up from Aireyholme Farm. Today’s Guisborough Woods visit did take in a few of the trails, which meant a lot more down and up than yesterday, not that it seems to bother SuperBri, whose secret appears to be pre and post ride smoothies which look as though they are made from liquidised body parts - or maybe it’s just an offal milkshake. I’ll stick to being the fat lad at the back thanks all the same. There were a great many people about today but very few of them on bikes, there were even some climbers giving the north-facing green cliffs of Highcliffe Nab a bash. Our great disappointment of the day came at the farm cafe, which decided, for some reason, to stop, temporarily, serving food as we arrived, it was two pm, to me it’s another example of the british approach to service industry, it could never happen in Spain. They did point us in the direction of the farm shop which served coffee and snacks. 

Storm Ellen Couldn’t Frighten Us.

Another face from the past reappeared today, The Ginger One forced himself away from overtime and golf to come on his first bike ride for nearly two months. He keeps wittering on about some place called work, which is, apparently, what people do to pass the time until they can retire. In the way that bad dreams disappear when we wake up, the horrors of twelve hour shifts are hard to recall after nearly two years of liberty. We met at Square Corner with gale force gusts rocking our cars. According to the weatherman we are being treated to the tail end of Storm Ellen, the west coast of the country is being battered but over here on the east we have some vicious wind and even more vicious showers, rain coming across in huge, wet sheets, drenching everything including us. I introduced The Ginger One to some of the Silton Woods trails discovered last week and reintroduced him to the first trail he ever rode as a mountain biker, seventeen years and six days previously. He couldn’t remember it, mainly because it used to be a gloomy ride through conifers, not a track across open moor as it is nowadays. Eventually, after some wild and wet riding, we reached Over Silton at the bottom of the forest, from where we made our way to Boltby Forest and the Hambleton Drove Road, a simple sentence which glosses over a lot of pain and suffering as we gained the necessary height. It was worth it for the tail wind, Ellen’s tail end pushing us across the moor all the way to the Mad Mile and the blasting drizzle meant we had a rambler free descent of the Mad Mile. Back at Square Corner it was too rough even to consider a tailgate picnic, so it was bikes away, wet clothes off and back down the A19 for a front room picnic.

A Brief Glimpse Of Summer.

Two rides in sunshine and temperatures close to summer, sandwiched between days of drab, grey drizzle. Staycation my arse; get me to an airport.

31 Degrees - that’s more like it.

The norm nowadays seems to be starting the week with a lonely ride and this was no different except it looks as though summer has muscled it’s way in to the seasons and is playing catch up, like a latecomer to a drinking session, whacking the heat straight up to gas mark 8, with temperatures sneaking into the low thirties. Lordstones car park was pretty rammed, even this early in the morning, everyone lured from their shells by the yellow ball in the sky. Considering it was such a hot day, I foolishly chose the most brutal start to any ride from Lordstones, straight up the old gliding club access track on the side of Carlton Bank, which gets no easier, continuing across the moor to Brian’s Pond and onward, ever upward to surmount Barker’s Ridge. Flatter riding took me to Cock Howe, another name which gave  The Pensioner something to snigger at, where I could leave behind the broad, sandy tracks which characterise the North York Moors and embark on some singletrack. 

The narrow bridleway which leads to Head House is a little overgrown at the start nowadays but soon opens up to a dry and dusty peat track, cutting through purple-blooming heather at an amenable angle, before dropping more steeply through bracken to a stream crossing. After the stream, the track continues over grassy moorland to a copse of trees behind the shooting house, a red kite, no doubt disturbed by a panting bloke on the verge of middle age opening the gate, took off, leisurely circling up on thermals in the direction of Bilsdale transmitter mast. I kept on the bridleway to Arnesgill Ridge, turning right to climb to Osmotherley Stones before retracing my tyre tracks back down Barker’s Ridge, always more fun in the friendly gravity direction, to Brian’s Pond. In what could only be described as a fit of masochism, I pedalled up to the summit of Carlton Bank, for no particular reason other than, in the words of George Mallory, “because it’s there.” Even the view wasn’t that spectacular, heat haze blanketing the horizon but it was nice to sit and catch a bit of breeze. Chatted to a young couple doing the Cleveland Way, who were the first people I had seen since leaving Lordstones a couple of hours before, strange considering the car park is rammed. The track back down the hill was a lot more fun than it had been ascending it, continuing past Lordstones, I squeezed in a couple of trails around the back of Cringle Moor before dehydration and hunger got the better of me. 

The Glorious Twelfth.

The next morning I was back in exactly the same spot, Lordstones overflow car park, this time with La Mujerita and the weather was anything but glorious, the whole hilltop covered in mist, billowing clouds drifting past at eye level, boiling up from gullies below us like steam from a volcano. The chance of another 31 degree day looking pretty remote. 

Today’s route is almost the same as yesterday’s, other than bypassing the singletrack owing to La Mujerita’s aversion to narrow, steep and rocky. As we climbed higher, the mist began to blow away, the sun got his hat on, hip, hip, hip hooray and we got our coats off. Bilsdale mast was our objective and we cruised toward it on broad tracks, fabricated for the grouse shooting industry and today is the twelfth of august, first day of the grouse shooting season. Normally the moors would be a thronged with shooting parties, shouting beaters waving flags made from fertilizer bags, the sound of gunfire and the smell of cordite, enthusiasts paying thousands of pounds for a day on the drink with added weapons; today, not a soul in sight, a glorious day for the grouse at least. And it was turning into a glorious day for us too, maybe not reaching yesterday's high temperature but plenty warm enough. 

We took a breather at the mast, three hundred and fourteen metres high, a sacred totem for the TV watching classes, doubtless beaming out shite to people sitting on their fat arses in front of the telly at this very moment. Breather over, we enjoyed a lengthy downhill stretch to Head House, the remote shooting house where I saw the red kite yesterday. From Head House, yesterday’s return route was taken again, minus the detour to Carlton Bank summit. When we returned, Lordstones was back in full summer mode, in contrast to the grey clag we had left behind this morning. A large group of paragliders were making the most of some mediocre gusty wind and getting a bit of flying time, impressing earth-bound spectators. Is there a collective noun for a group of paragliders? A flight? A canopy or a spiral could work maybe.

Grinding Through The Silt at Silton.

Well, that’s it finished, summer has crashed and burned with a couple of hot days, weather reverting to grey drizzle interspersed with heavy downpours, the forecasts, both long and short range predict more of the same, it’s an east coast effect which often plagues us this time of year. It’s glorious across in the lakes. Why aren’t we there? Mainly because it’s full. Rod had managed to wangle a day off work today and was delighted to introduce me and SuperBri to some of his secret trails around Osmotherley, which explains why we were assembling bikes in the moistness of Square Corner. 

We began in Silton Woods, starting with a trail which seventeen years ago, almost to the day, saw the inaugural ride of the Terra Trailblazers  (TTB 001) and the coining of the catchphrase “might be muddy”. The trail is now devoid of enveloping conifers, which has helped things dry up somewhat. We rode the first two sections of the “official” Silton Woods downhill track, after which my route knowledge becomes a little vague, as Rod led us, like a jungle guide, through brush and damp vegetation to the assorted trails he has been developing during lockdown. Not all his own work though, some of the trails have had features added, the sort of features gentlemen on the verge of middle age would be wise to avoid, let alone build. The sort of features more usually tackled by full face helmets, body armour and cajones the size of mangoes. 

Today’s weather conditions made the trails challenging enough without the added complications of sudden death or life-changing injuries to contend with. SuperBri soon found out that wet wood is slippier than black ice, damp rocks are also slippery and too much front brake on steep descents results in SuperBri becoming Superman. Everything was wet, slight gusts of wind shook big gobbets of water from the trees, damp bracken soaked our clothes, hidden puddles dunked our feet, tyres splashed water up our backs - who thinks to bring a mudguard in August? Slick roots and lubricious loam made up the trails,  we descended and climbed through various areas of the forest, every trail with the coda, “that’ll be great when it’s dry.”. Thoroughly moistened and in some cases, battered and bruised, we made our way back to Square Corner, which was shrouded in mist. Although aching legs said otherwise,  our mileage had not yet reached double figures, so we continued to Cod Beck Woods for further slip sliding away on more of Rod’s creations before returning to our cars for a picnic in the precipitation.

For those who might read the account of the Terra Trailblazers first ride (TTB 001), Blind Bob became The Pensioner and Simon became The Ginger One, which is paradoxical because the sparseness of his hair as he became older leaves most people wondering how he got the nickname.