Mountain Bike Ride
The Pensioner, The Ginger One.
It is still August you know; we shouldn’t be finishing a ride looking like early morning toilet bowls after a hard night of real ale and chillies. We began our ride in the village of Great Ayton today, with a vague plan to check out the new Fletchers Farm Coffee Shop, as it seems we must be the last bunch of cyclists in Teesside and North Yorkshire to visit. Making our way to the farm on the outskirts of Little Ayton, we passed the cafe, which looked very welcoming but a cafe stop within the first mile is a bit too relaxed a pace even for us. Intending to visit on our return leg we pressed on, upwards, ever upwards with pessimistic commentary from the senior citizen at the back, “It’ll never work. Fancy building a cafe here. No passing trade. I bet we’re the only people who’ve been along this track all week.” Duncan Bannatyne is like an eternal optimist compared to The Pensioner.
Making our way vaguely in the direction of Captain Cook’s Monument, or thereabouts, having no definite route in mind, we passed the old Red Run, one time test piece of nerve and machismo, looking treacherously slippy today after a few preceding wet days. Following a track through Ayton Banks Woods proved to be a messy experience, sodden grass and soft mud conspired with summer rigged bikes (in other words, mudguards still in the shed) to result in soaking-wet, mud-splattered boys after what ought to have been a pleasant couple of miles.
The steep tarmac to Gribdale came as something of a relief, as did the sunshine, which went some way towards warming and drying us, being satched as we were (Darlington patois for saturated apparently). More climbing followed from the car park at Gribdale, just in case we hadn’t already done enough, we made our way onto Great Ayton Moor where things, thankfully became a bit more horizontal and a lot drier underfoot. The moors are sporting a particularly profuse covering of heather this year, luxurious purple springiness stretching in all directions for miles and miles. Making our way to Cod Hill Heights via Percy Cross Rigg and Black Nab was pleasant enough, before nice singletrack through the heather took us to the famous local landmark of The Nipple and a grand bit of downhill to the road at Sleddale.
Returning along Percy Cross Rigg, the heinous crime of revisiting the same piece of track, in the same direction, twice in the same ride was committed; wisely me and The Ginger One stayed out of earshot of The Pensioner’s berating. This time we rode Percy Cross Rigg all the way to The Unsuitables’ gate, then cut across the top of Guisborough Woods to Little Roseberry, choosing the right hand descent which turned out to be slightly sloppy, giving a few hairy moments and a lot more mud-splattering. Things continued in this vein down to Aireyholme Farm, after which we rejoined tarmac to Dikes Lane. A scant half mile of downhill riding was soon polished off and we eagerly dismounted outside the much-anticipated coffee shop, where we were greeted amiably by a hearty Yorkshire farmer, who informed us the cafe would be open from Wednesday onwards. Being shift workers, we only ever have a vague idea what day it actually is and it took a few moments to realise today is Monday and we wouldn’t be refreshing ourselves in this cafe because it’s not open Mondays and Tuesdays. Oh well, it will have to be some other time, hopefully very soon. Back to The Pensioner’s favourite cafe then - Stamps in Great Ayton, for a breakfast scone and a piece of fruit cake.
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