Ride 064.

Date:    19th December 2005           Distance: 17.25 miles

Xmas Dinner ride.

Hard to believe it’s twelve months since we last did this Christmas Dinner thing, a few faces have come and gone but the dedicated have remained. Suffering the vagaries of English weather with a good-natured curse, glad to be freed from humdrum domesticity for a few mud-splattered; rain-soaked; lung-bursting hours. Ride days when the sun shone and the tracks were firm and flowing were pure ‘in the moment’ pleasure, the grim days more of a retrospective experience, sitting in the café afterwards, laughing about muddy falls and frozen feet. 

Today was a good day, pretty much, the sun shone and the ground was frozen - an ideal winter combination and we left Lordstones car park in high spirits. But not before we'd booked the all important Xmas lunch. The first hill up the side of Carlton Bank was a gruelling start but soon we reached the singletrack and we were away across the moor to Brian's Pond. Simon declined our attempts to put his excess bulk to good use and refused to test the strength of the ice covering the pond. We continued up Barker's Ridge, more or less the highest point of the ride, from where it would all be downhill back to Scugdale. Along Arnesgill Ridge, then a right turn onto the track across Whorlton Moor, the surface bearing up well despite the rising temperature. Chris began to have problems with his freehub latching and unlatching at random; the old 'bounce the back wheel up and down, then do it some more' trick, kept it going all the from Swainby Shooting House, along Stony Ridge, down Red Way to Sheepwash. The Red Way track network appears to have suffered somewhat under the wheels of 4x4's, now being deeply rutted which made for some off the bike time during the steep descent. 

The beck at Sheepwash was used to flush out Chris's freehub, a technique previously used in TTB 013, which seemed to be successful as it didn't play up for the remainder of the ride. More travelling in a downward direction took us through Clain Woods, down the Cleveland Way steps and along the roller-coaster track which runs through the bottom edge of the woods. Through the ford and up onto the Scugdale Road and payback time for the miles of downhill we'd enjoyed. Onwards and upwards as the saying goes, up past the psychotic Raikes' Farm dogs and along to the end of the road, where me and Oz chilled in the winter sun, waiting for Chris and Simon to join us.  

Thoughts of dinner were beginning to dominate the conversation as we pushed up the bridleway toward the popular Scugdale crags, curiously deserted today. Another (luckily) frozen bridleway returned us to Brian's Pond before a last uphill grind took us over Carlton Bank and a speedy descent to the cafe for the highlight of the day. Our Christmas dinner, as last year excellent and made all the better knowing we'd truly earned it. Simon showed us his forte, hoovering up the left-overs from other plates, stocking up on enough carbohydrates to see him through the rest of the week's Sky TV watching. 

 Height Profile: (click to enlarge)

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