Did i mention the weather yesterday - beautiful (some day all cycle trips will be made this way!) Another cloudless sky greeted us and once breakfast had been consumed Ivor appeared over the hill from Alston and we set off.
as we had eaten in Alston the night before we had spotted the start of the route for today - all of about 300 - 500 metres before we again took off for the skies - phew. In fact as i twittered at this point over 800ft climbed in 2 miles. but again the reward is a crazy downhill and we obliged by topping the scales with another 30plus on the clock into Nenthead.
The fabled Black Hill was next, highest point on the route. Trouble is climbing is quite a personal thing you just focus and zone out everything else, so i reached the top closely followed by another cyclist who came up with the quote of the 2 days - "F*%$ - i am getting too old for this" and the Ivor arrived very closely after that. A couple of mins later Simon rang me so fearing a mechanical breakdown or worse i answered the phone to discover that Simon was at Black Hill and Ivor and I had missed the left turn and were actually atop Killhope - at a similar altitude.
After a quick map consultation we decided to meet up again at Allenheads, even though Simon gallantly offered to come back down and up again to join us. - think we definately chose the short straw as although a great downhill towards Copthill. it meant another up and over to meet up with Simon again.
Allenheads to Rookhope was more of the same up and up (and just for fun up some more) passing littered bodies on the verge's before downhill to the Rookhope Inn and some more liquids (tea and coffee - before you assume!)
Got chatting to a fellow cyclist who judging from his near incomprehensible accent lived in the area. He regaled us with various tales including the fact that we had another climb up to a cattle grid and then the road flattened out -still climbing but a lot shallower then it was downhill all the way. - Sure enough we climbed, negotiated the cattle grid, road flattened and after a brief pause on the top of the hill, we blatted our way down the other side into Stanhope - almost wiping out some walkers as the max speed for the trip was reached.
Now remember the Rookhope cyclist's tale? We did as the hill he was talking about turned out to be NOT the one we had just gone over as we still had the monumental Crawleyside hill to get up - 17% gradient, blood sweat, tears - the works.
Again mountain bikers going backwards spinning their legs helplessly with little forward momentum were passed and we reached parkhead another Cafe - being hardened to the rigours of the day by now and also knowing that it was efectively down hill all the way now we made contact with the Support Team who by now were in Consett and informed them of our intent to arrive in about an hour.
The track was a bit gravelly but relatively solid, particularly as it was dry, but we flew down to Consett, in a little over 40 minutes and after 3 hours on the road grabbed some well earned lunch, in the car park of a KFC - needless to say we went for a more healthy option - various carbs surrounded by bread and pastry plus more water taken on board.
So the final assault - 25 miles to go - mostly traffic free, on a mixture of tarmac and cinder tracks - if it wasn't for the gates periodically appearing (presumably to prevent local scally's from riding mopeds up and down) and the dubious signeage, we may have gone a bit quicker, but hitting speeds of up to 25mph at best was great.
We entered Sunderland and glimpsed the Stadium of Light knowing that it was only a mile or so to go, and finally rounded the final turn for a run in to the Marina. Our support team were there clapping us in and taking more photos. As for the trophies, we must have picked the wrong day because no one was there in an official capacity but we knew we had achieved a massive feat in 2 days and best of all we had shared it together.
Our final feat was to scoot around to the beach, just to prove we had actually gone sea to sea and then after a quick shower at the marina (very nice) it was pack up load up and head for home.
Thanks to Ivor, Tricia and Ellis - the Cambridgeshire part of the project, and especially to Lynette and Sian for being all that anyone could want in a support team, but most of all thanks to Simon for initially maybe humouring me by agreeing to take part, but being there to share in the literal ups and downs of 2 days on a bike and to come out the other side smiling and still talking to me!
Day 2 Stats:
Stats for Day 1
Mileage 61.13
Time on bike: 4Hrs 59mins
Ave Speed: 12.2mph
Max Speed: 37.7mph
Total Ascent: 4673ft
Total Descent: 5789ft
So what next - plenty of roads still to ride, plenty of time to ride them - watch this space...
(Photos of the C2C coming soon.)
as we had eaten in Alston the night before we had spotted the start of the route for today - all of about 300 - 500 metres before we again took off for the skies - phew. In fact as i twittered at this point over 800ft climbed in 2 miles. but again the reward is a crazy downhill and we obliged by topping the scales with another 30plus on the clock into Nenthead.
The fabled Black Hill was next, highest point on the route. Trouble is climbing is quite a personal thing you just focus and zone out everything else, so i reached the top closely followed by another cyclist who came up with the quote of the 2 days - "F*%$ - i am getting too old for this" and the Ivor arrived very closely after that. A couple of mins later Simon rang me so fearing a mechanical breakdown or worse i answered the phone to discover that Simon was at Black Hill and Ivor and I had missed the left turn and were actually atop Killhope - at a similar altitude.
After a quick map consultation we decided to meet up again at Allenheads, even though Simon gallantly offered to come back down and up again to join us. - think we definately chose the short straw as although a great downhill towards Copthill. it meant another up and over to meet up with Simon again.
Allenheads to Rookhope was more of the same up and up (and just for fun up some more) passing littered bodies on the verge's before downhill to the Rookhope Inn and some more liquids (tea and coffee - before you assume!)
Got chatting to a fellow cyclist who judging from his near incomprehensible accent lived in the area. He regaled us with various tales including the fact that we had another climb up to a cattle grid and then the road flattened out -still climbing but a lot shallower then it was downhill all the way. - Sure enough we climbed, negotiated the cattle grid, road flattened and after a brief pause on the top of the hill, we blatted our way down the other side into Stanhope - almost wiping out some walkers as the max speed for the trip was reached.
Now remember the Rookhope cyclist's tale? We did as the hill he was talking about turned out to be NOT the one we had just gone over as we still had the monumental Crawleyside hill to get up - 17% gradient, blood sweat, tears - the works.
Again mountain bikers going backwards spinning their legs helplessly with little forward momentum were passed and we reached parkhead another Cafe - being hardened to the rigours of the day by now and also knowing that it was efectively down hill all the way now we made contact with the Support Team who by now were in Consett and informed them of our intent to arrive in about an hour.
The track was a bit gravelly but relatively solid, particularly as it was dry, but we flew down to Consett, in a little over 40 minutes and after 3 hours on the road grabbed some well earned lunch, in the car park of a KFC - needless to say we went for a more healthy option - various carbs surrounded by bread and pastry plus more water taken on board.
So the final assault - 25 miles to go - mostly traffic free, on a mixture of tarmac and cinder tracks - if it wasn't for the gates periodically appearing (presumably to prevent local scally's from riding mopeds up and down) and the dubious signeage, we may have gone a bit quicker, but hitting speeds of up to 25mph at best was great.
We entered Sunderland and glimpsed the Stadium of Light knowing that it was only a mile or so to go, and finally rounded the final turn for a run in to the Marina. Our support team were there clapping us in and taking more photos. As for the trophies, we must have picked the wrong day because no one was there in an official capacity but we knew we had achieved a massive feat in 2 days and best of all we had shared it together.
Our final feat was to scoot around to the beach, just to prove we had actually gone sea to sea and then after a quick shower at the marina (very nice) it was pack up load up and head for home.
Thanks to Ivor, Tricia and Ellis - the Cambridgeshire part of the project, and especially to Lynette and Sian for being all that anyone could want in a support team, but most of all thanks to Simon for initially maybe humouring me by agreeing to take part, but being there to share in the literal ups and downs of 2 days on a bike and to come out the other side smiling and still talking to me!
Day 2 Stats:
Stats for Day 1
Mileage 61.13
Time on bike: 4Hrs 59mins
Ave Speed: 12.2mph
Max Speed: 37.7mph
Total Ascent: 4673ft
Total Descent: 5789ft
So what next - plenty of roads still to ride, plenty of time to ride them - watch this space...
(Photos of the C2C coming soon.)
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