Getting There...

Things still aren't right with me at the moment, but I'm getting there. I've learned not to try and fight depressive episodes by trying to ignore the warning signs and carrying on regardless or whatever, but rather to give in to the lowering mood, let it do what it wants to do and I will come out the other side. It might be a pretty miserable existence while depressed and with anxiety raging, but it won't actually kill me.

I'd had a ride some nine or ten days previously, but the calming effects had been short lived and I'd got back into a slump straight away, where even thinking of doing anything at all just seemed too much, never mind actually doing it.

But by last Saturday, I was starting to feel like I could manage a ride. The weather was sunny intervals between lively showers, but nothing too torrid. I could cope with that. 
I could take the Fatbike - Fatso is the bike I enjoy riding the most and is always a good bet to put a smile back on my face. Yup, I could ride that.
I wouldn't have to go far, just enough to get out in the fresh air, have a poke about and exercise my legs and lungs a little. Tregassow Lane, my favourite haunt, would be just the job. Yup, I could ride along there.

So, having done a good job of convincing myself a ride would be beneficial, I set about making it happen. 

Depression I've discovered, does weird stuff to the memory and my routines, among other things. I normally just prepare for a ride without much thought going into the process - I just bung on the required clothing, add my wallet and phone to their usual trouser pockets, grab the cameras and all my usual guff and head out. But on the last couple of occasions, I've been mooching about and all of a dither trying to bring it all together. It's genuinely scary sometimes how such routine and mundane tasks seem to become half forgotten in such a short period of time when I've had a downward period.

But anyway, it wasn't long before the familiar fizz of fat tyres skimming along the road were soothing away worries of possible additional mental woes and my thoughts were turning to the rhythm of ride, the wind on my face and what the world was looking like that morning. 

 Fatso leaning on the bench on my beloved Tregassow Lane. A popular place for local dog walkers to head for, stop a while, then head back. The result is a minefield of dog bombs to negotiate when taking to the grass here to and from the bench. 

Gorse can always be relied on to add a bit of colour to the surroundings, add in a blue sky and it gets even better.

Hefty overnight showers had left everywhere soggy and the roads puddlesome, but overhead were deep blue skies and warming sunshine. Yup, I was right to persuade myself to get out, I was already starting to feel at home - back doing about the only things I enjoy these days, riding, poking my nose about and taking snaps. 

The peace and calm of the countryside along Tregassow Lane is always rejuvenating, and stopping to just listen to the sounds of Trevella Stream running beneath the bridge while a Pheasant crowed in the wood nearby, I utterly basked in the calming ambience, greedily sucking in the fresh air and feeling of freedom from all the junk of modern life.

Turkey Tail Fungus on a stick beside Trevella Stream. I have a fellow Flickrneer from neighbouring Devon to thank for the identification. 

Feeling better all the time, and like I wanted an even better dose of solitude and remoteness, I headed off down the 'foot'path that ultimately links up with a Bridleway that leads down into Tresillian. I wasn't going that far though, just to the clearing beside the stream, where I poked around a bit, stogging about in the ankle deep mire that surrounds the stream at the bottom of the hill. After a good old nose around, I found a comfy log to sit on, a rarity given my bad back, and just sat for a while doing, well, nothing at all.

The 'Foot'path from Tregassow Lane, goes to the right of the stile. I say 'Foot'path, as vehicles clearly use it, most likely 4x4s. I'm dying to ride up and then back down, the track leading up the field to the left, but I think that'd be pushing my luck a bit.

 Tregassow footpath.

This more open section of the footpath was thick with brambles until fairly recently, but the land owner has cleared it all making riding a lot easier.

 Yeah yeah yeah...

Riding on such a footpath might be a touch naughty, but knickers to it! I think in fact that these more rural paths, where possible, should be opened up to bicycle use anyway. This one is obviously some ancient track that in the past was well trodden, it bears all the hallmarks of a once busy right of way.

 The path passes through some charming and remote woodland.

Comfy log or not, my back still started to stiffen up so reluctantly I got up and bimbled my way back the way I'd come to Tregassow Lane. A brief shower failed to dampen the mood, but along with the return of the sunshine, produced instead a rainbow off to my left as I climbed the gruesome hill on the last stretch of the lane. 

A good reason to stop and have a rest on the flipping hill  

A Rainbow always makes a good subject for a snap...

That climb really brought home the lack of riding I've been doing lately, as my legs burned and I struggled up the slope I normally conquer relatively easily these days.

 They've been out lobbing random shovel loads of soft tarmac about again, supposedly in the name of repairing the potholes in the roads. This splodge of tarmac in the middle of a long stretch of damaged roadside edge is not going to last very long at all, and has probably actually made for an added bump for any vehicle running a wheel along it. Why they didn't patch the whole crater is a mystery.

Just to add to the uplifting air of the ride, I passed several clumps of Daffodils sprouting from the verges, a sure sign of good things to come, hopefully. 

Sat here writing this a couple of days later, I realise I'm still out of sorts and not quite back to normal, whatever that is these days, but I'm going in the right direction, which is the main thing. 

Getting amongst the wet and the mud, the fresh air and the sounds of the countryside again:  the best therapy I know.

---------------

Clever Sheep!

More moaning to start a blog entry with! Yes, it has been another duff few days as far as I'm concerned, with a very stressful ongoing situation leading to all my usual problems and issues ramping up, and also my freshly recovered back being aggravated once more by having to make a trip into town, with all the walking, waiting about and bouncing about on the bus that such a trip entails.

So I was back to machine gunning pain killers down my Gullet and trying to relax the muscles in my back as much as I could.

Thankfully I achieved quite a rapid recovery this time, and on Thursday, in association with both Ibuprofen and Immodium, I was able to get out for some riding therapy.

This being early in the ride and also at the bottom of the breathless plunge to Trevella Stream, I was a tad cold at this point, but it's easy to see to what a beautiful day it was out and about on Thursday. 

It was a beautiful morning too - still as a post, and with barely a cloud to be seen, sunny. Given the overnight frost that was still evident in the shadows, it was also nose drippingly cold, but apart from that, ideal weather for bike bimbling. 

A lot of my local rides involve heading off along the flat of Tregassow Lane, and such level geography means I normally build up some heat as I pedal along, but on this day I hung a left at the junction by the village school and made the long drop down to Trevella Stream instead, and that piercingly chilly descent had me wondering if I should've donned an extra layer before heading out, or even if I should return home to get one. But I bravely/recklessly decided to carry on and indeed the climb up the other side of the valley to Five Turnings junction saw me thawing out again nicely.

I still wasn't fully into the joys of the ride though, as I have so much churning away in my under powered and easily overloaded brain, that emptying my head of such traumas was providing a lot tougher than is the norm.

The ford at Boswiddle is a favourite haunt for some relaxation, so given my worries, there wasn't a choice to be made at Five Turnings, a junction that can see me dithering for ages over which of the four options available (five if you include turning round and going back the way I'd come) to take.

Once again the cold seeped into me as I dropped down a hill only to see temperatures soar again on the climb up the other side to the hamlet and farm at Boswiddle. A quick right turn and soon enough I was descending again accompanied by the familiar and welcoming roar of the water dropping a level at the ford.

On the flat before the descent to Boswiddle Ford, but on a winter's day as still as this, the water can just be heard as it passes beneath the road there.

The water has once again retreated beneath the road surface, after a brief excursion above it a few weeks ago, but the drop from one side of the road to the other still produces an invigorating thunderous noise, despite the low volume of water. It may not be Niagara Falls, but it does a good job for me. 

It all looks calm and peaceful, but the water doesn't half make some noise here. Usually at this stage of the winter, it would be running fast across the road in the background, so cheeky mid ride bike washing is in short supply at the moment.

As usual here I had a good poke about the banks of the stream and the footpath that bypasses the ford, looking for mushrooms, listening to the water and the crows, and just generally trying to level myself.

A tree on the footpath that gives the ford a swerve.

The trouble is, this sort of escape from stress tends to occur better naturally, when one is already in a better place to start with and just going with the flow. Trying to force the issue, to make a conscious effort to relax and lose myself in my pokings about and thoughts of what to photograph, can hinder the process as I keep asking myself if I'm chilling out yet and if not, why not!Some days, the prevailing stress/turbulence level is just too high to be lifted easily. 

I did enjoy hunting up and down the particularly frosty verge though looking for a photo to take, even though I failed to find anything worthy. I also observed the Sheep in the adjoining field merrily grazing along the line twixt sun and shade, as if joined on some long string or other. It occurred to me that Sheep aren't so daft after all, and in fact, are more intelligent than some of we humans! I've always marveled at the people stood stamping their feet in the cold of the shade as they smoke outside their office block, while a few feet away warm sun beams down. A game of 'spot the English in the lay-bys of Southern France' is just too easy, as all the locals park under the shade of trees while the English cars are always parked in the sun - doors akimbo and with sweaty occupants fanning themselves. In rain I watch sodden and bedraggled people dashing down the side of narrow (single vehicle width) streets that are being hammered with rain, while the other side of the street is entirely sheltered by the buildings that line it. 

We British are known for being obsessed with the weather, it's often the first thing we talk about when meeting strangers or long time friends - "Strewth it's henting down out there" and so on. Yet for all our awareness of it, we are utterly brainless seemingly at dealing with it! Those Sheep were plainly stood chomping in the warmth of the sun, but had they been supplied with a Mk I British human brain instead, they would be huddled in the shade no doubt, moaning how cold the grass was that morning. So that was the great conclusion of the ride - Sheep have more common sense than we British folk.

And that was about it really, I didn't photograph the cunningly clever Ruminants either, so the photos in this blog won't meet up exactly with what tripe is written here. But I was fast feeling what little stress I had rid myself of, returning. It wasn't the end of the ride, as I did carry on a bit, and did take a couple more photos, but I was getting grumpy again - it was those clever Sheep reminding me of all the stupid people that inhabit this planet that did it! 

The lanes in winter can be every bit as striking as in summer. 

I had thought of having a potter along a Bridleway not far from Boswiddle, hence the choice of Fatso as chariot of the day, but as my back was still a little tender, I decided against risking the recovery process further and stuck to tarmac.

 Now here was a bit of good news! Just before Christmas I set off intent on some off roadery in these woods, only to be foiled by a newly installed and much padlocked gate. A notice had been pinned up, but was some way inside the gate, meaning you'd have to climb over the gate to read it, which was rather less than astute it must be said. However, the notice has since been moved and rather than public access to the wood being stopped as I suspected, it is merely this entrance that has been closed. So that means woodland manouevres can continue here after all.

 Random roadside view into some woodland.

Some GoPro action treated to some Bleach Bypass witchcraft in Nik software afterwards.

So that's it for another ride. We're getting towards the thin end of January now and I'm still out of sorts and struggling to improve matters, but this week a field full of Sheep have shown more sense than a few folk I could mention, which is hardly helpful. Thankfully though, there are also good people who I've never even met, but who inhabit the internet and share similar interests, who remind me that we humans (even the rain lurking, sun sweating, British ones) as a race, aren't in fact all bad, and that there are plenty of good people out there as well to counter the dickwits one encounters so much these days!

---------------

A Short Ride but with a Magical Encounter.

Now before we start, some of the photos below look a bit tired and emotional from the uploading process, but if you right click on them and open in a new tab they come out a lot better looking.

It hasn't been a good week for riding, mostly thanks to my back giving me considerable grief that only now, after several days of firing Ibuprofen down my neck, is it starting to ease. 

Just the one ride this week then, and that was a short bimble around my regular, but always interesting, loop. 

I must've been around this loop, and variations of it, hundreds of times now, but it never fails to invigorate or fascinate in some way or other. Part of that though is down to being a bimbler in the first place, if I were given to spearing through the lanes like a missile chasing some Strava interval or whatever, I'd be missing out on so much of what these particular lanes, and and the countryside in general, have to offer.

There's always a photo to be found, somehow. I keep thinking I must've wrung every photo possible out of this loop, then I go for a ride and against all the odds end up coming home with something captured to portray the ride, or the countryside and how it appeals to me and so on.

Double gate to the left is the entrance to a solar farm, which will feature in, but not be the subject of, another picture shortly...

I feel happiest in these lanes too, the familiarity is comforting and relaxing, and though it sounds strange to say, I feel safe in the countryside, I feel at home.

Less than 2 miles out from home, but by the time I reach this section of my favourite lane I'm starting to build body heat and also acclimatise to the cold I initially felt on setting off. These high banks and overhanging trees always offer protection from aggressive cross winds and slicing rain, and so I invariably start to feel all the stresses draining out of my body and mind as I coast down through this section, often stopping to take it all in and just enjoy the moment.

But there is also the chance that something has changed, either natural in the way of the local flora finally flowering for instance, leading to a previously dull green bank becoming alive with vibrant colour, or by man in the way of activity in the fields. 

 Just poking about places like this bridge above, is a great way to relax and spend a few minutes.

Embrace the slop! I hate having dirty bikes and trousers all the time, but the benefits of riding through winter far outweigh the negatives.

Then there are the encounters to be had. Sometimes with dog walkers who stop for a brief chat while I'm messing with the camera or just admiring a particular view for the third time that week, or it may be with horse riders, or a brush with something majestic or magical, or both, in the form of the local wildlife. Usually this would be a Hawk or Buzzard or whatever (I need to A - start wearing my prescription glasses on rides and B - To learn how to identify these birds so I know what they are!) dropping out of a tree and swooping up the road ahead of me before banking off to one side and soaring away above a field. An all too fleeting glimpse of graceful wing span and upturned wing tip feathers that is simply awe inspiring. 

A Stoat, or a Weasel, (see above for reasons for poor descriptions given here...) was a real highlight, and so far, a single shot experience, my having not seen another since.

On this ride the other day it was another animal that caught my attention, and breath, when I had an encounter with a Hare. I was drifting along fairly easily with the blustery wind buffeting me from the west when I heard a brief flap of panic and rustle of grass and caught a glimpse of something brown launching out of the verge and into the field to my left. I stopped of course, as did what I could now see was a Hare, and we cautiously eyed each other. Slowly so as not to startle the creature more I reached for my camera in the bum bag (an ugly item to wear but for being quick on the draw with a camera they are hard to beat) and switched it on and zoomed it in before bringing it to my eye. These meetings are always over in seconds and the urge to get the camera out quick has to be tempered with the need to not create sudden movements or sounds. My target hopped a bit further away and once again stopped, turning to the side to better keep an eye on me, and presenting me with a most graceful and handsome stance to capture. I managed three shots before he, or she, decided that was enough attention for one day and disappeared fast into the distance. 

A little bit of bimbling magic - an encounter with a Hare, and what a proud and elegant looking chap he (might be a she for all I know but I'll go with chap) is. Tregassow Lane Solar Farm in the background.

Thrilled to have seen such a beast, I was immediately disappointed to realise I'd left the camera on a high ISO after some gloomily lit photo dickery earlier. Checking the rear screen showed I'd caught the Hare nicely in the frame but I still crossed my fingers as I rode home that the image quality wouldn't be ruined in a blaze of fuzzy noise.

Thankfully, after a bit of adjustment to the RAW image, I had some images that even when viewed at 100%, weren't too bad, and the encounter had been recorded in pixels rather than just memory. 

So a bad week for riding, but a good week for a bit of the magic of the countryside.

---------------

Savouring a Libation to Saint Drogo...

This year of bicycle bimbling has got off to a slow start, even by my meagre standards, with just two rides done so far and under 20 miles covered. Not that I'm worried mind you, as it's not a competition or anything. Just as well too. No, the key factor for me is quality over quantity - smiles over miles, pleasure over pain and happiness over...erm... sweatiness. It's not how fast, how far and how often for me, it's more how much I see, feel, and submerge into the landscape that tickles my Trout.

Saturday mind you, didn't get off to the most calming of starts though, as after a night spent anguishing over all sorts of junk whirling around in my head, I overslept and didn't stumble out of bed until nearly 10 in the morning. I obviously had got to sleep at some point, probably around Sheep number 15,020, but I can't say I awoke refreshed and ready for the day, but there we go. 
The normal procedure at such times is to stumble down to the kitchen to make coffee while arguing with myself mentally about what to do with what remains of the day, if anything. Going back to bed is a good answer on some particularly 'black' days, staring at the internet until it's time for lunch is another possibility on 'grey' days. But before going to bed I had in fact made plans to go for a ride somewhere and have a coffee, something I haven't done for a while, and so in an unusually positive move for me in such circumstances, I thought 'Why not' and decided to get out and get on with it quickly, before I changed my mind. To facilitate that, I would postpone the first coffee of the day until I reached a suitable point on my ride... This was brave bravery of the highest order! Riding 'pre-caffeinated' can be done, I've done it many times before, but usually on days when I've felt a bit more switched on to start with. This could get messy...

It wasn't just my head that was grey and drizzly, but Saturday was too, but I'd decided to head into the local wood (didn't want to take on anything too ambitious, not in my precariously coffee deficient state) where the weather wouldn't really make its presence felt. 

Hmmm... grey and grizzlesome out, and what the hell is all that noise?

The shooting season has been under way since October apparently, but you'd be forgiven for thinking it started on Saturday morning and ended sometime on Saturday afternoon, and the local gun bunnies were all out blowing as many furry/feathery things to pieces as they could, while they could. The normally peaceful lane to Lanner Mill where the entrance to the wood is sounded more like being beside a busy battlefield. Not just the sound of shotguns either, but a bird scarer got in on the action as well, unless the gun club have started using Howitzers now to take out the poor blundering Pheasants with.  Wouldn't put it past them actually...

A pleasant enough rural scene, but by the sound of it World War Three had broken out and no one had thought to tell me... 

Thankfully, once I'd taken cover in the wood, the trees did a good job of muffling the sound of guns and I could take the white flag off my selfie stick and set about enjoying some peace and quiet. 

The stream running alongside the lower path in Idless Woods near Truro.

The winter so far has been quite mild, and not very wet either - December apparently, saw just 42% of the expected rainfall nationally, but the lowermost path in the wood was surprisingly snotty, with many muddy, boggy, puddles to negotiate. Looking to my right and into the dense wood was, on this grey day, a move full of foreboding. Blimey it was dark in there. All sorts of nasties could be hiding within those shadowy trunks - gert big hairy arsed man eating animals... Zombies... a Camborne man marooned after missing the last bus home even... yikes, now that is scary! Best keep pedaling... 

I did go off piste though briefly to check out the ruins of the old Gunpowder factory.

An odd thing to find in a wood in the middle of nowhere but that was why these explosives factories were sited thus - to limit damage in the event of an accident - the trees would smother the explosion and also the roofs of the buildings were designed to blow off easily, allowing the explosive force an easy and relatively harmless escape route upwards.
The running water meanwhile was used to power huge grinding wheels.

Gunpowder for use in the mines had to be imported into Cornwall at great expense until the early 1800s, when several such factories were established in the county, mostly in wooded river valleys. Charcoal was produced in this wood, but the other main ingredients for Gunpowder - Saltpetre and Sulphur, would have been brought into the county, possibly arriving by boat into what was still then a bustling port in nearby Truro.

There isn't a huge amount to see here, basically what you can see in these photos - the ruins of some small buildings, unlike at other much bigger sites, particularly the Kennal Vale factory near Ponsanooth. 

Gunpowder production in the county lasted for about a hundred years before the increased use of Gelignite and Dynamite saw production end. The actual history of this particular factory has, frustratingly, so far eluded me - more research required!

More info on the works at Kennal Vale can be found Here

By now, the stresses of the sleep disturbed night and the sound of WW3 going ahead had long been forgotten and the bimble was working its theraputic magic as I relaxed into my surroundings, and congratulated myself on having got thus far and still feeling relatively human. But, coffee would have to be infused soon, so having had a good nose around I got back onto the main path and rode down to a favourite spot for a brew up at the edge of the stream, beside some more evidence of some past activity or other. 

 Whatever was here wasn't very big, but I'd still like to know what it was... eh Forestry Commission? A bit more history on your web site page for Idless Woods would be most welcome!

 Whoop whoop! Coffee time!

The Trangia getting a tad excited. I must buy some pointy flamed fuel next time, this flat topped flame meths is nowhere near as pleasing...

 If Beaver lived here, this is the view they'd get.

 And this is the sort of caper they get up to no doubt...

Coffee always tastes so much better when you've had to wait for it! I don't get into all the fermuckle that some folk do when coffeenating outdoors - not for me all the grinding and filtering equipment and all that guff. I prefer the ease of the all in one sachets that can be bought from any supermarket and the like. A coffee snob's worst nightmare, but darned good tasting to me. 

Had the day started earlier, well for me anyway, then I would most likely have then ridden on somewhere else but by now it was gone lunchtime, so I decided to stick around in the wood and have me a poke about up a path I hadn't poked about up before. 

 A couple of random woodland shots above...

 Now these strange sheltery type structures might be responsible for...

the damage to the bark on many of the trees here. It could be the result of animal activity, but there were no signs of tracks, droppings or hair/fur to suggest this is the case.

Unusually, I had trouble getting the old duffer (me) in focus while trying to get some riding shots. Normally it's not an issue, but for some reason, on Saturday, the camera wasn't playing ball. So time for plan B on such occasions, and blur the old boy and focus on something a bit more solid and most importantly, stationary.

The sun even started to come out just to make the day complete, and after a goodly bit of dicking about trying to get a satisfactory ride past photo, I headed home, muddy of bike and trouser, and in need of food now as well as more coffee, but very relaxed and happy. 

Heading home after what turned out to be a very satisfying day despite a dodgy start.

Only 7 miles done, but they were very pleasurable miles indeed, which is as I said some yards back up there at the top of this epic, what it's all about. 

Oh... Saint Drogo, the geezer mentioned in the title... he's the Patron Saint of Coffee and Coffee Houses. Sound chap obviously.

----------------

First Bimble of the Year in the Bag.

Well, 2017 got underway without much in the way of fanfare as far as I was concerned. I sort of stumbled into it like I do my clothes some mornings, before realising later my jumper is on inside out and I've put both socks on one foot. New Year's Day was a bit of a fuggy one for me, I wasn't really at the races, nor the day after, but yesterday, the third day of this fresh year, I thought it about time I got my first ride under my wheels.

It turned out to be cracking day for it too - beautiful and sunny, and still as a lamppost, but with a chunky frost in evidence along with air as sharp as needles in the lungs when gulping it in up some of the hills.

I do like silhouettes on days like these...

 Look, here's another. The lane at Treworgan on the way to Lanner Mill.

Once out of the village and far enough beyond the main road to no longer hear the traffic, the only noise to be heard came from the wild life and my tyres crackling softly on the gravel, and crunching on the frozen grass or mud up the middle of the road in places. 

I never knowingly go anywhere under dressed, so most of me was lovely and toasty, but my face and fingers were still making the cold air felt, and taking photos became a fumblesome affair as I struggled with the camera and dead feeling pinkies. Half pressing the shutter to get focus was the biggest issue, but the cold wasn't just bothering the flesh, the camera was acting up as well, adding to the fun. Once focused, it wouldn't then release focus after the shutter had been released, and the menus seemed to go haywire as well, flitting from setting to setting or flashing on and off. Back home and all is fine once more, so hopefully it was just the cold making mischief in the works rather than another Canon about to terminally call it quits.

Frozen fingers didn't help when descending the hill towards Lanner Mill either, as speed down there is unwise to say the least, but I was also wary of hitting any frozen damp patches while hard on the brakes all the way down. I'd passed plenty of frozen puddles and damp bits for unplanned skidding and crashing to be a real possibility, and I try to avoid that kind of thing if I can, plus I'd given my stunt double the day off, so care taking was the order of the day.

Climbing the swinish hill up out of Lanner Mill. A good place to stop for a rest  A nice spot for a photograph, featuring as it does, this attractive old barn/store.

More care was needed regarding that low sun too with regard to meeting the occasional motor vehicle. I always seemed to meet something that was travelling fully into the sun, either when driving towards me or coming up behind me, and I'm wary of how little the driver can see of an old bloke on a bike in such conditions, so as soon as I heard something I pulled right in and let them pass.

For some reason I always struggle for photographic inspiration around this particular loop, and yesterday was no exception, in fact, with the low but bright sun and dark shadows making for heaps of exposure befuddling contrast, it wasn't just my photographic eye that was struggling. That sun also made riding uncomfortable at times too, as it strobed away into one eye or the other depending on what direction my nose was pointing.

I've made a deal with the Devil Dodgers - If they don't knock on my door to tell all about their particular religious flavour, then I won't go knocking on theirs, so this is as close as I generally get to churches. I stay outside on neutral ground lest I get struck down by a lightning bolt or similar.

But this church, the parish church of St Allen, is a fine example of the type it has to be said.

 Always an untidy, messy lane this one, but yesterday the mud up the middle was thrillingly crunchy as the tyres broke the frozen crust.

A barn undergoing renovation at Ventonleague while out of shot to the left, a whole new building is going up. I just hope it fits in well with the surroundings and isn't some architect's glass and concrete fetish made real.

Apparently the result of air bubbles - some milky, some clear - in the ice as it formed, the patterns to be found on frozen puddles can be quite striking. Redness is the reflection of my jacket. 

All of which sounds like a lot of moaning, but in fact it was another enjoyable enough ride, full of solitude and fresh, invigorating, runny nose making, air, and I will never complain about that. 

These maps aren't the most detailed or interesting, but there we go. 7.9 miles was the journey, at a bimbleiferous 7.0 mph average.

---------------