Early Morning Coffee Ride.

Well the heat wave has come to an end, thankfully. It's a grey Thursday morning here at Bimble HQ and the temperature is a most pleasant 17c, which I can cope with, although rather bizarrely, my Hayfever has gone into overdrive and I'm sneezing and snuffling, my eyes are streaming and my face is aching like a good'un. This does not a happy Bimbler make, and the tablets are only now, some two hours after taking them, starting to get a hold of the situation. All through the hot weather it was nicely under control, but now it's cooled down it's gone crackers, but there we go. 

But it's good to get back to something a bit more normal weather wise. It was nice bimbling about in the sun, up to a point, but it did all get rather too hot for comfort after a day or two. Flesh was sizzling, tarmac was melting and the locals cows were giving evaporated milk, it was so hot. Beggar all that for a laugh.

On the plus side, the bikes haven't needed to be washed in weeks. I normally like to keep my bikes as clean as is practical, and hate them being covered in mud, but dust I don't mind so much, so they've just had chain clean and lubes between rides, something no doubt that will please the reservoir monitoring folk at South West Water - "Levels are holding up... has that Bimbles bloke not been washing his bike then?"

Through all this, my back has been pretty good, no coincidence perhaps, as it often seems worse in cold/wet weather, but a wrong move can still wreck it for weeks whatever the weather, so I have to still temper my enthusiasm despite enjoying rather more free movement than is my norm.

So not wanting to miss out on a good ride, I still bravely headed out into the heat for some short bimbles round my usual loop and also Idless Woods, but they were fairly routine, if a little sweaty, affairs.

Fatso on the main drag through Idless Woods.

Fuzzy photo? Right click and open in a new tab.

My last decent ride to East Portholland saw me up at Sparrow's Fart hoping for a good old sun rise, but instead I got drabness and drizzle until mid wayish through my travels.

For Tuesday just gone though, the forecast looked more promising, so I decided to once again get out early (no hardship in the recent weather - sleep being a bit hard to come by) and go and have a coffee down by the river, a bit of a bimble about, and get home again before the day got too hot.

Once again though, I just missed dawn itself by a matter of minutes, so it was starting to get light as I poked Fatso down the road at just after 5 o'clock. Unlike that previous early ride, on this occasion all was still, there was no breeze at all, and birds singing apart, all was so very, very, quiet. 

 Heading down the hill out of my home port of Trispen, and towards Trevella Stream. Even at just after 5 am it was pretty warm out.

Light in the sky top right is either a plane glinting in the sun, a passing asteroid or a UFO. I'm going with it being the former. If it was the latter,  well the little green men were heading east(ish), up country, so good luck with finding a parking spot for your flying saucer up there, and don't forget to pay the congestion charge.

Despite the early hour it was still pretty warm out, in fact, I was getting a sweat on just taking photos, I was glad to get tooting on the bike again just to get some air passing over me.

Easy wheeling down the short hill towards Trehane Wood I was aware of movement off to my left, in the field that sits above the level of the road. I looked across to see a Rabbit, or maybe a Hare (in the low light, and through a hedge, it's hard to tell one from t'other), speeding along parallel to me as if we were in a race. As I neared the left bend by the corner of the field Thumper was still going like the clappers and I half expected him to burst through the hedge and across the road, so a tad grudgingly, I conceded the lead and braked to avoid any unpleasant collisions, but he must've gone to hide in the hedge, or maybe just collided with it, and failed to appear. A magical few seconds though, and these random encounters with wildlife are definitely part of the pleasure of riding the lanes.

There were the usual twitterings of the birds, but otherwise everywhere was still, and utterly silent. 

 On the hill down into Tresillian I stopped to hang my nose over the gate to take some photos of the local Sheep. They looked how I'd felt a little earlier - upright but not yet fully awake.

After a couple more stops for photos, Tresillian and the riverside path was reached, and the Trangia was soon doing its stuff while I was sat on a bench just looking and listening, taking in the peace and quiet. There were still a few early dog walkers about though, and I had a struggle to keep one Black Labrador from burning its hooter on the kettle/stove, or just knocking it all over. Dogs must like the smell of meths burning, as wandering pooches always make straight for the stove when I'm brewing up. Not being a fan of the smell of burning dog snot however, I always have to try and keep them away.

 On the riverside track at Tresillian.

Nothing fancy for my morning coffee this time, just routine old Nescafe.

 What looks like a reflection of the spoon is actually a flame. The silver pot the kettle stands on is, according to Trangia, a windshield, but it is useless on windy days so I use a second wrap around screen when required. On this morning however, the air was completely still so I didn't bother.

Fully caffeinated the plan now was to head back into Tresillian and then use a couple of Bridleways and a footpath (ssshhhh) to get back home, rather than slogging back up the lanes. I'd only discovered this alternative route back in December, so it would be interesting to see how rideable it is in summer.

 Heading back along the track towards Tresillian.

The riverside path between Tresillian and St Clement.

Landowners are supposed to keep public rights of way clear and navigable for those allowed to use them, but clearly some work needs doing along one particular stretch where I had to almost crawl beneath low hanging branches, and then barge my way through elbow high weeds and nettles. There is a case for 'use it or lose it' though with some of these rights of way, and a farmer can close them off if they can prove nobody uses them, so I'm going to get my wheels up and down this route a lot more in the future just in case the landowner wants to remove access. 

Whurrrppp...Whoaaaa....Fwwwapppp... Steady on boy...

The Bridleway starts off as a narrow path across the rear of a load of back gardens, and is rather overgrown in places.

  More friendly than the sheep, this lot wandered over as I was passing to say hello. Not very cute though are they...

 Ah but these two are!

Now I know why I wear long trousers all the time... The Bridleway about to get a bit stingy...

The route passes through a farmyard and starts to climb up a track, then along the edge of a field to a hill top.

Chooching along on top of the hill, and it's all rather pleasant. Elsewhere, rush hour would just be starting... I have many blessings to count I must say.

Somewhere underneath all this lot is the main railway line that passes through a tunnel beneath the hill.

The Bridleway leads up onto a modest hill top, but even at this lowly altitude, the scenery looks remarkably different. It really is a different world when you get high up as you lose sight and sound of so many signs of human life, and in this case, looking around I could only see fields, woods, other hill tops and the occasional distant farm building. No roads, retail parks, solar farms or office blocks to blight the landscape. By crikey it was getting hot though, even though it was still only about 7.30 am, and riding up to the top of the hill saw me sweating like a glass blower's backside. The sun was also very strong too, and despite plastering some sun cream on before I left, I could feel my neck burning good and proper. Thankfully, what goes up must come down, and after a brief bit of flat, I was soon flying down the edge of the field in the tracks made by a tractor, which given the firmness of the ground, made for a bone jarring, double vision, ride, even with Fatso's gert balloon like tyres. Boy was it a great feeling though! Despite the hammer drill ride, the bike never felt like it was going to get out of shape and I was grinning like a loon at laughtime as I made the most of gravity to enjoy some cheap speed and a welcome rush of cooling air.

 Starting down the other side of the hill.

If you want to get a hat, get a head. Or was it the other way round?

My dear old Dad always said I was a scruffy Herbert, but even my carefully crafted shabbiness reaches new heights in hot weather when I delve into the far reaches of my millinery cupboard and fetch out the sun hat. 

Soon though, the Bridleway leaves the fields, travels along a couple of farm tracks and through a farm yard before changing to a footpath down through some woods, along the edge of more fields and back to Tregassow Lane. This latter section made for some great bush busting riding as it is currently very overgrown, and I had to batter my way along in my own personal cloud of pollen, seeds, petals and whatever else I disturbed. Luckily, I know exactly where this path goes, and where the rough bits are, otherwise a stranger might not be able to tell exactly where the path actually is. I was also a trifle wet too, as the morning dew had yet to be burned off and I must've looked a right picture as I emerged onto the lane wearing various bits of foliage, and thousands of tiny seeds and petals clinging to my wet trousers and assorted parts of the bike.

 Wuh... whoa... I'm not crashing... honest... whurrppp... 

 More power!!! 

Barging through the thick foliage is great fun, though I do have to be careful with my back. But the main thing is to power on through and I was flogging the pedals like a Totter flogs a rented mule, but Fatso and I made it out of the Jungle safely.

Ah now this bit is easier going, you can actually see where the track goes for a start. Thankfully, I know this route well anyway, and where to aim for.

 Now why did I take this photo? Oh yes, to show how wet the bike got thrashing through the still dewy greenery, and to show off the only (visible) injury incurred - a leaky forefinger knuckle. Once in the shower at home I found quite a few scratches to my legs, but hey... I'm a rufty tufty mountain biker and can take it like a man... Yow! Woorrrrr shiii...That water's hot...

Both bike and body were covered in this residue. The bike still is...

A quick dust down and removal of a particularly large chunk of weed from the bar end/handlebar interface and then it was round my usual loop to home, back in the door at just after nine.

It is an ambition to one day, or rather night, to do a sunset to sunrise, coast to coast ride, which should be quite easy to achieve down here. Watch the sun go down on the North coast (yup, I'd need to look left...) then ride through the night to the East coast and watch the sun come up there. That would be something a bit special I think, but also a bit beyond my capabilities at the moment. I need various health related things to improve a bit before I could attempt that. In the meantime though, I can do more early morning rides, as it is a quite magical time to be out in the countryside on a bike (especially when the day gets as hot as we'd been having!).

The full details and proper sized map can be found Here

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