Three Ride Catch Up.

Where the hell has our summer gone?

Right, it's about time I got caught up with this here blog, although to be fair, not a lot has been happening to report, just the usual bimbling about around my local 'hood last week.

Right now I am once again grounded thanks to my back, after a very pleasant few hours in the big city on Thursday (well... Truro but it's big for round here...) spent meeting a lady friend for lunch and a bit of a natter. It's all the walking about and catching buses and so on that does the damage, but riding in isn't always practical what with me being a scruffy Herbert when in my best riding togs. I'd need to get a decent lock too, but on balance I think for when meeting someone for pleasure, the bike is perhaps best left at home. 

But anyway, I've been nursing a beggared back since then, but thankfully it's starting to get better again and so I should be out on a bike again very soon. 

On the upside though, I did get all the bikes cleaned before my little trip into town - the Jamis hadn't been done since before Easter I think, so all is well there. Not sure I want to ride them again now... I'll only undo all that hard work again. Hmmmm...

Anyway, back to last week. Well to answer my own question above, our summer obviously went North - they had it up on Shetland and they weren't letting it go. In July, Shetland had 192.9 hours of sunshine, compared to Cornwall's paltry 153.5 hours. August so far, has seen the duffness continue with rain and wind interspersed with wind and rain and it just isn't right. It seems those long hot summery days of my youth are long gone now, replaced by a couple of scorchers in June and then weeks of rain or at best, showery/sunny intervals. 

The downside to these wet summer days is the towns down here in Cornwall are absolute murder to navigate, either by road or on foot, as all the holiday makers flock into the towns  to wander about, bored witless and generally clogging everything up. You couldn't throw a pasty down Lemon Street without it hitting someone on the head, that's how busy it is at the moment. Behind the tills is the only place you hear a local accent too, as we're invaded by all sorts of exotic sounding voices like Scouse and Brummie, and of course, Dutch. The Dutch get everywhere. I often wonder, if all the Dutch dotted around the world at any given time were all told to go home would the country sink? I reckon it would, hence why there are always Dutch folk wherever in the word you go. They must have some sort of agreement or timeshare thing going on to ensure so many of the population are out of the country at any given time. 

Ah well, it'll soon be September and the holiday makers will all flock off home again and normality will be restored. Blimey, never mind the weather, where has the year gone?

Anyway, back to Bimbles. As I said, not a lot has been going on, so I'll just lob some photos in and witter away in the captions I think.

Thursday the 27th of July saw a quick chooch around my usual Tregassow  Loop. Not many photos taken on this occasion, but I need one from every ride I do for a Flickr group I'm in, so have to come back with something. This time it was the Marin plonked in a gateway to show off the high banks of this narrow section of Tregassow Lane. After rain, you can trace the exact path of a stream of water criss-crossing the road as it ran down the hill here in the dirt that accumulates in the middle of the road. Back and forth across the road it goes, and I must admit to having followed it in the past, swooping left and right and keeping the tyres out of all the muck in the process. I'll grow up one day I'm sure!

 Sunday last I headed out for a short ride, but didn't get far before stopping for a photo or two down by Trevella Stream, this time being a bit cheeky and nipping into a field for a bit of 'crop plus bike' type photoery again.

Setting off again, I barely got half a mile further before there was a belter of a shower, so I took shelter in the tree tunnel leading up to Five Turnings for the few minutes the rain lasted.

Oh strewth, damned fuzzy photos again. Right click and open in a new tab if anyone wants to see the photos rendered better.

 It turned out I was right on the edge of the shower cloud that had dumped on me, as only a few yards up the road all was dry. I quite like days like this though for riding and taking photos. The air is fresh, the showers often bring out all sorts of scents and pongs, and the light can be weird too. The contrast slider gets turned up a bit on days like this too, making for better photos as far as I'm concerned anyway.

On the road to Boswiddle, Ladock Woods are on the hill top in the background there.

I found a long forgotten head harness for the Go Pro - part of a vast bag of cunning mounts I'd bought when I first got the camera, but an item I hadn't yet used at all. So putting dignity to one side (I must look a right pillock with the GoPro mounted on my head) I thought I'd give it a go so I can get two handed overhead riding shots instead of the more usual one handed and rather wobbly ones I've done so far.

The Marin really is turning out to be a great bike to ride. I love the wide bars, the simplicity of the one by gearing and the way it steers and absorbs road irregularities. It is a great bike for these back road bimbles where the view and the general surroundings are as important as the ride, rather than it being all about speed, cadence or thrashing down some single track in a flurry of flying mud. 

As ever though, fat tyres will lob mud and spray around most enthusiastically, and even with mudguards on the fork and downtube, my trollies still get blathered as can be seen in the photo. Not having any form of rear guard on this bike, I've also rediscovered the charm of the muddy streak of shame up my backside and the yucky feeling, cold, wet, bum. Yeeewwww... I must fish out the over trousers when riding this bike.

 Grrrrr... More flipping fuzziness.

 I'd like to know what the maximum height the water at Boswiddle Ford has historically reached, but there are no markers on that measure - those stripes being straps holding it to a backing post. 

Muddy water in the rivers and streams of course is always a sign of recent heavy rain, and we've certainly had plenty of that lately. 

So that was last Sunday's ride, just out to Boswiddle Ford and back. A very enjoyable ride as it happens, just ambling about and taking my time.

Monday and Tuesday had been very wet and windy, and Wednesday wasn't much better, but with the wind having eased and the rain making its presence felt in the form of showers instead of constant drenching, I donned waterproofs and nipped out on the Voodoo for a spin.

Fans of the 1990s TV cop series Wycliffe might recognise this scene, as it appeared in at least one episode as being outside the Superintendent's local church, and it is indeed outside my local church, which is behind me when I took this.

Every week the locals, and the Cornish ex pats living up country, would sit glued to their screens watching for recognisable locations and faces in the background, and notes would be compared over the following days, along with the gripes about the awful attempts at Cornish accents from some of the cast.

The same thing goes on with Poldark of course, but the locations are harder to spot there as they use more coastal and moorland scenes what with it being an historical piece n'all. They did film in Camborne I'm told, and it cost them a bomb to bring the place up to the 18th Century for filming purposes...

Yep, I'm liking that head harness alright. See what I mean about our summer going awol? It's August and Tregassow Lane is wetter than a Dolphin's dinner. More like winter down there t'was, as far as puddles and floods go anyway.

 Rainy the lanes might've been, but there's still no better place to be sometimes, not as far as I'm concerned anyway.

Puddles on the left in this photo are harmless enough. Those on the right however, when coming towards the camera here, are hiding a couple of gert big potholes and a very broken edge to the road. Not so bad on a mountain bike but not too clever on anything else, and reason enough to be wary of puddles on unfamiliar roads.

The lane past Trehane Wood, not looking at all summery. But, when you're all togged up properly, riding in the rain can still be a pleasurable experience when away from busy roads and traffic. It's not the rain that bothers me so much, but the wind that often accompanies it down here, lashing it into your face and driving it down your neck and so on, it's not so nice then, but when the wind is light and the rain is falling in a more gentle fashion, there is no reason not to go out for a ride.

So those were the rides, nothing special there then. Meanwhile I've been having more visits from 'Flash' my Badger chum.

Please excuse all the crap in the background here, this area is a bit of a dumping ground for some of my stuff at the moment.

He visits most nights now, but at varying times so I don't always get to see him. No need to stake the place out though, there's no mistaking when he's about due to all the noise he makes, snuffling, gruffling, and barging about. I thought he was being incredibly bold coming so close to the house but it turns out Badgers are not at all shy, and are very determined. It wouldn't surprise me one bit if he opened the back door one night and let himself in the kitchen to go through my cupboards. I come down some mornings and it looks like the aftermath of a ram raid out there, with stuff strewn all over the place from where he's been stanking about looking for food and generally being nosy. He's even been getting up on the wall behind and helping himself to the bird food I put out, the greedy git! How he gets up there I don't know, but he finds a way of climbing up my crap somehow. I saw him up there a few days ago, but my neighbour chose that moment to open his back door and let his dog out and Flash here leaped off the wall like a proper stunt Badger and was away across the garden sharpish. 

It really is marvelous to have him coming in and being able to watch him though, makes my day, or should that be night, every time. Costing me a fortune though feeding him and the birds... and once you start you can't stop can you...

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