The Hills.....The Hills.......Pootles around Pembrokeshire - August 2013

Welsh rides - Cycling (some of) the Pembrokeshire Coast

One advantage of not taking a holiday abroad is that you can strap your bike to the back of the family car and take it with you. My lot are quite 'relaxed' about getting up n the morning when we are on holiday, giving me a chance to get out early each morning and explore on two wheels before their day gets under way. 

I spent five days cycling out from our base in Tenby to different parts of the stunning Pembrokeshire coast. 

One important lesson was learnt on Ride 1: hugging the coast on local roads requires a lot of sharp ascents and descents and can prove to be very hard work but worth the views. 

I took the Tourer and was on occasions glad of the granny ring despite the weight of the bike. I wasn't sure what I would find but in the event most surfaces were of excellent quality for road cycling. 

Many miles this week were done on NCN Route 4, the other end of which I use on commute rides near the Thames.   

Coastal Road to Freshwater West 

....and a skyscape to savour. 

Strange dunes ahead - leaving Freshwater beach

All important Ginger Cake for those steep ascents 

On NCN Route 4 Tenby - Pembroke 

Tall Tower - Church at Lamphey

Pembroke Castle

.....had a touch of this at the end of the week!

Beautifully kept church at St. Florence

View of the Texaco Oil Refinery at Pembroke 

Coast View 

Manorbier

Early Morning - Tenby 

Wide Cycle lane - Over the Cledau Bridge 

Cake Stop - Neyland 

Brunel Cycle trail 

The Brunel Trail follows the path of an old railway from Neyland to Haverfordwest 

Car Free! 

Sustenance

Muddy end for a bike - Pembroke 

Pembroke Castle 

Sunny morn - Tenby 

The impressive Carew Castle

Carew Castle

Church at Carew Cheriton

Lawrenny

Lawrenny 

Carew Newton

Cycle path tunnel - Saundersfoot

Bit of coastal off-roading 

Pastel Street - Templeton 

Road though Amroth. By January 2014 this road would be a pile of collapsed rubble due to heavy storms and excessive rainfall. 

Rain sets in .......

Summer Visibility - Bakewell Soap challenge August 2013

Unloved.....

In August, I signed up for a Facebook-based cycling challenge called 'Bike Visibility', organised
by The Bakewell Soap Company. There were 316 entrants and the concept was as follows;

''A Distance Race With A Visual Twist
This is a challenge that anyone with a bike can participate in. Your rides can be taken anywhere in the UK, even if you take your bikes on holiday, you could be commuting by bike to work for the two weeks or simply going on family rides at the weekends.
However you decide to participate, the format is simple, we just want your mileage and more importantly your photo’s and videos to go with it.
We're after photos with captions and/or videos of what you see and where you are as you venture out. The most compelling photo and video stories will be showcased.
The first Bike Visibility Challenge Champ will be crowned on September 1st after the judges have whittled down stand-out journeys to just one. If we can't separate the top entries it will come down to total Endomondo mileage covered over the two weeks.''

Week 1 was a normal commuting week but still plenty of opportunities to record what goes on around me.
Week 2 was my family Holiday in Wales.........well, I'd started the challenge....so I had to take the bike too!

Happy to say I got third on the total Mileage but happier still that they liked my photos.

Here is a selection of some of the pics from my Summer Commute routes. Week 2's photos can be seen under my next posting -  looking back my Welsh Week when I was at the other end of NCN Route 4.

Comedy Capers - Teddington Studios 

Bold Fox at Boston Manor

Cheer Up.....Ride a Bike!

Kingston morning 

Essential Kit for Bargees - the bike , that is!

Life behind bars - Teddington Lock

Squeezed in.....Twickenham's narrow cycle Lane

Old Boys Rowing club - Richmond

NCN Route 4 near Ham

Isleworth traffic 

The shadows now so long do grow....

Cycle Lane for Tree-Huggers. Isleworth's finest ! 

Eel Pie Island's rich musical heritage

A Mariner's Tale from the river bank......

Not much of a life then!!

Commemorative plaque - Duck's Walk - Richmond

Space for Cycling Protest Rides - July16th & September 2nd

I was slowly getting around to posting some of the pics of two London Cycle Campaign Protest Rides I joined this summer but following the depressing news of more cycling fatalities in London over the last week, I thought this an opportune moment to catch up. 

Both these rides were held on weekday evenings after work and the first on July 16th was organised only a few days ahead but still managed to attract 1500 cyclists to Russel Square who took part in a slow, peaceful protest ride down to Lincoln's Inn Fields via High Holborn and Kinsgway. This ride was to mark a silent commemoration of a cyclist who had died after being struck by a lorry in Holborn earlier that week.

Meeting point - 6.30pm 16th July - Russell Square

Some pretty strongly worded messages here

The thing that struck me most as we set off was how much support and enthusiasm pedestrians appeared to show us, particularly tourists! Probably not the case for driver's and cabbies attempting to negotiate what became a traffic standstill around Holborn.  

1500 bike bells can make a lot of noise!

Slowly does it through onto High Holborn

The ride that happened on September had been publicised for a number of weeks in the lead up to Monday September 2nd. It was blessed with a beautiful warm and sunny evening. This time LCC had worked hard to prepare banners and signs available free to those coming along. It was a very red event with lots of people including myself wearing red cycling gear and adorning their bikes with LCC banners. This ride was to coincide with the debate on cycling infrastructure in Parliament that evening.

This time the meeting point was Jubilee Gardens on the South Bank. an orderly queue had to be organised before we set off as around 5000 cyclists converged on that area! 

Eyeful. getting ready for the ride....

...and still they come. This one could take a while getting started. 

The TV crews were out covering the event for London News and I even spotted 'Traffic Droid'  and said hello.   

It''s Traffic Droid' all kitted up! 

TV Crew 

The ride took us down York Road round and across Westminster Bridge and past Parliament at a slow crawl. 

Bike DJ

Long shadows on Westminster Bridge

Approaching Parliament

Big ones, small ones..........

Conveniently placed Dr Bike in Pimlico on the return journey


As a sort of postscript to this I thought I would include a good example, in situ, of exactly what we are fighting for.........here's a good (or should I say bad) case of 'where's my space gone'......bad design in the King's Road. Paint on the road isn't good enough!

London can be a beautiful place but why is it such a struggle keeping safe on it's roads? Time for change!

Chiswick on the river at dusk

Scenery and sadness on a November morning..........

Commute Ride - 13th November 2013

The dank weather of recent days receded during the night to allow the first hard frost of Autumn. Once the sun was up above the morning mist my cold commute ride became filled with deep reds and golden yellows set against a deep blue cloudless sky. 

Bushey Park 

I consider myself very lucky to haves some relatively traffic-free paths and roads en route to work, though I have spent a good deal of time and trial searching these out and they often take me out of the way, adding extra miles to the journey. Not all cyclists have such spaces available and the lot of those who face the daily battle in parts of central London is one that must take a deal of courage and dedication. 

Sadly it hasn't been a good week in central London for cyclists with four fatal collisions in a week. When will this end? This morning a woman was involved in a collision with a lorry at the notorious Bow roundabout. 

   

Every cyclists who commutes on a bike in and around London deserves a safer and more pleasant journey. Can all those drivers out there imagine what it might be like if we commuting cyclists got back into our cars to come to work??!!

I had considered an all road route through Brentford up to Ealing this morning after muddying up my bike a treat yesterday along the G.U Canal tow path, but the Autumn sunshine and colours 'off road' were too lovely to resist. 

This is what cycling should be about.......not the battle for space and struggle for survival that it often seems to be. 

Frosty Bushey Park

School kids crossing the park on two wheels - Safely!

Gold & Blue  - Grand Union Canal near Boston Manor Park

 

 

Farnham 50......Again - Charity Bike Ride 7th July 2013

Weekends were generally very busy during the summer, with regular club rides on Sunday mornings and other 'events' to tempt cyclists who relish a challenge.

After a rather slow Farnham 50 in 2012 (unselfishly riding at a friends pace), I was determined to give myself the challenge of doing this ride in 3 hours. Last year's ride never really warmed up for me, not helped by cool temperatures and the odd shower. This year the contrast couldn't have been greater: very warm, dry and still with the temperature at midday hitting the 29 degrees marker. Over this lovely but moderately lumpy route, it was clearly going to be a tough one in such heat.

Taking only one stop of about 3 minutes for replenishment of water and some delicious home made  flapjack, I managed (in actual riding time) 3 hours and 2 minutes. Quite pleased with that.  

Weirdly coincidental was the fact that my rider number was.......


                                       

Met, briefly, some friends who were doing the 25 mile circuit.   

Me and Steve shortly after starting in Farnham. Look at the state of those roads!

The Farnham Ride web site states that ''A total of 973 riders entered the 2013 Farnham Charity Bike Ride, 180 more (23%) than 2012. The new 16-mile route proved very popular attracting 162 riders, whilst 340 opted for the challenging 50-mile route''

Just a week after returning from my London to Paris ride, it seemed appropriate to get a similar finishing shot upon the return to Waggoner's Yard!

A great day was made complete at the post ride BBQ in the garden of a friends house. Frequent trips were made from Garden to lounge to watch Andy Murray fight his way to Wimbledon victory.