well sort of!

Monday, after I posted, was a bit of a washout, a trip to the shops but my head was in lockdown so I didn't really get anything else done. The top news, for me at least, was that Welsh Wales had reopened for business - my head was planning quickly planning some potential bike rides!

Tuesday morning arrived and as I ate breakfast I was still not sure where I was headed for todays ride, Wales? or somewhere else? I was no clearer when I set off - except it wasn't gonna be Wales as I was heading the other direction. Bath and...well it wasn't until I got to Warminster that the inkling of plan was formulated, I'd head across Salisbury Plain and visit Woodhenge for my lunch stop.

It might be a plain but its not flat, up, down, up, down - at least its mostly rolling, past Stonehenge and onto my destination. Durrington Walls / Woodhenge - well there isn't much to see but it was a pleasant enough spot for lunch after 80km riding to get here. But what now? Home of course, I followed the Wiltshire Avon (as opposed to the Stratford or Cotswold varieties) north to the Vale of Pewsey before turning west and into the stiff wind. I was keeping things nice and steady, designing my route almost junction by junction, gradually working my way towards Brizzle.

A quick stop just before Lacock, the National Trust village, five riding hours and two more to go! I managed to avoid riding too far directly into the wind and hit the 160km point at the Cotswold edge - another long one! By the time I was done it was showing 181km, 113 miles with 1500m of climbing, I certainly hadn't set out with such a monster ride in mind! The downside came much later, several bouts of excrutiating cramps disturbing my slumber despite my precautions.

So that's 3 rides in July, the shortest 103 miles, the longest ten miles further, what the heck am I doing? Answers on a postcard to what the heck am I doing, PO Box 57, Bristol. My excuse is an online challenge to ride 1600km during July, a bit of a step up from my usual 1400 or so, the back of that is now broken so the rest of the month I can revert to metric centuries - at least in theory!

And so here we are, the calm before the storm. I've posted a couple of Gaby chapters, Good Thinking from book 2 and Festival from book 21. The latter of these is slightly out of sequence, don't worry 33 will be posted but my addled head couldn't make up its mind the right sequence, it makes no difference to the flow but this way round works a bit better here on BC.

So that's about it, more at the weekend,
Tschussie

Madeline Anafrid