As I am unlikely to be able to cycle to work during bike
week I decided to do my rare summer bike commute this week.
Other considerations meant that I cycled in on Monday morning---
when I had my unclipping incident---and I cycled back home
yesterday evening. It's around 25 hilly miles with the trend
being upwards on the way home (80m altitude in Durham, 425m
at home.) Mostly road but with a few miles of old railway
track cycleway.
I decided to come home by avoiding the open moors and took
in a wooded valley. The first warning sign was the 15%
gradient (down.) The next was a bright yellow sign
addressing cyclists! It warned me of very steep descents and
sharp bends. Two wussy bends later I wondered what all the
fuss was about when another gradient sign announced a 20%
slope. Two hairpin bends then appeared, those sort where the
inside of the bend is sort of vertical. As I finally heard
running water and assumed I was near the bottom I started to
wory about the road *out* of the valley. I was almost
disappointed to find the valley side on the climb was
shallower and lower.
I then went through the wonderfully named Muggleswick,
village on one side of the road, open moorland on the other.
I suddenly found myself surrounded by flies. Two inch long
things, though and inch of that was a tail, with yellow and
black striped abdomens. There were thousands of them and
they were all following the road. They were slow buggers and
I spent the next few miles swerving and ducking to avoid rear-
ending them. I kept my gob firmly shut. The local swallows
and martins were having a field day. I passed a mesmerised
cat, it couldn't decide which one to go for. After a few
miles I finally emerged from the cloud. Whe I later checked,
at home, it turned out they way mayflies, destined for their
mere 24 hours of adulthood---those that avoided the swallows
at any rate.
Finally, after almost three hours of cycling I arrived home.
Then, just as I approached my gate I noticed my left foot
wouldn't unclip. Bugger! As I got nearer the gate and
realised my left foot wasn't going to come out of the pedal
I noticed the oncoming landrover of a neighbouring farmer.
The verge is soft but there was no way I was going to topple
over in front of Ian, so a last minute unclip of the right
foot and a slightly less than elegant dismount meant I could
wave to him *and* remain upright. Luckily he didn't stop to
talk as I was still joined to the bike and would have had to
conduct the conversation in a very odd manner indeed. When I
finally wrenched my foot out it transpired that one of the
bolts had come out and the spd plate had turned. I think
it's time for new platet and new bolts!
I got the bus in this morning :-(
Colin