Thursday breakfast at Beeches and Sunday lunch at Astbury

We completed a couple of easy rides this week, getting some miles in before the next bout of wintry weather arrives.

Last Thursday seven of us headed from Wilmslow to Beeches golf at Ollerton. Our route took us along a not too muddy track to Burleyhurst Lane, where we cautiously overtook a couple of horse riders, then past the Frozen Mop, and a circuitous route to Marthall cross roads. Next we headed to Stocks Lane, then right along the track next to the polo field, past Lower Moss wildlife hospital and towards Ollerton. A tractor with a trailer of manure joined us in Ollerton and followed us along Hall Lane towards the main Chelford road. Just before the junction was some very deep water, with no route around it, so we had to go through it. Most of the group waited for the tractor to go through first, so that they could see how deep it was, but then had to contend with the resulting tidal wave. The water went over the top of my winter boots, and I think that we nearly all had wet feet by the time we got into the cafe!

We initially sat outside at the cafe with our drinks, but headed indoors for food as it started raining. The rain stopped as we headed off again, Phil made a good suggestion to tweak the route to go along School Road to Ollerton and avoid the Hall Lane flood. We had a photo stop at the end of Mill Lane in Great Warford, then Sue, Tim, Phil and Richard headed back to Macclesfield via Artist’s Lane (due to flooding on the usual route via Oak Lane), whilst the rest of us headed back to Wilmslow.

Today’s ride was wetter than forecast, there were 16 of us out, so we split into two groups at Siddington. John took 12 on what should have been the longer hillier route, whilst Jim kindly agreed to navigate Kirsten, John T and myself, as my Garmin was refusing to stay on. We knew that meant that we would be in for an adventure!

John’s group set off first, and we kept them in sight for the first sevenish miles. We then missed a turn near Congleton, and Jim’s Garmin went on strike, so we had to make it up for a little while. Eventually Kirsten managed to get the route loaded on her Wahoo, and navigate us back onto the correct route. By that time we had ridden up to Timbersbrook, and ended up doing an extra 7 miles, and more climbing than planned.

Every cloud has a silver lining, and by the time we got to the cafe there was plenty of space available, and John’s group had all been served (some of John’s group were sitting outside, as the cafe had been too full to fit them all in). Most of John’s group set off back into drizzle, but it was easing off by the time we set off as a group of 6 (joined by David and Simon Ga), competently navigated by Kirsten. We even had a brief spell of sunshine, and made it back before the mid afternoon downpour.

Next Sunday’s ride will start from Wilmslow, and my Garmin has been fixed!

Katherine

News