What a shock ! not only to see Mike Gilbert on an aluminium bicycle that was A not steel and B not 35plus years old! But more importantly we seemed to subject to a form of wetness originating in the sky , we later discovered this phenomenon was called rain that we have not seen in Gogledd Cymru for over eight weeks.
Thus a damp start heralded the brave riders
venturing into the hills for our Welsh leg of the CER rota. Trevor fresh from
his coast to coast was joined by Keith who had been training in gale force
winds with Mike G on Anglesey last week and myself back from Dave M’s 80 mile
Bob Clift charity ride.
We were greeted by the waitress at 09:45 to be advised the coffee machine was “cleaning itself” but normal service would resume when they opened at 10am. Unfortunately they must have the cleanest machine in the dwyrain as it was still enjoying its spa at 10:15. Joyfully at 10:20 our coffee’s arrived.
The mod+ group consisted of young Chris Alan
Kevin and yours truly. Steve T was leading the mod group with a ride to
Overton. Caerwys is always a hilly route and I had attempted to flatten this
out by routing through Mold and Gwernaffield. whilst this section of the route
was pleasant and undulating the laws of physics and topography prevailed as we
rose out of Rhydymwyn heading for Lixwm. Another series of tough climbs and
descents to Ysceifiog saw young Chris a hundred yards up the road riding in his
big ring whilst we twiddled away in granny gears commensurate with three ( with
Kevin just two weeks ago) grandad’s.
The corner cafe at Caerwys were excellent as usual providing a brunch and “panad o de” for under £9. On leaving the cafe a stinging vote of no confidence in the tour guide led to Alan taking over the reins of the return journey. He was voted in with a manifesto to remove as many hills from the route as possible and in fairness succeeded. A high level route taking in Babell Pentre Halkyn and Rhosesmor soon had us dropping down to Northop. This is the preferred route for our outbound route normally.
In Northop our trusted guide Alan departed for Flint and the baton was returned to the shaky grip of yours truly. Cognisant of the fact there were no more hills twixt Northop and Hawarden I happily led the team home, only stopping briefly to check if Chris wished to use the A55 for one section to Dobshill, as it was more in keeping with his speed and abilities LOL.
A pleasant ride with all the mods+ riding to the start venue ,so an estimate of the core route would be 39 miles with 2800 feet of climbing, not the flatter route planned.
Steve Hu
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