Blogging at 21: 50 on Sunday 26th July from N 55.13145°, W 02.76544° / http://maps.google.com/maps?q=loc:55.13145%2C-02.76544
Well, it's been an eventful day.
First up was a pleasant drive right up to the Scottish border to a convenient spot to tackle the Kielder section of National Cycle Route 10 that cuts through extensive English and Scottish forests up to Kielder Water. This has been an idea that germinated when I did the Kielder Duathlon in October last year. I saw an NCN Route 10 sign pointing south down a forest track; that was enough...
First up, though, was my attempt for the virtual 5K League that we're competing in. Fair to say I was a bit jealous that Emma had cracked her attempt off last night. Of course, it was hard, but there are far worse things to do than run along a beautiful burn forming the England / Scotland border before many people have got out of bed.
Come early afternoon we saddled up to have a crack at the ride. It began well enough with outstanding scenery and no other soul to be seen but at about the four mile mark Emma had a bizarre and unfortunate stick-flicking incident that saw the stick she'd flicked bash into her rear mech, which then hit the spokes and was ripped clean off the bike.
It took a good twenty minutes or so of being ravaged by midges before an impromptu conversion to a single freewheel (pic) at least saw her able to recover the bike to the truck.
Once there I could properly look at it and there's just no chance of repair on the road. We're both a bit despondent; biking was going to be a bit of a thing this break.
On the upside, the scenery around here is really pleasant and the area is very, very sparsely populated. Best sightings have been twite and a beetle (as yet unidentified) as big as Emma's thumb, gruesomely feeding on what looked like a squashed slug.
At the coordinates shown now, a so-far exceptionally quiet spot where we're hoping to kip.
Sent from my Armour X5