Multi-national Freewheeling

Bringing matters up to date since the last blog post, here's the recent stats in date/time order:

1. Tuesday - Les - Algarve - 35 kms - 206 m - https://www.strava.com/activities/473688374
2. Thursday - me - Adelaide - 25 kms - 54 m - https://www.strava.com/activities/474809217
3. Thursday - 8 - Finzean - 34 kms - 393 m - https://www.strava.com/activities/475162182
4. Friday - me - Adelaide - 30 kms - 218 m - https://www.strava.com/activities/475515047

No match reports or photos from Les, but, on Wednesday, I took a trip up to the Adelaide Hills and watched a bit of Day 2 of the Tour Down Under. They passed by the restaurant in beautiful little Stirling that we were having lunch at a total of five times - here's a couple of shots of the peloton:

On Sunday the final day is round the city centre. The crowds everywhere are amazing - a huge mass of them are amateur cyclists and they come from all over and cycle to each day's location. They even got to do one of the legs the pros do on Thursday - there were hundreds, possibly thousands, taking part. There's a couple of short videos from Stirling here - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EMyGvT_oieQ and https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GdtsldsP_tY

Anyway, to matters more mundane. My first early morning ride yesterday (Thursday) was up to the ferry terminal and round Port Adelaide, where I chanced upon:

The original City of Adelaide clipper that was languishing in Glasgow until a couple of years ago, is undergoing a major restoration:

I had a ten and a half hour start on the Deeside Freewheelers, so I was already several beers and wines in to the evening by the time you guys set off. Continuing the recent trend of getting the rookie to do the match report - this time it was debutant Iain Wright who supplied the following narrative:

"As the new member, I got to write it. Two photos attached. Consensus was that if you photo-shop me into the larger group pic, you will get a full-house…….



Eight intrepid cyclists braved a temperature of +1C and headed to Finzean Farm Cafe, via the high-altitude, off-piste route around Scolty to Shooting Greens. Coffee and scones were delicious, except that Rob broke ranks and had an enormous pink meringue, which clearly fuelled his breakaway from the peloton on the return (low-level, scenic) journey via Strahan and Bridge of Cammy."

and here's the evidence of Rebel Rob:

 Minus our match reporter, here's the rest of the team:

l-r: John Perry, Rob Pollard, Scott Hunter, Dick Taylor, Ken Page, Ian Sharp & Jeff Dickens 

 and here's Ian (Sharp) welcoming debutant Iain (Wright):

and John P with the usual route map:

Sad to say, it's been reported to me that there was another transgression of the Freewheelers' constitution on Thursday. Mike Reilly was spotted out cycling with his wife on an official Freewheelers' day - a definite yellow card at the very least.

To finish, a couple of photos from my Friday morning run:

On the cycle track beside the River Torrens

On the esplanade at Henley beach