This week's rides

Ian's match report from hot and sunny Deeside this morning:

"Only 4 Freewheelers today – Dick / Les / Ken / Ian Sh.

We chose to defer Les’s excursion to the Mountains of Glenlivet until another day.

At 8.30am it was already clear that we were in for a hot ride – in more ways than one.

The starting temperature soon had us removing some layers as we pedalled uphill to Home Farm and onward to Torphins via the nice side road.

Platform 22 was bypassed ( too soon ) and we headed North stopping to knock on Sid’s door for a chat , before heading out of Torphins and cycling a new for us , slightly uphill  back road  to Torphins Golf Club – where we met Peter preparing for a golf match. A very “ social “ run today.

Our target destination for coffee & scones was Dee’s Teas in Kinkar.

At this point Dick had warned us that we could go the really tough hill we have experienced before OR we could go via the Annesley Care Home road which was “ not so bad “ .

Well !!! 

After much huffing & puffing to get up Dick’s “ not so bad “ hill, we enjoyed a fast ride down the other side into the west end of Kinkar – where we enjoyed our coffee & scones – siting outside on the boulevard . Lovely in the sunshine .

After the usual intelligent conversation ( and banter ) we moved on to yet another hill – the killer up to Shooting Greens. Phew !

Now that the tough parts were over we cycled back via the side of Scolty  to Banchory , taking in the Blackhall riverbank path to the big gates where Ken ( who had sped off the usual way back ) re-joined us!

A great run in superb – if a bit hot – weather !

I estimate it was circa 26 miles – with many thousands of feet of climbing !!!

But no doubt the high tech Strava results will be more accurate .

Worthy of note were the amount of traffic incidents that Les was involved in throughout the ride – both with third party vehicles  and his fellow riders. A few red cards were issued to him, and he undertook to go home to check the Highway Code and look for his school cycling proficiency test certificate !!

A further £20 was raised by The Freewheelers  for BSV and we now have £330 to date. Target is £500 plus for end August ."

Dick's Strava stats show a distance of 42 kms with climbing of nearly 1,800 feet - https://www.strava.com/activities/337476712 - and here's the team photo (edited a little):

Elsewhere, Robin reported on adventures a little further south:

"Just been cycling in the quiet back lanes of Sussex today in temperatures of 30 degrees and no water holder on bike!"

You guys should worry - here in Southern Oregon, it's been 40 C + for over a week now. Thankfully, we're heading to cooler, coastal climes down in southern California tomorrow - via the high desert of Nevada. We had one morning of unexpected brief cloud cover on Sunday - I realised it too late to get out early morning and take advantage of the cooler temperatures, so I thought I might for once try cycling late afternoon/early evening. Mistake - by then the clouds had gone and the temperature was back up again. Note to self - don't ever consider cycling between 5 pm and 7 pm again. I managed 32 kms, part of which took me through a partly disused industrial site:

I managed another 31 kms on Tuesday morning, but that's it for me until we get back to Oregon in 10 days' time.