Rothbury, 22 February 2003

Oh man, did I feel like crap on that first climb? I thought I was going to die - well actually I really did feel like I wanted to slip into unconsciousness, tumble sideways into the gorse and stay there for a bit. I was glad to get to the top and resume the 'hunched against a wall' pose which I had been forced to relinquish when I was crowbarred out of Andy's kitchen to get my bike. I was feeling so bad that despite wearing five layers of clothing I was still shivering. That's really not like me.

According to Andy, this is his 'default' route for days when he can't be arsed to come up with anything more excititng. Which makes me quite jealous, because it's better than even the best routes round my way.

Pies

I was relived to discover that after about five miles via Standing Stone, we looped back into Rothbury to visit the pie shop. Judging by the limited quantity of pies and pasties on offer, I'm fairly certain they weren't expecting around forty hungry mountain bikers to descend on them.

After this we climbed up onto the Simonside Hills, and after some fire road climbing we hit a superb technical climb. A muddy route with plenty of rocks strewn over it, it was superb stuff and I don't think anyone cleaned it all in one go. A particularly odd thing was discovering that the mud fell into a Northern stereotype, in that it was "fookin' ard," despite looking like soft, wet, gloopy Southern cack. Really weird to ride on.

Me dropping off the bridge (photo by Seb)

After descending a bit on more strange frozen mud, and a bit of fire road, we picked our way down a rock-strewn technical path. In the dry it'd be no problem, but wet rocks were catching everybody out. This is just the sort of trail I really love - weight over the back, sparing with the brakes, and let the bike dance under you. Sweet.

Swoopy

Oh but then there was more. Over a bridge with a nice wheelie off, and here comes the definition of "swoopy." It's a shortish section, but one of the nicest bits of super-fast singletrack I've ridden in ages. Thanks to a small amount of grit on the path, two-wheel sliding was on offer, and there was hardly any need for brakes. Yeehaaaaa!

Up another climb, and then down a fast and wet grass descent, sliding again round the corners, and soon it was back to the car. I was pretty pleased not to have blown up halfway round, especially considering the hangover, but then I guess I'd been carbo-loading of sorts.

Top ride. Top, top ride. You'll notice I only stopped in one place to take pics, because after we'd set off on the second part of the loop, I was just having too much fun riding.

Pictures

Strangely, there are none of me launching off this rock. This was at the top of the first climb, and if you've been paying attention you'll know I wasn't going to be jumping off anything bigger than a small weasel.