The Sunday riders’ section of the South Herts Cyclists met in St Albans at 9.00 a.m. We welcomed new rider Janos to our distinctive brand of wobbling on wheels around the countryside and five minutes later off we set.
Destination Great Missenden: this is quite a stretch for a first break so the route was fairly linear. We made a beeline for Chesham via Nash Mills, Flaunden and Latimer. In Chesham it was a small job of navigating the high street and finding Fullers Hill, a nice road that steadily climbs up and meets Weedon Hill. We passed through Hyde Heath and made our coffee stop in Great Missenden in good time. A short stop, as there was only a handful of us, and we were on our way again.
Now I had a really quick way of getting to lunch, which involved popping out on the Rignall Road and taking the Askett turn off, we also ventured up Longdown Hill, which was pleasantly traffic free. After Askett it was a simple task of going past Longwick and stopping at the second bridge so that we could access the Phoenix Trail and make lovely mincemeat of the rest of the route, it really was very pleasant on the trail and everything was looking nice and fine in the sunshine. Soon we made Towersey and our lunch stop.
It was at lunch after enquiring about my route to Cholesbury that Judy let out a gasp of concern. ‘Oh my god! That’s a bastard.’ she wailed as I explained that we were going to go up The Hale.
We were soon off again, back up the trail and making our way towards Great Kimble and then onto Wendover. It was quite weird but it seemed that the whole route to Wendover and up the Hale was just one great climb, but the views we got were fantastic. Climbing up The Hale was nice and we kept to an even pace. As a note: Judy made it up the Hale first.
We were soon heading towards St Leonards and Buckland Common. It was a welcome break in Cholesbury for teas at the village hall. For our route back home we decided to miss Berko and head for Bovingdon, via Ashley Green.
It was a great ride out enjoyed by all
Neil 15/05/2016
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