Gospel Pass Audax: The Hares and the Tortoises Saturday 4th March 2017

Summit Gospel Pass 2017

So here I go again. Setting the alarm for 5.30am on a Saturday. Why?! One of my girls asked me "why do you do it mum?" The good thing about a lovely cycling friend offering me a lift to Chepstow, and wanting to ride with me at my slow pace, means I cannot let Lynette down. I cannot lose face either after publicly announcing I am having another go at Gospel even though I now know what is coming! Here come the BRCC Gospel Girls Tortoises (Backwell Road Cycling Club)

Lynette picks me up at 6.15am, bikes are already loaded as I took mine round to hers on Thursday night. The dreaded porridge has been consumed (with chia seeds and blueberries) and the sun is coming up as we drive over the old Severn Bridge to Chepstow, with winking red bike lights on the cycle lane as the tough hardy souls riding to the start roll across.

No crises as bikes are unloaded, control cards collected, but all day parking tickets purchased and displayed and fellow BRCC members Simon, Stu and Kate and James are spotted and chatted with. Unfortunately we are one intrepid member down who is very definitely ill and has turned home, get well soon Russ.

A mass start of around 130 I think. The weather is looking good this morning, with forecast showers and increasing south westerly winds this afternoon. No snow.

7.30am departure from Chepstow Castle Picture courtesy of Audax Club Bristol 

Stage 1 Chepstow to Monmouth 28km 404m includes the only info control point. All other evidence of completion will be our control cards being stamped at the 3 control points (cafés and pubs) and at the end. The two sharp ascents out of Chepstow do not allow for a nice gentle warm up. Again I am very slow and steady and Lynette is somewhere off in front. A gathering of the distinctive yellow and royal blue Weston Wheelers jerseys in a lay by indicate a puncture already, or early hedgerow breaks? Of course that was the info control point, we forgot about checking the signpost for the Offa's Dyke long distance path. Kindly Weston Wheelers divulge the answer so all is well.

We chug along, up and down and admiring the beautiful scenery through St Briavels to our first control at Henry's Café in Monmouth. An early stop at just 28km, but I didn't make the same mistake as last year and we made sure to stop for coffee, even if we were already well back in the field <audaxes are not races> Very nice latte!

1st coffee stop - Henry's Café Monmouth

First stamp into our control cards and chatted with Chrissy and Katie from Weston Wheelers who I have "seen" on Strava but never met, they are inspiring cyclists and ever so lovely and friendly too. I dubbed the Weston Wheelers chain gang the "hares" as they shot off, stopped at the info control and we all came into Monmouth at about the same time.

Life Audaxes begin after coffee

So now our audax can properly begin after coffee! The sun was appreciated, felt silly having heavy winter waterproofs stowed away at this point.

Sun shining on Lynette in Monmouth

Could you do Gospel on that?

Stage 2 Monmouth to Hay on Wye 55km 648m

Not quite as much ascent on the Monmouth to Hay-on-Wye section, but it is steady, and we get into the groove. Lynette is off again and I resist the temptation to keep up, I will not make it if I go too fast. I tend to get stronger as the day goes on, but not faster!

We can see Hay Bluff masking Gospel Pass over there:

Hay Bluff from the north

The lovely lanes dip too and from from England to Wales and back again several times.

Looking towards Hay on Wye

Gospel Pass for later!

The wind is getting up and we do enjoy a bit of a tailwind into Hay but not much compared to the headwind for most of the rest of the day.

The best Cherry and Almond Cake, allegedly. Tic 674 is for my beans!

A nice surprise in Hay. My parents are down from Cumbria for a few days, and said I was to carry on with my plans, so Steve did bring them over for a drive and they arrived at The Granary Café in Hay on Wye just before us. Steve did say he thought we should have been making better time, as I had texted to say when we arrived in Monmouth and he thought that was leaving time. Smug git!

We rolled in with the Weston Wheelers again, and also saw Kate and James who had already consumed beans at another café as Granary was heaving. Fortunately the rush was easing and we did wait and order a selection of cakes (everyone else) tea and sensibly I ordered beans for me.  Mum dad and Steve set off to mooch in the book shops and Lynette and I head off out to find it raining, but the road is indicating we have just missed a very torrential downpour. The majority of the field will be up on Gospel Pass, it does pay to be tortoise like sometimes.

Heading out from Granary café with my mum and dad wishing us well.

Section 3 Hay on Wye to Abergavenny via Gospel Pass 34km 555m




With dropping temperatures and strongish winds even in the valley, we set off through the high hedges and past fields with newborn lambs as the climbing starts in earnest. There was a fair amount of traffic and other audaxers and getting up in one go without stopping may be a tall order. It was hard going, at one point several cars halted on the steepest bend and somehow I weaved round everything and kept going, there would have been a slow domino effect of everyone having clipped in falls otherwise. The hares were slowly passing us.

Knowing that the climbing eases up after the treeline made me a bit complacent but the strong headwind hit us as we pulled up and it was a long flog, the last steep pull nearly finished me off, as my parents passed by with a cheery wave from open windows. I was very giddy by the top, and annoyingly hadn't realised that the official Strava segment finished 100m down the other side, I should have kept on going to get an accurate time. Never mind. Lynette arrives seconds later (she had to unfortunately stop for those darned cars) and the Weston Wheelers, and a large walking party gave us all rousing applause. I wondered where the Gospel Choir was, but it was lovely that it was more of a joint celebration of achievement. The highest road pass in wales, Gospel Pass DONE!

Lynette at the top of Gospel Pass

The Gospel Girls

Cereal bars munched, all our layers on for the chilly, wet and cold descent. I lead the hares and the tortoises, glad to have a free view of the road and nice that no idiots came screaming past descending at speed. The road was like a river bed, and my chain was grinding and crunching in an alarming manner on the occasional turn of the pedals. We met a tractor, several cars and a very scary incident of a quad bike with a sheep dog running free alongside coming towards us at a lick of knots. The sheep dog was unflappable and no incidents other than passing other folk with punctures.  We continued through the trees towards Abergavenny and turned the corner onto the main road, still into the wind. The Weston Chain Gang chugged past and Katie said "get in behind" I just managed to hang on for a tow into Abergavenny, or more accurately Mardy. I did not miss the pub this year like I did last year, and we pulled into the Crown and Sceptre, hares and tortoises together. I could not feel my feet at all. Lynette is very slight, a real athlete, she was feeling the cold even more. Large mugs of tea and we slowly came too a little.

Section 4 Abergavenny to Chepstow via Usk 43km 446m

I'm getting quite concerned that it is nearly 4pm and Lynette doesn't have lights. The next 25km are OK ish but then there is one heck of a long grinding climb for 10km before the final descent. I have had helmet lights on all day flashing away,and make sure my industrial commuting lights are fixed on now and used for extra safety as the light is very dull.

The pleasant 25km are dispatched efficiently enough, taking it in turns to lead out. Our Weston pals left before us so we were fairly on our own now. We turn left at Usk and eat something (me) and Lynette downs a caffeine laced gel. I could not revisit gels. I have still only ever consumed one gel in my cycling career, at this point in the audax last year!

I shield Lynette from the traffic (because I have lights, illuminating her reflective stripes on her legs) up the long steady climb. We do not have sufficient daylight time to turn off and do the extra bit on the lanes at the top and stick to the main road. The descent is exhilarating, smooth fast and crud free the road has dried out and there is very little traffic.We havd passed the tandem at the bottom and know we are not last.

We arrive in Chepstow, turn into the Three Tuns pub bang on 6pm. The latest finish time, so we are legal (ish) Reunited with the Weston Wheelers who did the little extra (and then ride back across the bridge after final control) A great day. We thanked the lovely patient organisers, got our cards stamped and left them for validation. We should get them back in the post in a few weeks. I love my collection of audax cards with fun stamps.

A quick wobbly selfie in front of the castle a the sun sets. We are very pleased with ourselves. We wrestle the bike rack back on to the car, load the bikes and we're on our way.

My right foot finally thawed out in the shower at home two hours after the finish. Left foot pink, right one white. No lasting frostbite. Chinese takeaway and red wine devoured.


The Gospel Girls had a great day out, and I was relieved we were not last, and we had no mechanicals or accidents. Thank you Lynette! March Strava Gran Fondo also completed, that's 15 months in a row now.

We made the arrivée at Three Tuns Pub next to Chepstow Castle by dusk 18.00

Tour d'Ecosse Day 8 Ullapool to Gairloch Saturday 9th July 2016

Tour d'Ecosse Day 8 Ullapool to Gairloch 92km 1345m ascent

Cumulative: 677km 7186m ascent Ferries 9 Islands 13

I like Harris Gin too, served with a slice of grapefruit.

On your 28th wedding anniversary you go up lots of hills, eat some nice fruit cake and get very wet again after a dry start and finish with gin. Today's plan:
We can't believe our trip is half over already, although that's not to say it's downhill from now on. If anything we're more likely to have headwinds to cope with.

Today is our 28th wedding anniversary. Cue more slippery slopes downhill references, and "how many life sentences is that then?" Exactly four we decide, time for a 7 year itch! Well that was after I gave Steve my card with the gorgeous picture of Seilebost beach on Harris in the sun, and he twigged it must be our anniversary as my birthday is August sometime and we got married July sometime.

Another delicious breakfast, Waterside B&B certainly kept up it's superb impression with us. we had tasty Orkney smoked cheese, compote (which seems a competitive BnB thing with secret family recipes) to start and the oh so superb Stornoway Black Pudding as part of the inevitable "full Scottish" I rarely have the full fry up, I much prefer scrambled eggs and smoked salmon, or smoked haddock or kippers with lots of mushrooms. This is the bees knees champion of black pudding. we loved it. I think I may have had smoked salmon and scrambled eggs with mushrooms and black puddin'. I know I definitely had the latter! it wasn't all mixed together either.

Loch Broom towards Ullapool

We hauled our well fed bodies out of Ullapool on the main road alongside Loch Broom after absorbing the directions to the best coffee shop en route from our lovely landlord,  At the top of the loch was a chuffing hill, what a surprise! We carried on chuffing as we took a right onto a much quieter minor road and saw lots of 'slow down' signs for a sportive going in t'opposite direction. Oh yes, it's the normal world's weekend again.

The big hill after the main road wasn't as bad as we thought and we pulled over into a viewpoint, and admired the view of course, and probably ate  NAKD bar #31 and/or a banana #27 as was the norm by now.

Viewpoint after the climb up from Loch Broom. Quieter Gairloch road now. 

A nice dry bench!

It's positively sweltering this morning, we are only wearing arm warmers and gilet as extra layers with bare legs and it's dry. We descend, and as often seems the case, we can't believe how much ascent we have done and feel very sorry for all the sportive riders going the other way. We note the signs for Dundonnell and carefully ride all the way through the village and a couple of kilometres out the other side and as instructed, there was Maggie's coffee shop a little way past the village on the edge of Little Loch Broom.

It was a perfect stop. I think we had a toasted sandwich and home made soup then the fruit cake that hit the spot just perfectly. Lovely. The nice waitress enquired as to our route. She must have been a superb cyclist, apparently only one awful hill before Gairloch. One, she said...

Poolewe

There were five awful hills to Gairloch. We knew that really as we knew the stats, well over the 100m climbing per 10km that we class as a moderately uphill day. The rain set in and we were cold and wet by the time we reached Gairloch. The scenery was great though. We had to tour up and down a bit to find our BnB not at  the pretty end of town. It was OK, yes the pics on the website were accurate but a lot was missed out. Our room overlooked a garden of discarded junk, not the sea as you would presume. The owner and her family were nice enough, it was OK. But after a tough wet day it was just disappointing, Like being in someone's spare room with stuff stuffed in the wardrobe out of the way, and economy bottles of nearly finished shampoo. Sheets stinking of nasty fabric conditioner and slightly fusty. Not recommending this one!

Gairloch

Oh well, we showered, wrang out our kit, set the heater to high and went out to eat. Of course we hadn't factored in it being a Saturday, we hadn't booked. Back on the bikes and down the hill, we ended up on a nettley muddy track trying a short cut in our dry evening clothes. Turned away at the first suggestion and managed to beg our way to a table at The Shieling. Excellent Cullen Skink and steak saved the day, but served with just chips and onion rings. Please give us veg! Oh well, I fell in love with Harris gin served with grapefruit. That was fruit I think!

That is what you call a gin collection!

It was slightly drier as we puffed our way back up to the BnB and our room that was now doing impressions of a steamy hammam.

I'm so proud of Steve, we've had a tough few days with a few more to come and we are coping admirably, enjoying ourselves and appreciating Scotland's diversity in spite of the weather. Gairloch hasn't done it for us, but then again perhaps we didn't see the town at it's best. Most of the day was pretty good.

The chilly windswept palm trees in Gairloch

Touring Tips in Scotland

1 Do not believe the coffee shop assistant, however well meaning, as to how many hills you have to come until destination!

2 Arm warmers are your besties

3 After 28 years your husband still isn't going to remember your wedding anniversary!

Tour d'Ecosse quick links:

Planning
Day 1 Isle of Arran and a little Mull of Kintyre
Day 2 Inner Hebrides: Isles of Islay and Jura
Day 3 Inner Hebrides: Isle of Jura-Tayvallich to Oban
Day 4 Oban to Outer Hebrides: Barra and Vatersay
Day 5 Outer Hebrides: Isles of Barra Eriskay South Uist Benbecula Grimsay North Uist Beneray and Harris
Day 6 Outer Hebrides: Isles of Harris and Lewis to Callanish Stones
Day 7 Outer Hebrides: Butt of Ness to Stornoway and Ullapool
Day 8 Ullapool to Gairloch
Day 9 Gairloch to Shieldaig - Applecross Peninsula
Day 10 Bealach na Bà from Applecross to Plockton
Day 11 Plockton to Inner Hebrides: Isle of Skye Armadale
Day 12 Inner Hebrides: Isle of Skye Armadale to Ardnamurchan
Day 13 Ardnamurchan to Inner Hebrides: Isle of Mull to Oban to Loch Melfort
Day 14 Loch Melfort to Tarbert, Loch Fyne
Day 15 Tarbert Loch Fyne to Ardrossan THE END!