Took my karate monkey 29er last night. Appreciate it isn’t retro, but it is fully rigid and rides like a retro bike in my head (except it has brakes which work better than cantis) so bear with me.
Anyway, weekend here in Devon was blustery to say the least, and we have had a great deal of rain in the past few weeks and past few days, so much so that a planned night race at Haldon forest on Saturday night was cancelled, and indeed the park itself was closed all day Sunday and some of Monday due to the danger of falling/fallen trees.
So without my planned ride sat night, I instead went out last night and took the aforementioned 29er. I live in a valley, so first up is a horrid climb. Singlespeed sure makes you work hard but you do seem to go up hills quickly as you can’t stop.
I went out and did 20 miles on this a week ago, and spent ages cleaning it. That proved to be pointless! But here it is just off the first road section:
First port of call was a bridleway I have only just seen the signpost for which is quite local…
…turned out to be great for a hundred metres and then found the gateway to a field. The field was in fact a bog:
Still, I tried to get across it, went 500metres or so and it really wasn’t getting any better. I had an idea where it ended up thereafter, and I could hear what sounded like a pack of dogs (from the nearby farm) going absolutely mental. No doubt they were spooked by my lights across the field, so I went back on myself and went to the second bridleway I was looking for.
This was absolutely brilliant. I’m a real fan of checking out bridelways, something I hadn’t really done over the years much, and the joy of finding a decent one is such a buzz. Slowly getting a good loop in together. Anyway, this was a dry mile or so, halted by this tree:
Bit further on and I had a comedy dismount when leaning a bit low for a solo night ride and my tyres washing out. You know how it is in autumn, so many leaves on the ground its hard to see what is underneath, and when that is slippy mud you can slide all too easily.
Fitted a smorgasboard to the front, decent grip but rear still has a tyre with no tread! Decent tyres are a must for winter.
