Flippin' 'eck - how time flies - whether you are having fun or not it seems to me. Once again Poet's day has come around again. (Push off early tomorrow's Saturday.) Even more surprising it is practically the end of the month. I was originally thinking of taking Friday off and cycling to Norwich or Kings Lynn and maybe boost my Eddington Number. In the end stuff got in the way so I went with plan B and nipped out mid-afternoon. I wanted to make sure that I manged to hit 1000Km of cycling "miles" completed for the month of July, but I couldn't be bothered to do any route planning so it was out into the Fens.
The route is shown below and is a bit random as I decided where I wanted to go when I got there. Although I set out along Sustrans 51 out of Cambridge I took a short-cut and cycled direct from Quy to Lode. The road is not too bad, as a B-road it is quite fast but also reasonably wide and so I generally find that over-taking vehicles tend to pass with a reasonable gap. Just as the road is quite fast for cars it is also quite fast for cycling as it it fairly smooth and flat. The Bike Route Toaster (BRT) link is here. As you might expect it is a very flat route getting no higher then 18m above sea level with a total ascent/descent of 108m. The distance was a little over 64Km/40 miles so twice my daily target of 32Km/20miles so helped to make up for a few days of non-cycling early in the week.
I managed to catch up with the BBC 4 programme on the Story of the Bicycle (mentioned by TomC) which I enjoyed despite the air-miles consumed - I would have gone for a Shimano drive train and visited Japan instead of Italy and Campag though. It is around 35 years since I last had a bike with Campag gearing. My main reason for sticking with Shimano is not so much one of performance but rather I have gained some experience in fettling Shimano gears so was easier to stick with them. I also like visiting Japan. As I type this I am also watching the build up for the Hungarian Grand Prix - one of the great things about the modern Internet age. As it happens the bit at the moment is about Jenson Button cycling on his bike around Guernsey.
My ride did not start well though, within 100m of leaving my front door there was a strange clang from the rear wheel - I stopped glanced down and couldn't a loose spoke and tried to carry on. The rear tyre was absolutely flat. So I walked back home to fix it. It turned out to be a large thorn from a recently clipped hedge. The spike was 2cm long and had pierced the tyre, right through the inner tube and the rim tape. I use Schwalbe Marathon Plus tyres (700 x 25) they are good puncture resistant tyres. However I have had a few rear puncture so time to replace the tyre - according to my notes it has done around 3,000miles/4,800Km so not too bad. The inner tube had a few patches as well and quite a rip where the thorn had gone through so I replaced the tube as well. I used up the last of my spare tyres so time to order a few more over the Internet.
I have been cycling around this route a few times recently, and as the weather has been pretty constant and the season has been constant there has not been a lot of change since the last time I was around so I have not taken too many pictures. I could not resist this one of the Leek eating alien locust that descends into the fields to devour the leeks from time to time. There was a strong onion smell in the air as I went past.
When I reached the Stretham Road I took a byway that I have not cycled on before - normally I cycle a short distance along the Stretham Road towards Wicken Village - this time I crossed the road and used a byway to get to the Sustrans route into Wicken Fen. I am not sure that I will use the byway that regularly though.
When I reached Wicken Village I carried on through to Soham via the byway/bridleway/byway route. This is a great route in the dry - much trickier in the wet though. Parts of it are highly rutted and when soggy the bicycle wheels seem to attract mud until they clog completely.
This field in the picture had not been Combined that last time I was here.
The field opposite looked like they had "Combined" the headland (As in Combine harvester). According to my son they don't always use pesticides/sprays on the bits of the field near hedgerows and so when it comes to Combining they harvest the edges first. Presumably there might be more weeds and or less yield. So they don't want the whole field's yield reduced as I think they get paid by the quality of the load? Mind you it still amazes me how few weeds you see growing in the fields nowadays.
On my way back to Cambridge I detoured up the Sustrans 11 route from Burwell to the edge of Wicken Fen and back again, along a road which depending of the scale of map viewed is called Factory Road or Little Fen Drove and Dysons Drove. I stopped at CockUp Bridge and then headed back to Burwell. There was evidence of the Lodes Way being constructed somewhere between the yet to be opened Reach Lode Bridge and CockUp Bridge.
This is the view down Factory Road towards Burwell. The last time cycled along here there was water coming out of the ground by the Telegraph Pole it seems to have been fixed promptly. More promptly than other roadside leaks I have seen - I would imagine that it caused problems for the farm at the end of Factory Road.
This time whilst cycling through Burwell in the same spot a green van drove at me a Mercedes gave way and let me through - there are some courteous motorists out there. The trouble is discourteous can be dangerous.
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