Ride of the Century

As I was driving up to Heighington on the mild and dry morning of January 23rd, I was looking forward to a good turnout for my “Easy Ride”, ah well can’t be right every time. As I arrived at the Village Green Gary was there already having cycled from home. A few minutes later there was the familiar site of Pete’s Transit trundling towards us. As I had received phone calls from two prospective new members, we waited an extra fifteen minutes. There was no sign of any body else with mountain bikes, apart from a guy calling at the village shop for his Sunday paper, so the three of us set off on our merry way.

Leaving the village we cycled along roads and cycleways to the outskirts of Newton Aycliffe where we went off-road along a bridleway that took us to Middridge. Whilst travelling along this bridleway we were treated to lovely views of open fields and George Reynolds’s Chipboard Factory. From Middridge we used roads and tracks to reach Houghton-le-Side where we had a short refuelling stop. Next we took the bridleway past Walworth Moor Farm to The Dog Inn, no we didn’t stop here we had a much better venue for our lunch stop planned. From here we fought battle with the traffic on the A68 down to the Shildon turn-off where we headed east off road past Greystones.

If you were driving up the A1M and as you approached the Aycliffe turn-off, happened to glance over the fence to see three daft beggars up to their axles in mud, don’t worry it was only us. Our toils were rewarded though as this bridleway took us straight to the McDonald’s Restaurant. Luckily we had a committee member with us and Gary was sure there was nothing in the club rules prohibiting the use of a McDonald’s during a club event, so in we went. Mind you I’m not sure we will be using them again, I couldn’t help notice as we were leaving the state of the restaurant floor, there was mud everywhere particularly around our table. Perhaps we should have used the Ride-Thru, sorry Drive-Thru.

We thought we had better get back quick before the after effects of eating a Big Mac set in, so it was back on to the bridleway past Hill House Farm to the Heighington road, then with the use of cycle ways we were soon back at the cars.

Thanks to Gary and Pete for turning up, I’m glad somebody likes my rides! In fact everyone was in agreement that this was the best mountain bike ride we’ve had this century, so far.

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	Swaledale Outdoor Club

Ride of the Century

Dave Neesam