White Peak

Rode down to Tideswell and Millers Dale in the White Peak today, lots of quiet roads making the cycling really nice. Not as hilly either, although the rollingness does seem to take it out of you.


A pleasant Derbyshire scene.

One of the busier roads, still very quiet though. It's possible to go long distances without going on a main road, which is good as the main roads like the A6 are hideous death-traps.

Forgot to charge my camera today so the below is from my phone camera. Ran up Kinder Low today, felt really crap at first so ate a whole creche of jelly babies, which made me feel much better.

View from Kinder Low End looking west over South Head, Chinley Churn and beyond.

Wonderful view from the top of South Head today. I would love to know how to stop glasses misting up in these conditions (wind + mist/light rain). Ran intervals by running fast one field then running slow the next, the idea being to knacker yourself silly, which I feel I accomplished.

Sometimes it's worth getting up early on a Sunday...



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Mountain bike ride with Alex to Strines today, I took the tourer as the pedal predicament is not resolved. Also is the last day of holidays - back to work tommorow :( Still, two day week, yay!


A bridleway and an Alex

Manchester in the distance

Nearly home, an afternoon of watching Diagnosis Murder and feverishly washing the bikes awaits.

Shaft

Got back late last night from Alex's fantastic wedding in Italy. The idea was to purge myself of all the alcohol that had mostly replaced my blood, with a nice romp across tussocks to the Coburn tunnel airshaft then over Brown Knoll. However, someone had replaced the nice dry hard ground with knee deep peat while I've been away - has it been raining?

A crevasse in the peat, probably contains thirty sheep and a handful of ramblers.

Coburn air shaft.

The shaft close up, unfortunately the gate is locked so you can't go in and look down the shaft.

The inside, it emits a really spooky noise that makes you very frustrated to not be able to look down it.

Pedal-oh

Everything was going well on my ride today...


...I had plenty of food...

... I rode the Jacob's Ladder descent for the first time (weee..rattle rattle..weee... arg!... rattle... etc) ...

...Cairn you see the large pile of stones... fnar. Edale valley beyond, more fun descending ahead...

...Then my pedal fell off half way up to Mam Nick, about four miles from home. SOMEBODY had cross-threaded the pedal bolt, destroying the very expensive shimano hollowtech crank just enough so that after a 100 miles or so of peak district rattling it fell off. I have learnt two lessons - one, don't cross thread things, two - how to cycle with one pedal (being pigeon toe'd helps).

That was a nice thursday run, bit humid but not too bad. Managed a cycle home from work record trying to get home in time so I could get back out to Hayfield.


Top end of Kinder resevoir, looking up towards the downfall.

William Clough, looking dry.

The resevoir still has plenty of peat left, but not much water.

Today I went out for a short mountain bike after getting back from Alex's dads. No-one else around, which is unusual for the weekend, maybe they were put off by the bad forecast. Good news anyway as it meant I could fall off/push without anyone seeing.


Windy tree.

Rocky descent toward Hayfield.

Bridleway to Mount Famine.

View down to Bugsworth from Chinley Churn.

Here are some pictures from my Thursday fell run with Steve and Gill. Did a route up Mount Famine and then back via a path which I hadn't realised existed until recently. The farms in the area have let their cows onto the higher fields now so everything is covered in poo at the moment.


Ascent to Mount Famine, Hayfield behind.

The beginning of the path down to Oaken/Coldwell clough.

My favourite part of my newly discovered path, a lovely little sheltered wood in the middle of nowhere.