I Want to Ride My Bycicle

It's Bank Holiday. Everyone is being festive. It's the one day of the four-day weekend that doesn't have rain forecast. Sunday had been spent in a mire of couch-potato-ness, thanks to the incessant drizzle, so Monday was going to be active. We dragged out the bikes and did a maintenance check on them all. One needs a new brake cable, another brake blocks, but we found enough roadworthy bikes to do for the day.


I took the kids and we followed as many small roads as I could find to head for the forest. The road through Buckerage was like the waves of the sea - we would sail down one hill, then have to push up the next. The kids needed plenty of breaks and had scoffed their snack food before we got anywhere near the visitor's centre.

I don't think I have a picture of Eartha looking normal.

Naturally, the centre was like a zoo, it being bank holiday. We bought some lunch and Nick met us with the dog and his bike. We followed the red route, which is about 3 miles, with Pal bounding along beside us. He loved having humans that went at his speed for once.


Back at the centre, there was some debate about what to do next. Home was unremittingly uphill, but Grandma's, although further, was downhill. We plumped for Grandma's. Nick dropped the dog off and got a lift back, then we wove our way through the trees to the back of Uncllys Farm. The bridleway was muddy and uneven and Nick's brakes squeaked like he was trying to kill a ferret with his bare hands. There was one exciting moment, when a rutted path crossed our route and I thought all the children would sail into orbit as their wheels hit the deep indentations. In fact, it was a little later that Nick suddenly stopped killing his ferret and landed with a grunt in a soft pile of brambles. We were sympathetic once we'd stopped laughing.

No, I don't know which gang symbol they are sporting.

We pushed the bikes over a cattle grid and followed the lanes and a steep hill into Bewdley. Somehow we made it through the town centre without losing any children and ended up at Mum's, where the kids were surprisingly quiet. We'd cycled about 15 miles, at a guess. I wanna do it again!