Wednesday, 22 May 2013
Nigel writes: Despite the unseasonably cold weather there was a good turnout for tonight's ride: Rob, Tony, Daniel, Steve, John E, Peter D and newcomer John.
Our destination this evening was the Hare and Hounds in Harlton, a nicely alliterative pub that we hadn't visited before. I had phoned the pub earlier to check it was serving food and discovered that they stopped taking food orders at 8.30pm. Since this is a bit early for us I turned up at Brookside ready to suggest an alternative pub. However I was persuaded to stick to the original plan, shortening the ride to make sure that we got there in time.
Our route this evening was a simple clockwise loop. We set off south along Trumpington, the busway and the DNA path to Great Shelford. We reached Granham's Road to find the gates on the level crossing closing, so we made a diversion to use the Hinton Way crossing instead. However the gates closed a second time as we were crossing, stranding Daniel on one side whilst we waited on the other.
After a short delay we were soon on our way again, west to Little Shelford and then south along the road to Whittlesford. A pelaton of club cyclists overtook us and three of set off in chase, following them at about 22mph for over a mile before stopping to wait for the others.
We continued to Duxford where we turned west onto Grange Road.
This is a long straight road and despite the potholes our speed increased again, towed this time by our guest John, here on his first evening ride. At Chrishall Grange we turned north and continued our clockwise loop through Fowlmere, Shepreth, Barrington and over Chapel Hill to Haslingfield. A few minutes later we arrived at Harlton, where we stopped at The Hare and Hounds as planned. It was 8.15pm, in good time to order food. Impressions of the pub were positive: it was busy with plenty of people eating, and with a good menu with a good range of cheaper options. We agreed that we would come back here another time.
We sat with our food and drinks for almost an hour before returning home to Cambridge. Again the speed was satisfyingly high on the final leg, and I was home by 9.45pm, having cycled
30 miles.
View this GPS track on a larger map