Sunday, 14 June 2009
Joseph Sugg writes: Today's ride was heading west. We started from Brookside at 9:00am. John Lumbers was our leader. There was a good turnout, with at least ten at the start, including two newish faces.
We headed out of Cambridge via Grange Road and along the Barton Road to Barton. We continued through the village along the the Barton Road until we reached the Wheatsheaf crossroads where we turned right to Eversden and Kingston. We passed a number of race marshalls along the way, who told us that the riders were just five minutes behind. We never saw them; perhaps we were going too fast!
After Kingston we headed through the fords at Bourn: one dry and one wet! From there we continued through Caxton and Gransden to Waresley, where we stopped at the Garden Centre for coffee. There we met Geoff and Vic and picked up Tony, Martin and Brian.
We continued past Gamlingay to Everton and through the woods to Sandy where we joined Sustrans route 51 to Bedford. We continued to Willington where we sat by the lock eating lunch and watching the boats passing through. We then continued on to the cafe at Danish Camp to have a very reasonably priced coffee. I even got ice in my water bottles at no extra cost!
After lunch we split into two groups. Greta took a group directly back to Cambridge via St Neots, leaving seven riders in my own group. We continued to Bedford country park where an event was being held for bike week. We stopped for a while to pick up some much-needed frame touch-up paint and admire some expensive bikes.
We left the park via its southern end and rode under the bypass to Cardington, where we passed the large Airship Hangers. These are very impressive and well worth seeing. Brian left us soon after and we continued past the Shuttleworth museum. Our route then took us past Broom and through Langford and over the A1 to Edworth. From here we headed to Sutton and Potton before reaching Gamlingay in good time for tea.
I was the sole day rider left at tea as the others went straight home. After tea we charged home along the quickest route. I did 15 miles in about 55 minutes. Total mileage:
73 miles.
Joseph Sugg.
1 comments from old website
Sunday 21st Jun 2009 at 7.03am
The Cardington Airship Hangers are listed buildings. A former member (now deceased) of the Mid-Anglia Computer User Group was responsible for them being listed.
He was a surveyor for the area at the time, one of his assistants said they said be listed so he said "Do it". The assistant applied for listing, got it and George said "Now you can go and tell the Commanding Officer". He was an Ex-RAF officer himself.