Sunday, 21 July 2019
John F writes: This was to be my first visit to the Ashdon Museum since its refurbishment, a favourite tea stop for CTC Cambridge. Perfect cycling weather despite a stiff southerly breeze tempted 13 riders to Brookside for the 1.30pm start. With two further joiners at Long Road we had what might be a record for a Sunday afternoon.
Waiting to start at Brookside
An anti-clockwise route via the Shelfords, Coploe Hill (with the obligatory pause for a photo-shoot), passing Audley End House the grounds crowded with visitors we reached Saffron Walden and Seward's End.
Coploe Hill
Thence it was the quiet traffic-free lanes via Red Oaks Hill to the Museum, arriving three minutes before the ETA of 4pm, having cycled 31 miles. The all-day riders had preceded us by 20 minutes but ample refreshment remained. Most sat outside but I plus a few others stayed inside to avoid the heat of the sun: a rare necessity in the UK but may become more so with global warming.
Tea at the Ashdon Museum
A consensus view was to take a longish route home via West Wratting (just the highest point of our route at 393 feet and hence presumably the wind generators), Dullingham and Quy where Adrian's cycle punctured (the only hold-up of the day).
The Brookside to Brookside (whither no-one ever returns!) distance faithfully recorded by Strava would have been
52 miles.
John F