The Wall - rest stop
Everyone said I would love it and they were bang on the money!
Mike and I (and Sarah) set off to Wales on Friday afternoon, after 5 and a half hours of road works and diversions and we made it to the B&B. A relaxed kind of place that served up 12oz steaks cooked to perfection, and the best thing is that I had only ordered an 8 oz. The weekend was already off to a great start!
Saturday morning and after some brief car trouble(!) we got to the Glyncorrwg visitor centre. We met up with Jane and Steve in the carpark and after the usual faffing we set off up the skyline trail armed with tangfastics and camelbaks full of dodgy tasting B&B water, nice!
On my new Yeti 575 (on its first outing outside of Stanmer woods) I was instantly impressed at how well it climbed. It seemed to go better than my old hardtail, it stayed in a straight line and kept great traction, with the pro-pedal engaged there is very little delay either, when you pedal – it moves.
On the first climb the trail was very busy, partly due to the stag party of about 20, including the stag dressed as a superhero, I didn’t envy him at all seeing as it was about 26 degrees at this point! When we reached the top of the climb there was a skyline diversion in place, we trundled along some fire roads for a bit but were soon into the fun stuff, flowing singletrack descents, jumps, drops and the odd berm. We were all well warmed up from the climbs and I was loving Wales. Before the final skyline descent we bumped into Paul (fellow Brighton MTBer) on his way up, Mike and I decided we would go back up with him and do the black section of the whites level trail before lunch. This was a very rocky descent and quite challenging in places, I came close to losing it a couple of times to made it down in one piece. We then headed down the final skyline descent as before with the intention of riding it with no stops until the bottom. After about a minute of descending Paul got a blowout, on closer inspection we noticed he was running tyres made of tissue paper so no wonder it had gone pop. One new tube and we were off again for about 30 seconds until Mike fell into a heap on the ground tackling a set of rock steps, they were on a bend which made them tricky so we let him off that one.
At the visitor centre I ate the largest portion of beans on toast ever constructed by man, and a redbull and a flapjack. As we set off for the late afternoon ride Jane had a mechanical so her and Steve called it a day, I was almost tempted to throw in the towel myself (probably due to the amount of food in me) but we headed back up to the top, Mike, Paul and myself. We took the Whites Level trail this time and it was brilliant, very flowing and a lot of
3rd Puncture
bits and pieces to jump off. Paul got another two snake bite punctures and was I think regretting his choice of lightweight tyres. After the third puncture he announced that he had some downhill tyres – in his van! We suggested maybe putting them on for the next day.
By 6.30 we were finished we met up with Alec who turned up with some of his organic sausages and bacon so we joined Debbie and the Brighton Explorers for a BBQ at the centre campsite. It had been a great day of riding and definitely the most trails I have hit in one day. I felt like my bike had been well and truly ‘worn in’.
Sunday morning we spent some time trying to locate the annoying creak in Alec’s Ellsworth, we all agreed it was definitely the front end, then the back end, then the middle….etc etc. We had some coffees and gave up on the creak search. We decided to tackle both the Whites Level and the Wall trails so set off to Whites first. Having ridden the Whites Level the previous afternoon I felt faster and more confident over the trail, that was until we came across a guy on the side of the trail with a mouth full of blood! He had come off and face planted a rock, he was standing but not looking good. I immediately administered tangfastics and he seemed to perk up, then he fell over. Jane sat with him for a while until he was a little better Steve caught up with his friend who rather reluctantly rode back to find him. He asked Jane how his teeth looked, this was a tricky question really as they were all over the place, but possibly not as a result of the crash!
Paul, Jane and Steve headed for home at about 2.30 leaving Mike, Alec and me to tackle the Wall trail. We rode a fair distance along the valley to get to the bottom of it and began climbing. The climb was not as interesting as the others, more fire roads and more of Mike and I moaning about it. Alec seemed to take it in his stride. Mike was particularly annoyed with a guy who said we were “almost there” when in actual fact we were only about half way! It took what seemed like ages but we made it to the top and had a quick stop in the picnic area, (luckily Alec actually had some Picnic bars so we tucked into those whilst debating if we could count the nuts and raisins as part of our 5 a day).
We shot off down the descent, I went at the front this time and knowing it was the last trail of the weekend I went flat out trying to pop off everything in sight. It felt really fast and I got a real sense that the bike wanted to go quicker and quicker. Before it could end in disaster, we reached the bottom in one piece. We rode back to the centre and got a very well deserved cup of coffee and a cake. We had done two long days of great riding on amazing trails in perfect weather (and had some bloody good laughs in between). A brilliant weekend that I look forward to repeating soon.
PS – Alec is missing 3 raw organic sausages – anyone with any information on their whereabouts is encouraged to step forward.
Rich
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Thanks for a cracking weekend – as for creak you’ll be pleased to know that I took it to Freeborn and it appears that when I replaced the bearings I fitted new bolts and used Threadlock which apparently caused the creaking – picking up at weekend – hopefully ‘creakless’ – everyone will be pleased to know! Sausages – still a mystery
Alec
By: Alec on June 10, 2010
at 7:57 pm
A great weekend.
Great riding, weather and company what more could anyone want.
Perhaps the sausages were victims of the little known ‘Afan Triangle’.
By: mike61 on June 11, 2010
at 8:35 am
Great write up Rich – think I’ve solved the sausage mystery – the Beast Of Cwmbran
http://www.britishbigcats.org/images/cms/Cwmbran%20Big%20Cat%20Photo%20low.jpg
Love to go next time – I’ll wear a gum shield.
Cheers,
Mark
By: Mark on June 11, 2010
at 11:56 pm
Great write up Rich – think I’ve solved the sausage mystery – the Beast Of Cwmbran
http://www.britishbigcats.org/images/cms/Cwmbran%20Big%20Cat%20Photo%20low.jpg
Love to go next time – I’ll wear a gum shield.
Cheers,
Mark
By: Mark on June 11, 2010
at 11:57 pm