I believe it requires a mild psychological imbalance to get out of warm bed and venture outside on a pushbike even on a nice day. In the cold and wet it’s just plain stupid. Add 40mph winds (with gusts of 60mph) into that equation and you’d have to be utterly bonkers to go for a bike ride. So as expected, only 8 people were deranged enough to risk life and limb in what was starting to look like a scene from “The Day After Tomorrow”.
A motley crue of myself, Steve, Kyle, Adam Hogarth, Elaine, Simon Gibbs, Craig Fenwick, and Alan Dick assembled inside Anna’s café, sheltering from the onslaught outside. The wind and rain rattled against the window like a Christmas movie, and I contemplated the fact that we were about to brave it all, hoping someone might suggest we all sack it in and have a full English instead. I was praying someone would be sensible. Maybe someone would see reason.
Er… no.
Minutes later we were cold and wet, heading out of Ponteland towards what actually looked like blue sky. We wound our way through the country roads into Stamfordham and onto Ryal, before heading over through Capheaton, up Middleton Bank (yuck) and on to Bolam Lake Country Park.
As the 7 of us (Craig had vanished earlier) headed into Bolam, there wasn’t much to report. Apart from strong winds and a few light showers, the ride had been pretty uneventful. I had stayed near the front and tried to keep a nice high cadence to try and reduce muscle stress after Thursday’s commute over the Mountain Time Trial course. Uneventful, did I say? That was about to change.
First off, I tried my hardest to cause a pile up by slamming my breaks on at the wrong turning. Needless to say, I was sufficiently scolded by Simon! I think my chances of becoming a ride leader (not that there were particularly high anyway) have now all but vanished.
Secondly, lining up at the counter in the café, most of us were all behaving like school kids - on account of the 2 attractive, young girls working behind the counter. For example, as I was ordering my beans on toast, someone remarked (whilst nodding towards the aforementioned girls – who thankfully were blissfully unaware of the testosterone fuelled mirth),
“James, do they have hot stuff here?”
One particularly member of the Vags appeared to have 7 courses to his lunch, re-visiting the counter at every opportunity (I should point out it WASN’T me).
The café itself is lovely – it’s a wooden cabin in the middle of a forested country park that is well worth a visit should anyone be in the area. (I should point out that this was a proper wood cabin too. A few years ago I went to Wales for Christmas (it was shut by the way). We stayed in what was described as a “wooden lodge” with a “whirlpool bath and sauna”. It was actually a static caravan with wood cladding on the side, a cupboard with an electric heater, and on of those tiny single person baths with a bubble stream in it.) Anyway, the sandwiches and cakes are lovely, some of the nicest we sample on our Vag rides. Only 1 complaint – the metal t-pots seem to pour the tea EVERYWHERE except where you point them. It took a bit of getting used to, but I discovered if you sort of hold the t-pot at a right angle to the cup, tilt your wrist about 30 degrees either way, stand on your head and whistle a merry tune, the tea nearly goes into the cup. The end result was a wooden tray of tea and soggy sugar wrappers. Nice.
As we all got ready to leave, I discovered that the air that had been inside my rear tyre had now miraculously found its way outside my rear tyre (bear in mind I’d only put the inner tube in last Thursday). The thought of waiting for me to fumble around changing an inner tube was too much for Simon and Elaine, who rode off into the sun – and then there were 5.
What followed in the 8 miles from Bolam Lake to Ponteland can only be described as a cross between a Russ Abbot sketch and a scene out of Police Academy. As you read this following paragraph, please imagine the Benny Hill music in the background, with everything being played on Fast Forward. First, Kyle punctured. We all congregated at the side of the road as Kyle and Steve set about replacing the tube. Within seconds of stopping, Alan too had a puncture. The wind was now so strong that bikes, tyres, tubes, humans, trees and even cows were being blown all over the road. Well, maybe not the cows. It was utter chaos. Kyle could barely stand up. Alan snapped his tyre lever. Steve’s bike nearly got blown away. Something smacked me in the face – I suspect a rogue leaf. Alan couldn’t get his tyre off. Keith and I were stood freezing cold (although Keith felt it appropriate to use me as shelter from the wind). You can imagine the language. As Kyle and Alan finally put their bikes back together, it suddenly dawned on Keith – he too had a suspiciously flat tyre. A thorn had made its way into his tyre and at that particularly point in time, the only thing keeping the tube inflated was the thorn. That was until Kyle ripped it out of course! We inflated the tyre (hoping it would be a slow puncture) and made off for home.
The wind was now staggeringly strong. I expected, at any minute, to see a black train of pickup trucks drive past headed by Helen Hunt and Bill Paxton or see a cow / truck / entire wooden house fall from the sky in front of me (for the ignorant – that’s a reference to the film “Twister”). I was leaning 45 degrees sideways and into the wind in order not to fall over. Kyle had been blown completely off the tarmac and had landed in a bush at the side of the road! Unhurt, he climbed back on his bike and we all limped our way back to Ponteland (after stopping twice more to pump up Keith’s tyres).
As we huddled into Anna’s Café, it was clear some of us had enjoyed it more than others. Personally, I was glad it was over. I was pleased I was one of the few that braved the elements, but was relieved to be home safe and sound.
As we had stood at the side of the road fixing tubes and tyres, I had began singing “The 12 Days of Christmas” but with the calamitous events of the day instead of birds and whatnot. The final song goes something like this:
9 mental cyclists,
8 of them blown up Middleton,
7 courses of lunch,
6 cups of (weak) tea,
5 assorted tyre levers,
4 punctured tubes,
3 crap Vittoria tyres,
2 attractive waitresses…
…and Kyle upside down in a bush!
I thank you and goodnight!