That went well!
There was a cool blustery wind, but after an overcast start we eventually got mild, sunny conditions. We don't get many mid-November days as good as this up here!
The e-bikes of
@Vantage and
@Littgull worked flawlessly. Littgull even had enough charge left at the end to accompany me back to Todmorden to catch his train home from here.
The low grovelling gears on the bikes ridden by me and
@GuyBoden got used a few times, especially on the one really stiff climb, at Thursden pasture towards Widdop reservoir.
@colly demonstrated that he didn't need a motor,
OR a grovelling gear!
There were no significant mechanical problems, despite Vantage trying to wreck his bike in a pothole on the ride from Hebden Bridge station to the start point in the town centre...
The hills were looking lovely in the autumn sun. We took our time on the ride, and soaked up the views.
Hebden Bridge was looking great, but was very busy when we got back. The fine weather had brought lots of other tourists out.
We had drinks and snacks down by the river before parting ways.
I took a couple of photos (Littgull will post some more later)...
As regulars on my rides will know, I like to perform a tongue inspection early on to make sure there will not be any problems later. Vantage was obviously listening to my instructions, but the others were distracted by the sun about to pop out from behind the clouds, and stood there grinning like loons while waiting for it:
The grinning thing is obviously infectious because Vantage was no longer sticking his tongue out by the time we stopped for the second photo. (The one that I took to demonstrate that we did actually end up in sunshine.) Yes, there
was still a lot of cloud, but the sun was shining, trust me - I had pointed the camera away from the direct sun to avoid it messing up the picture. You see those dark areas on the road? They are called '
shadows'. (We don't get many of them in Yorkshire, so I had to Google the name for them.)
Normal dark and depressing conditions will no doubt be restored in the next few days, and then last for 3 or 4 icy months!
Unlike the first time I did a ride through Trawden,
this time was not traumatic!
Watch out for Hebden Bridge ride #3 next spring.
