ColinJ said:
No, I know you enjoyed the ride and I think you made a good effort. I was more worried that you might have felt that I was bullying you to catch the train! It was getting cold and the waiting rooms at the station are shut at that time of night so you'd have had an unpleasant hour waiting for the next train and it would have been late by the time you got home.
Not at all, I was very grateful for the encouragement - when you said at one point I'd be fine if I could keep up to an average of 11mph, I had doubts whether I could - but we must have. Of course, the downhills helped boost the average, but having you up front to just tag onto really helped too. And you're right about the cold - I was pretty chilly by the time we got into York, despite having put all my layers back on. I rode back to the flat with chattering teeth - it's not really far enough to warm up. Still, I was in bed within 15 minutes...
I'm normally the one to keep everybody waiting on my rides. The other CC riders must be getting to know each other really well because they have lots of time to chat while I catch up. I then often have to go on ahead because I'm the one navigating so I don't get that much time actually in the group.
When I first started going to Northumberland with friends, some years ago, I was the one trying to keep up all the time. Gradually I've got better - but I think I've also tended to choose the group I go out with better, so that I'm not straggling - so I might feel more athletic than I really am.
Funnily enough, I was talking to mine about that too. She said that she remembered her uncle having a fixed-wheel bike when she was a little girl. He worked somewhere near Fort William and lived in digs during the week but used to ride home to spend the weekends at the family croft on the coast near Oban. One particular Friday evening he missed the last ferry at Ballachulish (in those days the bridge at the mouth of Loch Leven was a rail bridge) so he had to ride round the loch via Kinlochleven. He got caught out in a thunderstorm and was so cold and tired when he got home that he couldn't dismount so his brothers had to come out of the croft and lift him off his bike. They carried him in and propped him up in front of a big open fire to thaw him out!
Yikes. One time, coming back to Wooler, we'd had a headwind all the way from Lindisfarne, (30 miles or so I think), and I was utterly wiped out. On the outskirts of town, I had to get off and walk, because I could no longer ride fast enough to stay upright. We popped into the Co op for some dinner on the way up to the hostel, and my companion picked up pasta and sauce and said "Shall I get some cheese?". My reply was "I don't care". For me not to care about cheese, is pretty much on the point of death....
I was fine, once I'd had a cuppa, and some dinner. But oh god....
Only moved to the flatlands 6 years ago 
There are 3 good cake stops en-route + fish & chips if wanted, but I dont think the ride is long enough to justify 3+ stops 
