FLAT imperial century (metric century option) from Garforth, Saturday 23rd March 2019

[ColinJ]

I have updated the route in the original post. Make sure that you have the final version for Saturday. (Best to wait until Friday evening in case there are any last minute changes).

@Littgull - Brian, I checked the return Northern trains to Leeds and we can catch them at xx:15, or just after xx:45. The trains in between are TP so we won't be catching one of them because of the reservations/limited numbers of bikes issues.

 

[Littgull]

Thanks Colin - @ColinJ, for updated route and detail about the trains back. Good that we won't need to get involved with TP trains and all the bike space shenanigans.

 

[NorthernDave]

There are plenty of places in Garforth where any hungry cyclists will be able to get something to eat if necessary.
There's a big Tesco just over the road from the station, and a 'spoons on Main Street (although I've no idea about any cycle parking facilities)

 

[ColinJ]

There are plenty of places in Garforth where any hungry cyclists will be able to get something to eat if necessary.
There's a big Tesco just over the road from the station, and a 'spoons on Main Street (although I've no idea about any cycle parking facilities)

They could be handy for some of our riders but I think Brian and I will just hop on the first available train back from Garforth to Leeds. Unless we are very lucky with the timing of the trains then it could easily be 2 hours after the ride finishes when we get home.

I'll be okay with just the one stop. I'll probably carry some emergency shortbread and chocolate rations and will refill my bottles at Cawood. OTOH, if we happened to get to Womersley by 15:30 then I'd be happy to stop at the cafe there until it closed at 16:00. We should be able to ride back from there in about an hour and a half.

 

[ColinJ]

Do you think you will be able to make a guest appearance on the ride, @NorthernDave?

 

[ColinJ]

I have just been checking back through some of my files to find a mystery hill that almost had me walking with my singlespeed and on which @Littgull bonked! It turns out that it is the hill that I have taken out from Campsall to Little Smeaton via the road up to Barnsdale Bar. We did it from the north. I can't remember if I put it in deliberately, or if I hadn't noticed that it would have been much easier to go via Norton...

 

[NorthernDave]

Do you think you will be able to make a guest appearance on the ride, @NorthernDave?

I'd like to meet up, even if it's only for part of the ride, but I'm still badly with this hateful cold and haven't touched a bike for over a fortnight.
I'll have to see how I go unfortunately.

 

[ColinJ]

I'd like to meet up, even if it's only for part of the ride, but I'm still badly with this hateful cold and haven't touched a bike for over a fortnight.
I'll have to see how I go unfortunately.

I had one of those bugs for the first half of February - not nice!

Don't risk knocking yourself up, but if you do start to feel better then trundle along with us for a while and then peel off and head for home?

 

[Venod]

@ColinJ

Been out for a ride today, there were road closed signs on the way to Cawood, thought it might be flooding, but further signs said road closed 18/3 for five days, I carried on and they are resurfacing through Cawood, I got through on the footpath, they should be finished by the weekend and you will have a nice new surfaced road, but if not you can ignore the signs and get through on the path.

The road from Beal to Birkin was impassable (flooded) this may have receded by Saturday, the pic is took from Birkin Church looking South towards Beal, with the amount of water laying on the land I would imagine Topham Ferry at the Southern end of the path from Pollington to Sykehouse will be flooded, this may have also receded by Saturday but as its an unmade path it will probably still be muddy, the problem is if you get there and its not passable the only alternative is to return to Pollington. see if you can get a report on the path between Wetherby and Spofforth as I know this gets muddy.

 

[ColinJ]

Yikes - thanks!!!

I am now looking at the North Yorkshire council roadworks map to check for potential problems.

A Beal to Birkin closure would be a pain ...

Hopefully most of the water will be gone by the weekend but I don't really know the area so I would find it difficult to improvise on the day ... I do have the OS maps on my phone but I can't reprogram my GPS while I am out. I'll preprogram some alternatives in for likely trouble spots.

If this were a summer 100 km route then lengthy diversions wouldn't be so bad, but with limited daylight hours and a 100 mile route planned, adding much extra on would be a BIG headache!

 

[ColinJ]

Pah - I'm sticking to the hills in wet weather in future!

I knew that flooding can be a big problem in York but I hadn't really thought about the fact that it could affect the whole area ...

Quite a few parts of our route are potentially affected. I don't think that any significant rain is forecast between now and the weekend though so hopefully everything will dry up by Saturday. I'll certainly be searching online for information leading up to the ride.

 

[Slioch]

I cycled that Beal to Birkin road last year on a 100 miler last March/April when it was flooded. There was about 50m of the road that was underwater. I looked at the map and worked out it would be a 6 or 7 mile detour to go round it, so I took off my shoes and socks, put the bike on my shoulder, and waded through. It came up to my knees.

It took 5 mins to dry out and put my shoes back on the other side, and I was on my way again.

I suspect that any floods will have receded by this coming weekend, but if not we can always go for a paddle.

 

[Kestevan]

Hi Colin,
Any chance you can knock up a gpx for us wusses doing the 100k route please.
I'm having no luck splitting the route without manually re-entering the whole damned thing from the start.

 

[ColinJ]

Hi Colin,
Any chance you can knock up a gpx for us wusses doing the 100k route please.
I'm having no luck splitting the route without manually re-entering the whole damned thing from the start.

I was thinking in terms of just pointing down the road and saying "carry on that way for 3 kms to rejoin the original route, we are turning left here"!

Actually, I suppose that we might get separated and those of you with more modern devices might have them trying to reroute you. My screen would just go blank until I got about 2.5 kms down that shortcut road and then I would see a grey line appearing on the screen ahead of its little person icon.

Here you go - two GPX files for the price of one. The shortened version of the original route (104 km) which finishes up The Lines cyclepath. That might be muddy so an option would be to avoid the path and go on the road through Kippax instead (103 km).

 

[ColinJ]

There is only one flood warning left in place in the area now, at Roall Dyke just south of our route. Hopefully, all will be okay!

Beal bridge should be okay now ...

I'll check that the cafe at Cawood Park is going to be open. Mind you, we found in the past that there weren't a lot of alternatives nearby ... While I am at it I will ask if they have had any flooding problems.