Ah - the intractable Fabian Way problem. Vast bogs to the North, and what roads there are to the South are verboten. If we do it next year, I shall put some thought into the avoidability or otherwise of the said GSoDC. I don't enjoy the bridge and the sliproad, but I do enjoy the continuation of the fast, flat terrain that characterises the second half of the ride. People (not me) do use the cycle path alongside, but it's a case study in rancid and inferior segregated facilities - indirect, interrupted, littered with all kinds of grot. And you can't really have some of the riders on it and some on the road, because it keeps veering off wildly and you'd need two lots of waymarkers and TECs. You can avoid the bridge and sliproad using the Briton Ferry/Jersey Marine Variation, which is pleasant and flat, but a rather large loop out of the way for dodging only a small part of the offending road, and throws in a dodgy bit of merging from the right. The other options involve both added distance and hills - we made the calculation that this could be deeply unpopular with anyone finding it hard going, made especially cruel because we've been dangling the destination in front of their eyes round flat coast roads for so long. Actually, one of the North loop options is rather picturesque, but there's a clue as to its possible downside in the name Bog Road...
FNRttC Friday Night Ride to the Coast - Cardiff to Swansea 20th May 2011
- Thread starter dellzeqq
- Start date
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Ah - the intractable Fabian Way problem. Vast bogs to the North, and what roads there are to the South are verboten. If we do it next year, I shall put some thought into the avoidability or otherwise of the said GSoDC. I don't enjoy the bridge and the sliproad, but I do enjoy the continuation of the fast, flat terrain that characterises the second half of the ride. People (not me) do use the cycle path alongside, but it's a case study in rancid and inferior segregated facilities - indirect, interrupted, littered with all kinds of grot. And you can't really have some of the riders on it and some on the road, because it keeps veering off wildly and you'd need two lots of waymarkers and TECs. You can avoid the bridge and sliproad using the Briton Ferry/Jersey Marine Variation, which is pleasant and flat, but a rather large loop out of the way for dodging only a small part of the offending road, and throws in a dodgy bit of merging from the right. The other options involve both added distance and hills - we made the calculation that this could be deeply unpopular with anyone finding it hard going, made especially cruel because we've been dangling the destination in front of their eyes round flat coast roads for so long. Actually, one of the North loop options is rather picturesque, but there's a clue as to its possible downside in the name Bog Road...
Ravenbait
Someone's imaginary friend
- Location
- The Seventh Level of Hell
I'd echo previous correspondents' comments about the amount of heckling from the Cardiff nightlife. Definitely more than London. Perhaps they don't see many bikes. Also, there can't be many opticians around in Cardiff as one bloke shouted out I had nice legs.
We had rocks thrown at us on the Dumb Run one year, and I'm sure someone said we'd been shot at during DRIII...
Heckling is just showing appreciation!
Sam
CharlieB
Junior Walker and the Allstars
- Location
- Therivermeadowatthepileofstones
Another enjoyable night out. I cannot but echo all the previous correspondent's posts.
By FNRttC standards a very rural ride, and I can't remember one as dark in some places. The stops at half-time and full-time were par excellence.
The jazz hands moment on the M4 bridge very funny, especially contrasted against the misty distant view of the Margam steelworks.
With regard to the local press incident , those of us of a certain age may find a resonance in the Dad's Army journalist/platoon member character played by Welsh character Talfryn Thomas (I think), when the guy from the paper burst into the café with a cry of "Evening Post - group photograph!"
The guys who rode from the east - way to go!
Many many thanks again to Simon and Claude for this one.
Ps - couldn't find a copy/copies of the photo(s) on the photo sale part of the Evening Post website earlier, but maybe it'll appear later?
By FNRttC standards a very rural ride, and I can't remember one as dark in some places. The stops at half-time and full-time were par excellence.
The jazz hands moment on the M4 bridge very funny, especially contrasted against the misty distant view of the Margam steelworks.
With regard to the local press incident , those of us of a certain age may find a resonance in the Dad's Army journalist/platoon member character played by Welsh character Talfryn Thomas (I think), when the guy from the paper burst into the café with a cry of "Evening Post - group photograph!"
The guys who rode from the east - way to go!
Many many thanks again to Simon and Claude for this one.
Ps - couldn't find a copy/copies of the photo(s) on the photo sale part of the Evening Post website earlier, but maybe it'll appear later?
No idea. I'll scan the paper in when I get a minute, though.
Susie's in the pic (as is her bike, aloft), whereas you are C by your A. I think you might have been conducting essential smartphone research into opening times...
Aperitif
Meme bar
- Location
- ...I don't have much idea - really.
Scan my copy in iambic pentameters please... it was a ride of sheer poetry, and I thought the dual carriageway was alright - part of the ride. Don't worry about it!
Aperitif
Meme bar
- Location
- ...I don't have much idea - really.
See. Playing the field, and now you haven't a leg to stand on...
frank9755
Cyclist
- Location
- West London
It's good for us to get some press recognition but I have to say it feels a little bit odd / random / possibly sexist to put someone's age in the article.
@ Teef, I asked my skydiving mate about the Breitling Wingwalkers. He knows of them but doesn't know them personally (so can't help you stay in touch) but he said that the girls were experienced skydivers before taking up wing walking and that they were very expensive to hire.
Agree on the dual carriageway section. I thought it was fine. Apart from when Adrian, who had been riding behind me, pulled alongside and said that a truck had appeared to be in two minds as to whether to brake or run me over.
@ Teef, I asked my skydiving mate about the Breitling Wingwalkers. He knows of them but doesn't know them personally (so can't help you stay in touch) but he said that the girls were experienced skydivers before taking up wing walking and that they were very expensive to hire.
Agree on the dual carriageway section. I thought it was fine. Apart from when Adrian, who had been riding behind me, pulled alongside and said that a truck had appeared to be in two minds as to whether to brake or run me over.
Odd, and certainly irrelevant, but to be fair I don't think they only do it to women. Just another duff convention they don't seem to be able to break with. I did offer them a chat with Our Glorious Leader, who was only feet away, but because they can't tag him with "Simon, 56, from Blaen Y Maes", and have never heard of Streatham Hill, they didn't know what to make of the opportunity...
threebikesmcginty
Corn Fed Hick...
- Location
- ...on the slake
My mum was interviewed by a paper recently, she was very pleased as they knocked 10 years off her age. And her eldest kid was 40, that's my older brother that is
(gutted I couldn't get organised to go to Wales)
Do we (we? who's this we, white man?) need to look at handling of Big Roads? The exit from the layby on top of Reigate Hill onto the A217 was similarly chaotic.
Just, as User10571 puts it, sayin...
frank9755
Cyclist
- Location
- West London
I have to confess that DZ did suggest to me that we had a re-group stop before that section but, not fully appreciating the nature of the following roads, I failed to communicate / implement that properly.
Aperitif
Meme bar
- Location
- ...I don't have much idea - really.
a) his loss then and b)Apparently that is a common complaint... Me? I'm just an aesthete...but I did wonder why she asked me to 'give her a wing'
Re the age thing, it was most unjust of the hack-y-dah not to mention that you had recently celebrated your 50th - even though you look younger, Frank.
Oh yes - Adrian did tell me about the truck, but, to be fair, not much would have 'got you down' at that stage in the voyage - not even Swansea's finest deliverymen.
