So....Mike E, Adam and I met up at York Station, and chatted with two amiable rogues who had just stripped the fruit machine - twice. And then we went up to the Minster, which was nice, and decided that starting from in front of the Minster would be top. And then we went for a little tour, and admired Georgian York, and settled on a route out of town, which is very, very simple. And then we set off, turning neither left nor right, and went through a town gate, over a bridge and on to the Hull Road, and, in minutes, we were out of the centre of York and on a broad quiet road travelling eastward.
Three miles from the start we were over the ring road and out of the streetlights, wandering down the B1228, which is a fine road to cycle at night - not straight, but flat and well-marked and almost devoid of traffic. Then we branched off to the left and headed in to Melbourne, where we came across a pub with people in, so, despite it being around one o'clock, we asked for and were given coffee, and spent a pleasant half an hour explaining ourselves - not easy when you start with 'we're riding to Cleethorpes'.
We said our goodbyes and turned east and then south, going through North and South Cliffe and then North and South Cave, Mike giving way a bit on the route as we realised that this first stretch was going to be longer even than HPC to Faygate.
And simple it is - the route has few turns, and no hills to speak of. We did some winding about the A63, through Welton, and then Mike took us by back roads and a car park to our halfway stop, which is hard by the Humber Bridge and looks very, very nice, with plenty of space for the bikes outside.
We paused only for a little while, because it was starting to rain. Mike led us up a slope to the bridge, and we went over by the bike path to the side. I'll ask the toll booth staff if we can take the road, because at this time of night there's next to no traffic.
We then went through Adam's home town, Barton, and headed east. The wind was now against us, and the rain was coming in horizontally. My legs turned the colour of raw liver, but, nothing daunted, we entered Cleethorpes along a wide tree-lined avenue and reached the seafront just before six.
Cleethorpe's seafront is unpretentious, and, at that time of the morning, closed, but, in an inspired move, Mike took us to the railway station, which had a pub, serving beer, having opened early to fortify Grimsby Town supporters, whose team must win today to avoid dropping out of the football league for the first time in 100 years. I believe there is a photograph of the beer.
And, after Mike and Adam had had a couple of pints we went to Brown's, which does a decent breakfast for a fiver. Mike and Adam caught the train to Barton, Mike looking forward to his second crossing of the bridge, and I caught the train to Doncaster, which, after a couple of stops, carried not only Grimsby supporters, but Scunthorpe supporters and Leeds supporters to Doncaster, where I caught the train back to the Great Wen
So......we think the ride is about 67 miles. It's flat, but very susceptible to the wind and rain. The weather is everything. We've been invited back to Melbourne for coffee, and we'll probably take up the offer. We won't get to the Humber Bridge for sunrise - that's a disappointment, but there you go. Taking in to account the two stops we should get in to Cleethorpes a little after eight.
I'm still nervous about the numbers, and we'll probably take no more than 60 - maybe 70 if it turns out that some of the more local riders are out of the MSeries mold and happy to take on some TEC'ing. There are about 34 on the list at present, and Mike has a few more names. There are a couple of riders who have no experience of this kind of distance, and I'll go through things with them - one problem is that we're quite a way from railway lines for most of the ride. If the weather is kind we'll have a lovely night. If it isn't we'll all feel in need of the pubs that open all hours.