Bit of a mixed bag today. Plan was to cycle to Cheddington station (~10 miles, depending on route), take train to Milton Keynes, pootle around the lanes of North Bucks / South Northants for 30 miles or so (an area I'd tried to do before, but abandoned due to adverse weather), then eventually back to Cheddington by train and from there, home. That would give me at least 50 miles, probably more and I'd see if I felt like adding on a bit at the end.
First part was fine - caught the train I wanted and got out into some rather nice countryside. Norhants (or at least the bit I was in) is surprisingly undulating - I didn't tackle a single climb of note, yet my elevation gain for the day was up there with my Chilterns rides. The one thing I did note was that the main A roads in this area were very busy and traffic was VERY fast, especially compared to the major roads near me. I wasn't on any of them for long (by design), but the few times I had no choice but to, if there was a path available, I was riding on it, even though the path surface was terrible - I just didn't feel safe mixing it with Northants drivers at their speeds. Yet on minor roads to be fair, they seemed to be a far more sensible bunch regarding speeds; my problem here was the state of these minor roads - though some of that was my fault in plotting a route that turned out to have about 3-4 miles going down something more akin to a farm track than a road (should have checked StreetView and not relied just on overhead pictures).
As I came back into Milton Keynes, I tried to take the Redways to get me back to the station and ended up getting horribly lost, not helped by a 1 mile section of one of the paths I needed being closed as it was being dug up and that meant I had to take a massive diversion. Eventually found my way back to my route, but just as I was about 500 yards from the station, I heard a "pop", followed about 20 seconds later by the tell-tale "thump, thump" noise from my back wheel. As I was going over a rough section of paving at the time, I hoped it was just that causing the noise (that sort of false alarm has happened to me many times before), but it continued as I got back onto a smooth surface and so at that point I knew I'd been cursed by the fairy.
I thought I'd have time to fix it before my train departed, but for the life of me, I just couldn't get my wheel off - the quick release was completely stuck. At that point it started to rain and I thought I'd rather fix it at home in the dry than continue to fail to do it while getting wet by the side of the road and so called the wife to pick me up from Cheddington station - because I hadn't boarded the train yet, she could probably beat me there. Ending the ride in MK did mean I ended up shy of my imperial half target - totalled about 47 miles (I only logged the Northants bit in the half century challenge).
), but with 2463ft climbed.
well done sir 
