There is one deliberate "general PM me with the answer. Usual rules: if you want to play, who do by referring to it in your replies. If you don't, then please don't spoil it for those knowledge" style factual untruth below. Droughts and hose pipe bans in the news, and pouring rain and weather would be...
Last night, realising that today's unreliable... howling gales outside - what a year it's been so far. I decided to make today's project an assault or don't remember: MOPE is Middleton Incline on the High Peak Trail. I have described MOPE in previous write ups, but for those who can't old railway track bed.
The High Peak Trail is an on My Own Personal Everest (MOPE). It starts at the bottom of the valley near to the Cromford Canal, and climbs up by the Middleton Incline which leads up to Middleton Top. There is then a short section of fairly level trackbed, followed km) long, and approximately 1:7 (14%) gradient. Middleton Incline is something like half a mile (0.8 a huge incline to Black Rocks - an outcrop of gritstone much favoured by climbers.
Like some other inclines on this line, it is so steep that the trains had to in a pit at the bottom of the incline. The big pulley wheel for the continuous cable is still visible compacted grit, and some loose stones and ballast. The surface is varied, with some compacted mud, some be winched up by a static steam engine in a building at the top. Every 10 - 15 metres or so, there is a diagonal round one end or the other, which means choosing the best route between mud or loose stuff, and contending with slight but significant changes in gradient.
Each of these is an obstacle to be overcome - on the way down, I can ride over them, but on the way up, I have to go trackbed is particularly uneven, with big bits of rock breaking through, A third of the way up is a bridge, under which the kerb to redirect rainwater run off, and to prevent erosion. On previous rides, the best I have ever managed is to with 150 mm cranks. That was on my Nimbus 24 is just short of the first bridge.
The furthest I've managed before the first UPD reach the top in four stages, with only 3 UPDs. So, today's primary objective is to make it through the bridge before the first increase in skill outpacing my decline in fitness? How good is this new KH24, and is my a mile down the road, it is raining stair rods. So I leave home in light drizzle, and by the time I'm UPD, and the "ideal" is to make it to the top in one.
I'm tempted to turn back, but what the one is just leaving! It is raining persistently (absolutely persisting down, in fact) and I wonder what on Earth I'm doing. Nearly an hour later, I am in the car park at Black Rocks - my car one of only two present, and the other today. Two experiments hell? I carry on. First, I am using my old waist-pack with space before buying the Camelbak.
I rode many miles with this back sweat, and the water isn't so refreshing though a tube. I don't really like the way that the Camelbak bladder makes my for two water bottles, instead of the Camelbak. On the other hand, the waist-pack doesn't spread the weight new ridiculously expensive Garmin Foretrex 201 wrist-mounted GPS. Second: this is the first time out with my waiting for this new toy to find some satellites.
So I stand in the rain in the car park, disconsolately so evenly, or sit so steadily on bumpy tracks. Then I'm up an on, and has flooded to a depth of 4" - 6" in places (10 - 15 cm) and there are puddles as long as swimming pools. Did I mention it had been raining? The trackbed is slightly "dished" because of the amount of pedestrian and bike traffic it takes, and it don't get a rooster-tail of spray up my backside. Unable to avoid them, I slow right down so that I riding along the trackbed.
A UPD here would mean wet shoes and socks I stay on. There is some slithering, but I had an audience, because it probably looks more hardcore than it is to do. There's about half a mile of this, and I soon get used to it, and almost wish too, so I take it very steady. Then I see mountain bikers of their time not actually riding.
Mountain bikers seem to spend a lot side, and make encouraging comments. As I approach, they pull to one blocking my path. Then I am at the bottom of MOPE, My to pace myself. I slow down, and try surprisingly well.
I am doing Own Personal Everest, the Killer Slope of Doom. In fact, it seems much I remember them, and... Even the kerbs are lower than half a mile or so of 14% gradient, with no hazards or obstacles other than the sheer distance and steepness. This sustained challenge to my technical ability, my concentration and my physical stamina has been reduced to a long smooth slog - easier than ever before.
Don't you hate it when I'm still riding in the seated position. Soon, I am almost at the bridge, and and picking my route with exhausted care. Usually by now I'd be standing on the pedals, they improve things? The red brick arch of the bridge towers above me - although it is one of the best-preserved late Tudor (1593) then more of the same, really.
Under the bridge with no problems, and and the top of the incline is my own level of fitness. This is just a long steep slog, and the only obstacle between me railway bridges in Britain, it is taller than expected because the arch is in the much earlier steeply-pointed Norman style. I am breathing hard, trying to keep the pace down without losing momentum, and my this smooth surface, it is no longer a proper Personal Everest anyway. The little demon on my shoulder whispers to me to give up, because with this time, It'll only make you come back until you do.
The demon on the other shoulder snarls that if I don't do it mind is wandering into that dark area where it wonders what the point is. Then something interesting and before I reach a bridge that passes high over a road. About 8 - 10 ramblers appear from a gate on my left, shortly some on leads, some not. They have about 1.5 dogs each, unexpected happens.
The ramblers turn up the hill in front of me and in the traditional manner eye contact with me after coming through the gate. I say ignore because at least one of them made direct ever so slightly faster than them. I hate this situation: I am going of ramblers everywhere, spread out, slow down, and ignore the cyclist approaching them. I can't easily slow down, but it could take me up or snap; others are on leads, and in some ways that is worse because a particularly cunning dog can leap across in front of you, stretching the lead across your path.
There is an etiquette problem here: when does a single unicyclist ask 8 or more dog walkers to step aside? Can the dogs be trusted? Some are loose and may jump couple of the ramblers turn, express surprise with raised eyebrows, and step aside, calling their dogs to them. In my habitual manner, I grunt a bit louder, cough a couple of times (how English is that?) and a a long time to catch and overtake them. They shout ahead to the other ramblers, and soon the whole path ahead of me is a maelstrom of dog walkers and up at my leg as I pass it. I make it through with just one dog jumping sub vocalise through gritted teeth words to the effect of "Bloody stupid animal."
It is on a lead, and I make momentary eye-contact with the owner and dogs, attempting to control or ignore each other respectively, and all I can focus on is finding a way between them. I am now very close of a swimming pool away, and at about eye level. The gate at the top of the incline is the length there. I am nearly indeed to six things:
The two dogs are unrestrained, and heed to the kerfuffle that has just happened behind them. The dog walkers are in their own little world, having paid no smooth than the lower part of the slope. The ground here is just a little bit less too lively to be predictable. I am at the end distracts me just that bit too much, and, BANG! I UPD within sight of the finish line.
Plotting a route past dogs and dog owners, or timing my ride to avoid the need to overtake them duck escapes my lips. A word that rhymes with of my energy reserves. (That's it, boys and girls, I said, "What bad luck!") annoyed, irritated, exhausted and embarrassed. What to do now? I am Hardly worth it.
Carry on to the top? The dog walkers turn in surprise. Ride back down and try again? my way? In my calorie-depleted chest-heaving teeth-grinding state, this last one seems the only rational course of action. Ride back down to show these people that I had ridden this far before their stupid dogs had got in the slope on legs of jelly. So I remount and set off down It'd probably kill me.
And I meet the main party of dog walkers, and the same bloody dog jumps up, and I make momentary eye-contact with the lady I'm at home typing this up as the early evening sun brings the red roofs of Carlton Valley to glorious life. I'm not proud of it now, but at the time I was tired, dripping wet, and it was pouring with rain; now down the slope, my legs rebelling. With mixed embarrassment and residual annoyance, I plod holding the lead, and I am, shall we say, ungracious in my analysis of her dog's charms and merits as a perambulatory companion. I make it to the bridge over the hill, I now decide to drink some of it.
Having carried the weight of all that water up the top and roll down my new impulse-buy Lycra arm warmers. The rain is much lighter now, and I take off my waterproof road and stop for a rest. Sweat rises as vapour from every part of me to the very short level section where another path joins. Back on the uni, and down through the Tudor bridge, and the pedant in me notes that one cycles down a decline, and up an incline.
There is a sign here that says, "Danger, do not cycle down the incline." As always, giving me, I fancy, a Mephistophelean air. To the bottom, where I meet another dog narrow mud path onto a raised area to my left. I see an opportunity to avoid it and swoop up a the route I've just taken. This path turns sharply left, parallel to walker with a barely restrained dog.
To my right is quarry, sometimes only inches from the edge. I follow the path round the lip of the area where I fell and gashed my chin a couple of years ago. Having done half a lap of this little quarry, I see to my left the a disused quarry. With the ground so wet and muddy, and my legs still protesting, I to rest another day.
That demon can be laid on the quarry floor, and a quick swoop down a slope and up a slope and I'm back onto the track bed. Then more skyline along the edge of this little quarry, and appreciative "Oooohs" from a lady walking her dog a few feet below decide not to go and try that particular little obstacle again. Then it's a few hundred metres of floods and puddles give up? I decide to carry on. Here is a decision point: to carry on, or to four council workers/rangers, one of whom enquires solicitously as to the whereabouts of my front wheel.
As I'm about to turn right and up a short slope away from the track bed, I see (fluddles?) until I'm back at the car park. I chuckle through lecturer or the other students on the Misanthropy 101 course.) (I was going to become a misanthrope, but I didn't like the of the Black Rocks outcrop. To my right is the dark bulk gritted teeth.
Riding down from it is possible; riding up to it is not, so I follow a path that is dogs looks terrified, and the owner is embarrassed and apologetic. What is this? National Dog Day? One of the reassure the dog. I dismount and try to parallel to the track bed, but more interesting, until I meet two young women walking their dogs. He won't come in hats?" I ask with dry irony.
"What is it? Doesn't he like men she explains with pleasant imbecility. "No, it's bikes he doesn't like," near me. Back on the uni, and up a slimy the woods, so I pass safely, crest the hill, then swoop down one of the trickiest bits of path I know. More dog walkers ahead: two people with about a dozen dogs! The people step aside, and the dogs are away frolicking in some solid - poking up ready to trip the wheel or provoke a pedal strike.
The ground is mainly slimy wet mud, but there are big lumps of gritstone - some loose, muddy slope under dripping wet trees. Although the ground is wetter and muddier than I have ever known it along this section, I make it further zoom past within nano-inches of the wheel. That's enough for me, and I UPD as they walk up a really steep horrible slope. I walk for a bit, then turn and than ever before - then two dogs come along the path in the opposite direction, like quadrupedal torpedoes.
At the top, I young oaks, a few birches, beeches and rowans. This is a nice place to be, with small panting - and my pants are very large and noticeable, I can tell you. The sound of bird song is almost deafening - I can even hear it over my pause for breath. I look up and see a bird never seen one before.
I'm not sure, because I've book, and I'm no wiser. When I get home I check the that might be a cuckoo. The two dog walkers and hill in deep mud and loose rocks looks difficult. The man comments that riding a unicycle up a steep past him.
Not much gets their many dogs arrive. In a narrow corridor - when he's a bit, walk a bit, trying to regroup those tired leg muscles. I let him and his canine tribe go on ahead, then I ride from my childhood visits to Wells-next-the-Sea in Norfolk. I smell cut pine - a smell I remember well carrying a very big box.
A hundred metres later, I come to a new and rather back and practise those downhill skills... This is a suitable point to turn UPD within a metre. so I mount, ride, and ugly clearing where hundreds of pine tress have been felled. Then again, and pedal strike on a rock, mud and rock, doing a few small drops (inches, not feet).
Third time lucky, and I enjoy the descent, picking my route between the combined effect is both very tiring, and sometimes painful. Soon, there are lots of these small drops in sequence, and and fly gracefully from the saddle. My fertile imagination comes up with "Little I am suddenly and unexpectedly confronted with the two young women with the terrified dog. Well, I should be concentrating more on the riding and less on the contrived puns, because off/UPD.
I step droplets slaughter, little cries of pain..." There is a are waiting for me to pass them. I am waiting for them to pass me; they and make encouraging noises to the dog. I put the uni down, remove my hat, Mexican stand-off.
The party passes, with a polite exchange of courtesies, and with the mud patch, right on a hairpin pend, and with random rocks in it. Back on the uni and down the slope, until I hit the deepest slimiest ride through it. Four attempts and I can't dog keeping as far from the uni as it can manage. The fourth time, I dismount ballistically, and run shaking a tree-load of water from its leaves, all over me.
I put my hand out to stop myself against a small sapling, for a while. I decide to walk a short distance down the slope. Then I remount, and there's more controlled descent - the hardest bit being to avoid the pedal easy ride back to the car. At last, back on the trackbed, and an is a far better way of carrying it.
Water tastes better out of a bottle, but the Camelbak strike that could pitch me over the low wall to my right, and down the slope. Trip distance "only" 3.04 miles (7.6 kph) Average speed 4.7 mph absolutely bushed and bedraggled. Less than 5 km and I'm (4.9 km)
Time to repair to the Corner Caf for style factual untruth in the above. There is one deliberate "general knowledge" PM me with the answer. Usual rules: if you want to play, the best veggie breakfast in Derbyshire. If you don't, then please don't spoil it for those to those thirsty souls amongst us.
A treeload of water from Mike - be a mistake but Im not sure if any of them are right or not... I think this one could be a bit less obvious...i found several things shich i think may who do by referring to it in your replies. As always, the pedant in me notes that one that's true. I'm not sure - not necessarily upwards.
I think "incline" just means "slope" cycles down a decline, and up an incline. Although "decline" can indeed mean or verticle. A deviation from horizontal in real life? Mike what is your job a downward slope...
The red brick arch of the bridge towers above me - although it is one of the best-preserved late Tudor (1593) a few wrong ones. Plenty of good answers, and entrants. I had 13 railway bridges in Britain, it is taller than expected because the arch is in the much earlier steeply-pointed Norman style. A 1593 railway bridge is impossible, given that railways as an old railway trackbed and the trains were winched up the incline by a standing steam engine.)
(I exlude mine trolleys, horse trams, and the like, because elsewhere the story makes it clear this is Trevithick, and was tried out in 1804 at Merthyr Tydfil in Wales. Wikipedia: The first steam locomotive to operate on rails was built by Richard we know them weren't invented until the 1800s. For more points: a Tudor building in the is very much later. The idea of "retro" architecture look back to the classical period.
Around Tudor times, the elite were starting to earlier Saxon style is pretty unlikely. And for pedants: the date given was in the period usually called Elizabethan, although to be as ever. Entertaining and appreciated quick skim for the error a day or so ago. Finally managed to read it properly this morning, rather than my fair, Elizabeth I was a Tudor, and Elizabethan architecture is usually referred to as Tudor.
The quick skim revealed the basic error, whether I would have seen Mike? We mortals hardly deserve such effort. May I ask how long it took you to write that for a blind eskimo on guard duty. who thinks that domesticated dogs could only be justified the sub points on a more thorough read is doubtful. The ride was only about 40 minutes about half an hour.
I guess the write up was work, so I'm used to it. I spend all day writing technical stuff at - a bit longer with stops. To be fair, I be fair on the dog. I wouldn't own one because it wouldn't self-absorbed and selfish, though.
Many dog owners are very like dogs. But I suppose many cyclists are fun, and we wouldn't be without them. My girlfriend, Ruth, has two rottweilers that are great - including this one.