North Wales Day 2

Day 2

We arrived back into Llangollen just as it was becoming dusk, we hadn’t had any real rain but it was over cast and damp. Before putting the bike away we refuelled ready for a quick start in the morning.

The hotel was quite a tidy but Spartan affair, but it suited us. We got partially changed in the car park to minimise the amount of dirt we walked into the hotel.    I couldn’t see a posh hotel allowing bikers to walk in and out as they do. They had a hanging rail in the bedroom and a heater which was handy to dry out the clothes, the bed was hard and I couldn’t find the free wi-fi they advertised, however my room had a deep bath with plenty of hot water and that’s the main thing.

That evening we sat down in the hotel bar to a nice pub lunch, where we join by Wolfie and his son George. We talked about tomorrow’s ride and while Dave had the route plotted on his GPS, I backed it up onto my Satmap and showed Wolfie how to map the route onto his Satmap. With time ticking on and the route mapped I retired back to my room to get some kip before the morning’s ride.

I awoke early to watch the sun rise, well as much as I could through the changing weather, sunrise, rain, sunshine and rainbows. The wind had picked up considerably too. Soon it was time to go down for breakfast, a buffet affair where you could have anything from yoghurt and cereal, to a full blow English, and if you felt really hungry you could have everything. But today for me would see sensible eating something that would fuel the body for a good day’s riding.

 

 

Breakfast done it was back up to the room, pack up, get kitted up ready for the ride and checked out of the hotel.  The weather so far today had managed to throw everything at us apart from snow. This was going to be the setting for the rest of the day.

Four of us sat in the rain, waiting in the hotel car park whilst the others filled their tanks with fuel; the ride that was planned would see us having to fill up half way round to be able to return, so the tanks were brimmed to be sure. The rain turned to drizzle and we were finally on our way. The ride saw us making our way through a housing estate, not the norm for getting to a lane. We edged our way to the outskirts of the village where we found our first lane, the lane started as a single laned track of broken potholed tarmac which lead up to and weaved between a couple of houses. Once past the houses the lane deteriorated until it became a mixture of shale, stones and large rocks. The lane was slowly climbing and had now turned to mud and stone. The lane turned again and the climb started to increase, for a while the mud got deeper and the stones bigger. Leaves covered most of the surface, the only part they couldn’t cover was the small rain water cut streams that were running down the hill. These little streams exposed a glimpse of the surface to come.

 

 

 

The hill suddenly became steep, the rain had on this point of the climb washed all the soil away and the surface was a solid slate stepped affair strewn with rocks and boulders. This was one of those climbs, where you knew you couldn’t stop until you had reached the summit. Unfortunately that wasn’t going to happen anytime soon. Dave had stopped at the bottom of the hill to assess the situation. Wolfie had gotten most of the way up but had stopped at a very large step up on the right hand side. His son had stopped about 10 yards further down. I was heading up the right hand side, I realised I had to get over to the left but got boxed in by Dean, who was bouncing all over the place. So I came to rest just behind George. Dean continued to bounce and paddle his way up until he finally got spat off just before the step up.  Colin also managed to slip passed skidding left and right until a moment later he got spat off too. We then spent what seemed like an age slipping and sliding trying to lift, drag and carry our bikes up the hill and over the step up. Wolfie had the idea that if he went all the way back down, he could then come up the left hand side and get up to and over the lip. This second attempt saw him fail even further down the hill from where I had got boxed in.

 

 

 

Finally we had all made it up and over the step, and just in time as 3 Landrovers roared up the trail. Once we had regained our breathe we set off to tackle the rest of the climb. Colin and Wolfie were the first off followed by Dave then me.  As we climbed the hill two bikers were heading down and I wondered which way I would have preferred to tackle the hill. A little further up, Dave caught the wrong line and was soon off, for the third time this weekend.  I felt bad as I passed, but it was one of those climbs where it is better to get to the top then walk back down, than to stop and try and get started again. Once the trail levelled off at the top of the hill we waited.  Wolfie had stopped about three quarters of the way up, but soon both he and Dave joined us.

 

 

 

The wind was blowing so hard it was driving the rain almost horizontally across the hill top into us, then all of a sudden the rain stopped and the sun came out leaving a rainbow across the valley below. A short while later the three Landrovers passed us followed by Dean and George. They had decided to let the Landrovers go first whilst they took a short break then followed them up.  We took a short break then carried on our way.  The sun shone whilst we made our way to the second lane and stayed with us. The second lane was another step climb of mud and rock, the rain was running down the hill in a torrent and had washed a gully out that weaved its way from side to side and exposed the slate bedrock. The climb was technical trying to think ahead, but we were lucky to have made it passed the worse of it when we met the Landrovers again, but this time they were coming the other way. The lane was narrow and tight but the guys in the landrovers managed to back up and pull into a field to let us pass. Thanks Lads. We stopped and chatted for a while and they informed us off some nice lanes to ride, which once home we were to investigate and plot for our next visit. This was the last time we saw these guys.

 

 

 

We finished the climb and hit the third lane which was a short flat typical farm track, the fourth lane was a heavily rutted lane, but not by 4x4’s as the ramblers like to say and blame, but by heavy farm machinery. The lane was relatively flat and the water lay brim deep in the ruts, the muddy brown water hiding what lay beneath.  We ventured forward chancing each puddle as we went; all bar one of the puddles was forgiving. Luckily we were traveling slowly through the watery lane, because there beneath the murky cover lay a deep and nasty rut that swallowed the front wheel. Fortunately it wasn’t that long a rut and we were soon through without drowning any of the bikes.

The sun was now shining and the day was turning out to be better than expected and not as forecast.  Some more road work saw us onto the next lane. This lane was the same lane we had fun with yesterday, the one where Colin, Dean and Dave had struggled. But this time we were armed with the knowledge of how to tackle the slippery slate bedrock that had caught us out before. Holding the gate open I let the others get ahead, everyone had disappeared around the corner by the time I was back on my bike so I headed on up.  As I rounded the corner I saw Colin and George stuck on the slate.  George I could understand because he wasn’t with us yesterday but Colin should have known better.  I passed safely and when further up the track waited to see if I needed to go back and give them a hand, but several minutes later they were on their way. As they headed up the lane the low autumn sun shone silver off of the wet slate and running water. The clouds on the horizon looked ominous, but for now we basked in the sunshine.

The sunshine was not to last though. We took some narrow country lanes to the next trail, having to stop for a while, whilst a farmer on a quad drove some cattle from the opposite direction to a field we’d passed. The drizzle started and when we got to the next it had turn to rain, we took a break at the gate where I changed memory card and battery on my camera.  It was here that Colin’s bike stand decided to parted company from the rest of his bike. By the time we set off again the rain was being driving by the howling wind and day had turned into that which had been forecast. The trail started by following a hill top with a deep valley just off to the right of us, the trail then slowly made its way down into the valley, criss-crossing mountain streams, the trail itself was a mixture of stone and rock, loose slate shale, or compacted, rutted and smooth (as trails go).

 

 There was a section in the middle were the trail cut through a marsh and a wooden sleeper raised surface had been put in place. It was a good idea but with all the local rock lying around I would have thought that, that would have been a harder wearing and more sustainable surface. This obstacle did throw up a hazard in the form of an unpredictable surface, the surface had been polished smooth from the tyres and was very wet and slippery. It was this surface that saw George pirouette his bike and get spat off. The first sleeper sat on top of the slate trail, so a small amount of gas was required to lift the front wheel on to it, then a second blip to make sure the back wheel followed. It’s my guess that George gave it too big a handful, the rear wheel got traction and over took the front, spinning him round and throwing him off.  This make shift surface didn’t last too long, but it did make you concentrate and think about your throttle control.

 

As we neared the end of this trail the sun tried it’s hardest to come through, but its attempts were short lived. Although for a while rainbows smiled over the valleys. The trail crossed several small streams and to the right now ran a stone wall. We passed through a gate and had to negotiate a small section of step rutted slate bedrock to reach the tarmac road.

Dave now wanted to explore and find a trail that was not on our original route, this of course saw us getting temporarily lost. Well it wouldn’t be a proper Wales trip unless we got lost, now would it. Finally back on track we found ourselves following a lovely lane cut into the side of the mountain lined with large pine trees. The lane came to an end at a large house but the trail continued through a gate and across a large white bubbling river, it was a bit of an unknown quantity, but the trail clearly crossed here, it was just how slippery it was going to be, the whiteness gave away that it wasn’t that deep. We all made it across safely despite a few having to dab a foot just to make sure. The trail then climbed steeply up the mountain side. Sometimes exposed and sometimes through forest. Soon the trail cut through the open mountain top, brown/green grass lay either side, the water tumbling over the slate bedrock. It was at this point that the sun tried to make another attempt of showing its self. Unfortunately it managed too, but at this point it was more of a hindrance than a help. As we were riding directly into the sun and because it was now made ten times worse by the fact it was reflecting off of the wet slate and water. The trail stopped at a main road, the sun now gone but up here on the exposed mountain top the wind howled.

 

We turned right on to the road, as we now had to get to the halfway point to refuel. As we made our way along the road one large gust saw George get blown from one side of the road to the other. Luckily no other vehicles were coming the other way. The wind and rain was now relentless and the water had found its way into every gap in our clothing. At the garage we fuelled the bikes and ourselves. The day had taken its toll on all of us in one way or another. We checked the return route and despite all wanting to go on we all decided that in fact the best and only real option we had was to make our way back to the hotel via the roads. As the rain eased once more we stared our road ride back to Llangollen. As we pulled into the small Welsh town for the last time Colin’s bike started to play up but we had made it. Once again the heavens opened, but we took shelter in the back of the van and got changed into some warm dry clothes. With the bikes loaded we took advantage of the hotel’s hospitality one last time and treated ourselves to a nice hot Sunday roast.

 

Now all that was left was the long drive home, which thankfully I didn’t have to worry about as I sat snug in the back. Quick thanks to Dave for arranging and working out the ride and Colin for doing all the driving.