Tuesday, 18 September 2012

The man who went up a hill and came down a mountain. 9th September 2012


The first foray into Wales proved successful. Lots of double LL place names and narrow country roads. All didn’t go according to the schedule, as a long first hill and difficult navigation between the hills proved time-consuming.
After dropping Elaine off at her Dad’s I set off for the first hill. (The Road to Hell)
As usual I followed the plan of driving the hill and parking at the top. It was a good move as the hill was of the longest I’ve done and it wasn’t a straightforward route. In fact, I wonder how it was graded by Mr Warren, as there were at least two substantial downhill stretches between Denbigh
 and Llyn Brenig. The parking at the top was quite exposed, but I set off down and within seconds was doing over 45 mph!
A windy descent put me at the foot of Love Lane 

and the start of an hour trip back up the eight mile climb, past some unusual wildlife!
 
A short but navigationally challenging drive soon found me at the top of Moel Arthur. I had to negotiate a narrow road and lots of cyclists to reach the top, only to be welcoming by cow bells, clapping people and waving flags.... the Eureka Sportive was passing this way. 



A quick dive down the hill, followed by a long pull back chasing another group of cyclists and I was done and heading for the last climb of the day.



Penbarra had a great viewpoint at the top, plus an ice-cream van selling whippy 99s with red sauce. A perfect end to a short, sharp climb from the main road.

22 miles 1141 m of climbing

No comments:

Post a Comment