We couldn’t of course match the daring of the young (and not so young) guns who got up in the middle of the night and headed to Avebury in the moonlight, but 5 of us decided to defy the forecast and head west towards the incoming weather front. Rain was expected around 11 am but it was evidently in a hurry and gave us a sprinkling before we’d even made the rendezvous in King’s Square! Setting off promptly we headed out via Westgate, taking to the cycle path to avoid the closed slip road, but my plan to turn right at Over Farm and take the cycle way to Highnam was thwarted by the crossing being closed and made pretty much inaccessible by massed ranks of traffic cones.
No matter; we stuck to the cycle way heading west then dropped onto the road and took the right turn at the traffic lights to climb past Higham church and head along the Newent road. Turning off after a couple of miles we hit the lanes to Tibberton and Kents Green, then on the lane towards Newent the raindrops began to fall – now was this to be just a smattering or the full deluge? Well neither as it turned out, but enough to make a rider properly wet so we stopped on Conigree Lane to don raincoats and continued onto the main Gorsley road. Here there must have been a downpour as the road was streaming wet – and cars were throwing up quite a spray – but soon enough we were turning off onto the Aston Ingham road where there was less traffic.
The climb up to the Penny Farthing was as horrible as usual, not helped by a slight headwind and the familiar atrocious surface (seems to have been like that for decades). Regrouping at the pub we removed rain jackets as it was now appreciably warm, and descended to Lea to cross the A40 and head for the Forest proper – but before even reaching the Drybrook turnoff the rain returned, and looked like it might mean business so once again it was on with the raincoats. Of course this meant that within about 5 minutes it stopped again, but we continued and climbed on up (the beautifully smooth surface really helping to make this a pleasant experience) to emerge at Euroclydon and regroup. Once again rainjackets were stowed away and we descended through Drybrook, through Steam Mills and took the road through Cinderford’s industrial estate to Ruspidge. Along here there were many signs of wild boar activity, huge divots of turf dug up, many of which were right up against the garden walls of the houses.
Cutting across the main road for the last decent ramp before coffeetime, we continued through Ruspidge and onto another beautifully smooth surface down to Upper Soudley, where we came to an abrupt halt as the road bridge crossing the stream was closed and barriered off – but fortunately there was a small gap for pedestrians so we wheeled our bikes through and continued on our now very quiet road to the Dean Heritage centre; arriving at 11:13 with 25 miles covered from the Square. One of our number met up with family for a pre-planned rendezvous and subsequent lift home, and the rest of us headed back by a fairly direct route, expecting more rain but actually enjoying a little sunshine and a tailwind!