I thought that heading for a colliery would be a good excuse to base this write up on the only other famous miners I could think of. Close inspection of the above photo however will show that there were ten of us, and although there are plenty of obvious candidates to be ‘Grumpy’, ‘Sleepy’, and ‘Dopey’, no one really looks like Snow White do they?
Oh well, leaving the shelter of the square we headed into the stiff breeze and made good progress through Highnam and Tibberton to Huntley. From there we passed through Blaisdon before picking up the first climb of the day – Flaxley valley to Mitcheldean.
Then it was Lea, Pontshill, and the Walford valley, before a nice sheltered spin down to Lydbrook and our second climb up to Cannop and Hopewell Colliery. Plenty of calories were taken onboard. I do like their huge rock cakes.
It was as we tried to settle up and leave that the ride first turned into a bit of a pantomime. The card reader was playing up due to a lack of internet connection. A couple of people were able to pay when the cashier went outside and stood in just the right spot in the car-park, but even this was flaky. Some had cash (remember that?) but in the end several had to leave IOUs.
Home was meant to be a nice downhill downwind dash (except for Fancy Hill out of Parkend and the drag up from Blackpool Bridge) but pantomime act two began when we realised that the road is still closed at Soudley and we had little choice but to slog all the way up Ruspidge Road to Cinderford and then back down to Littledean.
From there we really did get our wind and gravity assisted homeward fling along the A48, which went swimming well until we met the huge queue of traffic for the Over roadworks.
So, a good day out with rather more climbing that we had planned, but the weather stayed dry and the rock cake was excellent.
55.6 miles, 3,583 ft, 15.8 mph, no digging.