Look back at 2013

We've all enjoyed those rides where we have been out for hours, have no idea of exactly which roads we have travelled or how many miles we have ridden. However, we can remember the banter, the people we rode with and the sheer joy of just being out on the bike. A feeling as close to 'Nirvana' as you are likely to get in this life. You can lose yourself on a bike; you find you are in a kind of hazy existence as a cyclist, that ordinary but boundless experience of just riding somewhere or nowhere in the company of others. Being a cyclist is living the kind of life that effortlessly but fully includes bikes and rides but is not all or perhaps even primarily about going fast and suffering nobly. Being a cyclist comes as much from the being as from the cycling.

During this last year, I have truly rediscovered this and immersed myself in the joys of club cycling with CTC Wessex where I have found a group of like-minded souls. I thought it would be fun to look back at the year-spent riding with CTC Wessex Cycling along the lanes and byways of Dorset, Hampshire and Wiltshire. Looking back our introduction to CTC was back in February when we joined the Saturday ride to Burley under the guidance of Terry Walsh and John Hayter. At the end of the ride we decided that on the following Sunday we would join the CTC ride with the Potterers. 



That first Sunday ride would have put less hardy or perhaps foolish persons off but as we said in the original blog; "It is a bitterly cold day and the cafe at the Compton Abbas is a welcome sight, a chance to chat some more and warm up over coffee and cake. Back on the bikes again and it seems colder, it probably isn't, just the effect of having been in the warm..........A great ride with great company, cycling really brings back simple pleasures. We will be back to ride with CTC Wessex again."





And of course we were back again riding regularly through the rest of last winter into spring and summer and back into autumn and winter again. Up to now we have completed 35 rides with CTC Wessex in our first 10 months with the club and have enjoyed everyone. We have visited places previously unknown to us and certainly travelled along roads we would not normally have used. We have made some wonderful friends and discovered the camaraderie of the cycling community.

It's strange looking back over our achievements and the excitement of the first fifty miler, completing the Coastlet 100k and then on to to do rides pushing us towards 80 miles. However, the real achievements are not measured in miles but in other things learned and the experience gained. Things like ride and group etiquette, a greater knowledge of the lanes and backroads, villages and hamlets discovered and for me a rekindled interest in local history. This trip through history has revealed connections along the way with a diverse group of characters ranging from Oliver Cromwell to Dr who and Worzel Gummage to John of Gaunt.

Quiet lanes
and good company

It seems to me that there are different ways to enjoy this sport of ours and for some it would appear that cycling has become a solo experience, about speed, competition and racing. Now undeniably all of this is an important part of the sport we all love but cycling is, I believe, more than just a sport and with the exception of the time trial,  not just about the individual. It is a true pastime using one of the purest forms of transport, providing recreation that makes us slow down and take in the world around us, while also doing our bit for the environment.

Me - enjoying the summer sunshine

Now, I like to push myself on the climbs, speed down the descents and occasionally race for the sign marking the start of the next village or town. I say Chapeau! To those elite cyclists who are pushing at the boundaries and moving our sport forward. However, for me having pushed myself up the climb I like to stop and enjoy the view and the banter while we wait for the group to reform. The group, the people I cycle with, that is what makes the club run special.





The reason I love cycling? It’s the shared experience of the road travelled, the opportunity to stop and look and to travel at a pace that enables you soak it all up. That is what keeps me coming back for more - so because of this I have found within CTC and the world of touring cyclists a place I want to be.



So I'm sorry CTC Wessex it appears you are lumbered with me as I'll be coming back for more in 2014!

For those of you that have enjoyed following my ramblings in the blog I promise to continue but on a new blog page to cover the 2014 rides at
http://wessexctcpotterers2014.blogspot.co.uk/

For those of you that cycle be safe and enjoy the ride and for those that don't, enjoy the read and maybe it will inspire you to dust of your bike and venture into the world of cycling.

Happy New Year and all the best for 2014 and don't forget the new web address for 2014.

CTC ride Merley Bridge to West Holme

CTC ride West Holme to Winfrith Newburgh

CTC ride to Westholme and Winfrith Newburgh

Magna Road

Its the last Sunday ride before Christmas and for me probably the last club ride of 2013, so once I have written this it will be time to close this years 'blogsite' with a review of the year before we enter 2014. However, there is this ride to deal with first and it's a start from Merley Bridge and a ride out to West Holme for coffee. Last night there had been extremely strong winds and very heavy rain so most of us had some sort of challenge just to reach the start point. I had to negotiate the newly formed lake on Magna Road and those arriving via the trailway had to climb over and through a fallen tree. So we all had a reasonable idea of what the roads were going to be like for the ride and we were all checking to make sure we had spare tubes and repair kits!

We took the usual route to West Holme carefully picking our way along the grit and debris strewn roads. The route out to coffee turns out to be uneventful and the six hardy riders that started out all get there safely.

At the tea stop we bump into the Inters who are leaving as we arrive en route to their Christmas Lunch.

John enjoys his tea

..as does Derek

..and Jim

Tea shop at West Holme

Once we have finished tea and after some discussion we decide to still try and head for our planned lunch destination of Lulworth Cove, although we have concerns about the weather that is forecast to be heading in.

We head out via East Stoke and East Burton passing the site of the Old Winfrith Nuclear Reactor. Now decommissioned, it opened in 1958 and was used for nuclear reactor research and development into the 1990s. The last reactor was shut down in 1995, although decommissioning of the site will not finish till 2021. Winfrith housed nine reactors including the experimental Dragon reactor and a large Steam Generating Heavy Water Reactor(SGHWR) feeding the National Grid from 1968 to 1990. It also housed a used nuclear fuel examination facility, with the associated hot cells. By now the wind has picked up and the skies are darkening so a decision is made to have lunch at Winfrith Church and not to push on to Lulworth and risk being caught in the midst of a 'nuclear winter!'

Winfrith in the days when operational

The stop at Winfrith Newburgh, to give the village it's proper name is lovely and the church is another gem. The other thing that the church has to recommend it to passing cyclists and walkers is a toilet accessible to the public. There has been a church on this site since the 11th Century. However, the oldest remains are from the 12th century church and include a Norman external doorway. The church is mentioned in the Doomsday Book referring to Bolla the priest who has the church of Winfode. The church today when we visit it is all ready for Christmas with nativity scenes and a mice choir atop the font Interestingly the font lid used to be locked to stop local farmers from pinching the holy water to sprinkle on fields!

After sitting under the shelter of the lych gate which leads to another interesting fact. The word lych is evolved from the saxon word for corpse and the lych gate was traditionally a place where corpse bearers carried the body of a deceased person and laid it on a communal bier. Inside the church on display is an old funeral bier, a four wheeled trolley used to carry the deceased in and out of church.

Lunch in the lych gate

Bikes parked for lunch

From here we head for home dodging the puddles, stopping at Bob C's for tea and then the ride home where the weather eventually catches up with me. I arrive home a little damp but rewarded with a rainbow but no pot of gold. However, my reward has been a great ride and as always in good company.

Puddles on the road home

Rainbow to greet my arrival home

Potterers Christmas gathering at Kevin and Kathy's

Good Food, good company and great stories! The Potterers gather at Kevin and Kathy's for pre Christmas nibbles, drinks and a chat.

CTC ride Ringwood and Fordingbridge

CTC ride Ringwood and Fordingbridge

Todays ride starts from Hurn Stores but my mind starts working well before we get there as we cycle through Kinson past one of the old thatched cottages. These old cottages now sit amongst the ex council houses that make up the various estates that surround the old village of Kinson. Kinson and the surrounding hamlets all pre date the town which they are now part of - Bournemouth. Kinson's church, St Andrews sits on the site of the original Saxon church and the present day church has its own stories to tell. 

St Andrews Kinson

The area was historically used by the smuggler Isaac Gulliver whose men would carry the contraband up from The Chines in Poole Bay and take it across Cranborne Chase to be distributed to patrons all over Southern England. Gulliver had several properties in the Kinson area; however, the contraband was stored in the tower of St Andrew's Church (the marks of the ropes used to haul it up can still be seen in the soft sandstone walls of the tower) and in several stone graves in the churchyard which were constructed for this purpose and never saw a coffin. A tunnel was also reputed to exist to allow smugglers to escape to the local river under cover (this has never been proved, however).

Also in the churchyard is the grave of one Robert Trotman, who was killed when trying to land contraband on the shore near Poole. Smugglers at the time were regarded by some as folk heroes, as they circumvented high government taxes on goods such as alcohol, tobacco, etc. The presence of his grave on open display in the churchyard, with its rhyming elegy to the deceased, is an interesting comment on the social status at the time of people who were technically criminals.

We meet up with everyone at Hurn Stores and take the direct route up Matchams Lane to Ringwood. It's only a relatively short cycle to coffee and I have just about warmed up when it is time to stop but Derek promises a jaunt across the forest before lunch. The cafe is very busy for a Sunday morning but I think it was full of people meeting prior to going Christmas shopping.

Outside the cafe is a life size bronze of a New Forest pony mare and foal by artist Priscilla Hann.

We leave the cafe and head off into the New Forest out through Linwood and past Red Shoot Wood and on to what we know as the 'airfield road'. 

It is in fact the site of Stoney Cross Airfield which Opened in November 1942. 

The airfields three runways operated R.A.F. Hurricanes and Mustangs of the Army Cooperation Command, then Stirlings, Whitleys and Albermares training Horsa glider pilots.After this D-day support given by U.S.A.A.F. P-38 and B-26s was superseded by R.A.F. Transport Command York and Dakota duties, the airfield closing in 1946. The road we cycle today follows the path of one of the runways but unfortunately no other evidence exists to show that the airfield was ever here.

From here we head out to the Roger Penny Way (rather unromantically named after a Hampshire County highways engineer) and cycle back towards Fordingbridge where we have lunch alongside the River Avon. We don't linger as it is getting colder and no-one seems keen to hang around.

So its back onto the lanes and a brisk cycle back through the edges of the forest to Ringwood. One thing I did notice today were a lot of donkeys out and about. Now we are used to seeing them but there seemed to be a lot of them out and about today, is it just me or was anyone else concerned about what they may be up to? 

View from lunch the bridge
 at Fordingbridge

Donkey's lurking in the hedgerows

From Ringwood it is a brisk cycle home and in for a hot mug of tea and put the heating on!! Thanks everyone for another great ride - see you all next time.

CTC ride Cranborne and Martin

CTC ride to Cranborne and Martin

John of Gaunt

We meet at Wimborne Recreation Ground on a fairly grey and chilly morning, it really is starting to feel like autumn now. We head out on our normal route to Cranborne going past Gaunt House which was, allegedly, once the home of  John of Gaunt, 1st Duke of Lancaster, (6 March 1340 – 3 February 1399) who was a member of the House of Plantagenet being the third surviving son of King Edward III of England and Philippa of Hainault. He was called "John of Gaunt" because he was born in Ghent, then rendered in English as Gaunt.

Horton Tower

From here it's on to Horton and the tower that sits on top of the hill looking over the road. The tower is a five red brick gothic observation tower designed and built by Humphrey Sturt who was an architect, Lord of Horton Manor and MP for Dorset. 

He was responsible for developing Crichel House at the nearby village of Moor Crichel. At Horton he had already created a 200-acre (0.81 km²) lake, and he resolved to indulge this whim again at Moor Crichel, albeit on a smaller scale. There was only one difficulty: the cottages of the village were in the way. The site of the former village of Moor Crichel now lies submerged beneath the waters of the lake. The entire village was moved to what is now called New Town at Witchampton, leaving only the church (rebuilt in 1850) and a carefully contrived landscape in front of the classical mansion. The site of the old village disappeared under the waters of a large crescent-shaped lake, around which was planted an elegantly landscaped park.

Leaving the tower or 'Sturts Folly' as it is known locally behind us we continue on towards coffee at Cranborne. On route we catch up with Alan and Ann who are finishing repairing the broken chain on their tandem trike. They were doing this alongside a humorous sign (see picture) which the club should now probably replace with one that reads 'On 17 November 2013 Alan and Ann of Wessex CTC stopped here to mend a broken chain.

We cycle on enjoying the changing colours of autumn and avoiding the wet leaves that make cycling more interesting at this time of year!

The road takes us through Edmondsham which appears as ‘Amedesham’ in the 1086 Domesday Book, the name simply means ‘homestead or enclosure belonging to a man named Eadmod or Eadmund’, from an old English personal name and ‘ham’ for homestead. After this it is Cranborne, the garden centre and coffee in The Old Potting Shed Tea Room. The garden centre is actually situated in the old walled garden of Cranborne Manor but at this point of more interest to us is the fact that there is hot drinks and excellent toasted teacakes!

After coffee it is on via Damerham to lunch at Martin. Damerham was an ancient land holding of the Saxon kings and was mentioned in the will of Alfred the Great, who desired that his men of Damerham should be free. In 940–6 Edmond 1 granted a hundred dwellings at Damerham, Martin and Pentridge to his queen Æthelflæd. Damerham may have been the birthplace of Æthelflæd who bequeathed Damerham to Glastonbury Abbey when she died in the late 10th century.

Dr Who

We are fortunate today that the church is open and we can get in for a look around as it is a lovely church with beautiful stained glass windows. Martin has another claim to fame which is very topical as we celebrate 50 years of Dr Who it was used in the episode 'The Awakening' as a film location. For those interested the episode was filmed in 1984, featured Peter Davison as the 5th Doctor and was set during the English Civil War.

Window at All Saints, Martin

Kevin and Derek

A selection of steeds......

After lunch in the churchyard at Martin the group splits with some heading for home by taking the flatter route back through Damerham while the rest of us head for the hills. It is another one of our well cycled routes that takes us up Blagdon Hill and back to Cranborne. We can tell winter is on its way as the pigs that reside on top of the hill in summer are now in their winter quarters in the shelter of the valley. We follow suit and after a brief comfort break at Cranborne follow the valley back to Wimborne and finally home.

Another great day out that has covered Plantagenets, Saxon Kings, Victorian Follies and Dr Who; who said life is dull!