I woke around 7am to a silent house, and got packed up ready to leave Gloucestershire for Wales. Today was to be a much easier ride than the previous two days - 80 hilly miles on the first day followed by 60ish hilly miles in Leics and Rutland had taken its toll on my knees, so all I was doing was following the River Severn down to Cardiff, a nice, flat journey.
I eventually got rolling about 9.30am. It was a much warmer day than the previous two, but overcast and gloomy, with a bit more breeze. Steve had suggested a "scenic" route (euphemism for hilly), but as I wanted to spend some time with a friend in Cardiff, I was conscious of the time, so headed straight along the main A48 to Chepstow. Once through the seething metropolis, I turned off for Caldicot, and wound down some lovely tiny lanes which make up NCN Route 4 to Newport, through the villages and hamlets of Undy and Nash, coming back to so-called civilisation at the Newport Transporter Bridge, which had closed 5 minutes before I got there.
As I re-routed over the next bridge my front tyre punctured, and when I stopped to mend it, I noticed that my pannier rack had lost a bolt. I had a couple of spares in the bolt holes of my forks, so it was soon repaired and I was back on the road. I'd contacted my friend Colin who'd said he would ride out along the coast road to meet me, and despite becoming fairly lost and getting stuck on the horrible A48, I managed to find my way south and meet up with him at St Brides.
We took a leisurely ride into Cardiff, and had a bite to eat on the Lightship in the bay, then I headed off to get a train back to Pembrokeshire.
My GPS reckoned I'd travelled 355km, which is around 220 miles. 20 miles of that was by car while my GPS ws still switched on in the back of Steve's van, so call it a round 200 miles.
Enough to make anyone's knees hurt a bit.
No comments:
Post a Comment