Finished a contract late July. Went on a long family holiday. Decided I really couldn’t be bothered to work again for a bit. Until we have to start stealing and boiling the neighbours’ shoes for food 😉

[url=https://flic.kr/p/ovnK5y]Fairly sure..[/url] by Alex Leigh, on Flickr

Not ridden these woods for ages. Vaguely remembered some trails. Found a few more. Took this while hiding from a massive rain storm which made all the roots (of which these woods have many) slick. Fairly sure I’ve fallen into that hole when I first rode up here.

[img]https://farm4.staticflickr.com/3890/14772373067_bfc121799c_c.jpg[/img]

Been a bit of building as well I see 😉 Rode that twice – I’d just like to say again it was blooming wet – first time lack of comittment, nearly nosed it, second time it went very well until I hit a patch of mud on landing and nearly went out the front door. I didn’t try it a third time!

My conclusions from this ride were a) it’s good to go back and ride stuff you used too and b) I’m not desperate to find a job while the trails are not a muddy mess.

Wonder what I’ll do tomorrow…. actually I know what I’ll be doing and it’ll involve a garden fork not a mountain bike!

Alex, That is a shame as i’m strava stalking you and have been enjoying your recent forays! Heading off to Ross on wye tonight for an explore in fact

out of interest why did you get rid of the rocket and go for the pyga?

Mark

I’m currently going through a contract renewal process with one of my biggest clients. I’m torn between pulling the stops out to secure it and thinking 3 months off riding bikes would actually be very nice

I’m enjoying the time off. Woke up at 7am this morning, thought ‘oh @@@@ it’s a work day’ then realised not for me it wasn’t and went back to sleep for an hour or two. My plan for contracting was always to work 9 and take 3 off. Never happened and I decided this year it bloody well was going to. So far, so good. Only mildly troubled by feelings of guilt.

Mark – come and have a ride then! Drop me your details (email in profile). Will be riding at least twice more this week, possibly every day if poss. There’s a great ride group that go out Weds and Fri – give Nic (the mechanic) a call at revolutions ar Ross and tell him I sent you. There’s some lovely stuff just above Ross mainly built by that crew but you need to be shown it as it’s quite stealthy.

The Rocket went as it was a proper mans bicycle and I wasn’t man enough! Simple as that really. The PYGA probably isn’t quite as good going down (with me being the limiting factor obviously) but as an all round trail bike it suits me better. And of course I do have a Nukeproof Mega as well 🙂

Alex,
Thank you for the offer but working in swindon now means a bit of a trek back for an hours riding recently. Looks like we ride the same local routes, im sure we’ll meet at some point, that Pyga’s not exactly subtle , look out for a TI brodie!

Will stop by revolutions, havent been in before as id wrongly assumed it was just shopping bikes

Many thanks and keep the pics coming

Alex,

we had a great night, managed to get truely lost then met a couple of locals who showed us the good stuff. Bit gutted i took the anthem as some of that stuff was pretty steep. Gonna be heading back there again, skyline was brilliant in the dark with no lights 🙂

Excellent. There’s definitely a lot there to ride. It’s even more *fun* in the wet 😉 Skyline is one of my favourites. Hope to see you up there sometime.