Had my first real nightride since last December last night. Set off about 6pm and climbed until about 8pm with the sun setting over San Sebastian behind us. It was properly cold, must have been below 10degs, so the air was totally clear and we could see for miles and miles and miles. By the time we reached the descent it was totally dark so we lighted up, I took my first ever nighttime photo and we descended for about 35mins to the lights you can see in the photo.

(clicky thingy)
I'd forgotten how much fun night rides are, it's a trail I've done a lot but it felt amazingly different and the sensation of speed was amazing. My friend Carlos hasn't done much night riding but he was on my back wheel the whole way down and is a definite convert!
Advice on the photo would be fantastic, I'm keen to get some better night photos. I used 1st curtain flash, 3s shutter and set the apperature and ISO to get the right exposure. Maybe would have been better without the flash?

I too had my best night ride last night, did a short loop (10 miles) around Dalbeattie it was fantastic bar my contaminated from brake pads that put pay to one descent!!

Where did you ride?

Ahh, Dalbeattie is great for a night ride. I've only done it once and it was as a night ride. We camped around there for a weekend a good few years ago. I remember we rode some parts of it back to front and it was fantastic.
I'm in the Basque Country, north of Spain on the Atlantic coast. This is a local hill called Jaizkibel just on the Spanish/French border.

It was brilliant I've wanted to ride the spooky wood section at night since I moved up here and wasn't dissapointed.

Spain looks stunning.

that photo is ace. 😀

Cheers! It was a beautiful night. I don't think the photo is that great but it sort of captures the atmosphere. I've been totally buzzing all day and can't wait to get out again!

Night rides are so fun. I'm amused at what you call cold these days!

Yeah slw! I was quite dissapointed in myself shivering last night but felt better when I got up this morning and there was a hard frost! Need to do that night ride next time you're out here.

Doug

Wait until you get home here and come out on a night ride with us, 10degrees is tropical 😆

Ha! Yeah Gordy, I'm looking forward to getting some Highlands night rides in over Christmas. It's true, there was no danger of having to urinate on anyone's freehub last night!

I love the photo. The silhouette of the rider sitting ghostly behind his lights is a really great and refreshing perspective.

Although the light trains you can get from a early or late flash are interesting to demonstrate movement, I think that your shot captures a feeling of "the unknown lying in wait ahead of the rider" that other shots don't capture.

Exposure-wise I think it's perfect and your use of flash works very well in this instance. Any longer you'd burn out the area in front of the rider, any less and you'd probably miss some details like the coastline.

Camera settings are usually f4.0 6 secs iso 100 daylight wb.

That descent looks tantalising. San Sebastian is a beautiful city too.

minus 10 already? that's colder than than were I am, 30K north of stockholm!

minus 10 already?

Think he meant below 10 degress as in 0 – 9 degrees, not actually minus 10

Yeah, below 10! San Sebastian is a beautiful city, I wouldn't want to live there but it's great to visit.

Cheers for the picture comments. Need a bit more 'night time' practice though!

I did my first night ride a few weeks back. The first pedal strokes out of the changeover at D2D were my first ever turn of the wheel at night on trails. Strange time to start to ride at night but it was a good way to do it.