Can you add “obsession with lists of things”.
It must be a slow news week or lack of freebies week at STW Towers :-)

I live in Broadmayne only a few miles away from Eweleaze Farm (as the crow flies). We are blessed with miles and miles of bridleways in Dorset so you are spoilt for choice. I would ride an MTB to make the most of trails, some can be very lumpy especially if they are dried out after being used by horse riders. Best to get an OS map out and have a look, but I would suggest …

Go west along the South Dorset Ridgeway to Hardy’s monument, drop down into Abbotsbury and come back along the quiet back lanes and a few BW’s into Weymouth

Go East on the Inland Coastal Path to Lulworth via the top of Ringstead Bay and come back on the the path that runs parallel to and just north of the ICP.

North is Puddletown Forest, but you won’t make the best of that unless you ride with one of the locals, none of it is sign posted and you could spend a couple of days just exploring

Wareham Forest has loads of gravel trails

The Purbecks are brilliant, loads of trails, some big climbs and descents

If you are looking for an off-road route you could use The King Alfred’s Way trail. The section between Winchester and Salisbury is just north of the New Forest. Follow it clockwise until Wantage, from there you can use an NCR which runs thru Didcot and Abingdon and then into Oxford.

Check out the website – King Alfred’s Way | Cycling UK

Guarantee you won’t see any of these on a trail anywhere near you anytime soon. Roadie wear!

@Hannah explain to your daughter that, in the words of every sports pundit, “you can only play what’s in front of you!”
I am playing in the final of our Squash Club’s veterans tournament tonight, it doesn’t matter that only 6 people entered, I will still be the club Vets champion if I win. :-)

@codybrennan – I didn’t get the “sister Norma” comment so googled Norma Stitz, OMG I wish I hadn’t!!!!!

@argee Looking at the prices there isn’t too much difference between the high end HT Uurun and the low end FS Rise H30.

@thegeneralist, get your drift, but you say tomato and I say tomato. If I am carrying all my “stuff” from a to b to c to d etc, but not necessarily camping, I would still call that bike-packing or touring.

As e-bikes go the Orbea range are (imho) by far the best looking ones on the market. I would be interested to know what the rough mileage figures are, i.e. roughly how far can I go. Could this be a bike packing option with the range extender, assuming of course your overnight stops include somewhere to charge the bike. One significant draw back to this is not being able to remove the battery to charge it.

@jeffl very similar to your “lady in car” story …..
While on my MTB ride this morning I came across two ladies riding horses towards me on a Bridleway in Moreton Forest, I politely pulled off the track so that they could get past and said good morning.
1st lady (in a very posh voice) “you shouldn’t be riding a bike on this bridleway”
me “it’s a bridleway so actually I can ride on it”
1st lady “well you shouldn’t be”
me “well if I can’t ride my bike on it then you shouldn’t be riding your horses on it either”
1st lady “ummm, errr, well, errrrr, ummmmmm …. well I don’t think you should be”
2nd lady (even posher voice) “well lets just agree to disagree shall we”
We went our separate ways with me wondering what time portal I had slipped thru to be in a Jane Austen novel where only the landed gentry are allowed to use the bridleways on their horses.

Ok I’ll be the first to say it, how much(!) for the Rapha t-shirt! It’s a t-shirt for gods sake, not even a very nice colour. It’s a £20 t-shirt with a £40 badge, I don’t care how light or technical it might (?) be. This mornings news was little apart from stories about families who can’t afford food, pets being taken to shelters because their owners can’t afford the food or vet bills, oh and something about Keir Starmer doing Sharon Stone impressions (might of been another politician) and Rapha think its ok to launch a £60 t-shirt.
Ok rant over, feel a bit better now, perhaps it’s time for lie down :-)

@mattkkitch / @chrisdavids
e-bikes could well be part of problem. Grinding up a hill on my “normally aspirated” Stumpjumper I have never had anything but encouragement, courtesy and the odd joke from passing walkers, but not sure I would get the same reaction if I effortlessly zoom past on an e-bike.

Locally (Dorset) I am now seeing e-bikes in places where I never used to see anybody apart from the occasional dog walker. People are now able to go to places (top of hills mostly) that they would never consider going to without an e-bike to get them there.

So is this good or bad? It’s great the more people are out riding bikes and for some no e-bike means no riding (two friends I regularly ride with definitely couldn’t do so without e-help). However this means more people on bikes where you wouldn’t have seen them 5 years ago and therefore there is more likely to be conflict with other trail users.

One other issue for which I have absolutely no hard evidence. I learnt about MTB’ing over a long period of time (been doing it for 30ish years) going from short local rides to much longer and more adventurous ones as fitness and bikes improved. Reading a map (way before Garmin and smart phones), understanding where you could go and more importantly where you couldn’t, taking the right food and drink, having tools/spare parts and the knowledge to use them was all part of that learning process. Now I see people on the trail with an e-bike, a phone and bottle of Evian and I wonder what their plan B is when it all goes horribly wrong? Ok I am exaggerating a little, but it does now seem that the instant E-Bike Weekend Warrior is just the swipe of a credit card away. Someone will probably say that it was the same when I started, but the difference is back then I had to build up the fitness to go further afield, now that can be bought by just splashing some cash.

@Alex the phone box at the Saracens Head, mind you this was taken in 2009! Seems like yesterday though :-)

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@Daffy A hardtail on the Quantocks descents …… Kudos :-)

@alex Saracens Head at Symonds Yat one of my favourite pubs, have they still got the old red phone box in the bar?

That Ground Effect stuff looks great, never heard of them before, expensive, but it’s mostly Merino so you get what you pay for.

@oceanskipper –  given the different sizes of tyre, 27.5 and 29 and 700c, and widths skinny gravel tyres to 2.6 (or more!) the amount of fluid is probably a bit of guesswork. Never seen a tyre size vs fluid amount chart anywhere, but there probably is one on the bits of paper that come with the fluid that I rarely read. :-)
I use Stan’s and they recommend 4 fluid oz per tyre, but I usually put in a splash more for luck, after all you can lose a bit as the tyre seals and had what seems quite lot spray out when a puncture seals. Better to have a little more than a little less I think.

Don’t like hot (very spicey) food so ignoring the recipes with chilli’s, but luv crumpets and eggs so the Eggy Crumpets sound delicious, a must try this winter (we only have crumpets in the winter months in our house for some reason that I don’t understand!)

mag hasn’t hit the doormat yet and half the articles already seem to be on the website! ummmmmmm?

Just saying ….

Like @intheborders I used TFTuned’s service to pick my shock and forks, only £13. They e-mailed me the address labels and arranged the pick up, I just had to be home when the collection people (DPD) arrived. All went very well. Their service was excellent, they guy who did the service rang me while he was doing it and talked me thru all the bits that needed sorting. Collected, serviced and returned in a week. I would have thought that if you let all the air out of the shock/forks they shouldn’t be dangerous at all, I always do this anyway before removing them from the bike frame.

@rocketdog –
That toastie look lush, I can almost taste the melted cheese …………..
Blind cats everywhere there then!!!

Had a bimble out on the local trails this morning in the sunshine, but forgot to take any pics, enjoying the peace, tranquility, bird song and sun too much! :-)

Agree with @andrewh someone born male who goes thru puberty and then changes to female will have a massive physical advantage over someone born female. It definitely wouldn’t be a level playing field. Also check out Prof Robert Winston’s comments on this subject on Question Time last year.

Both my “boys” are in their 30’s now, but I remember the youngest finally beating me at Squash, he never looked back and I rarely got close to him after that. I can still out do the eldest on an MTB, but he doesn’t ride that often and bench presses huge weights that make me sweat just looking at them :-)

What Has It Got In Its Pocketses Precious?

Agree with @intheborders the displays don’t tell anything you don’t already know, i.e. you just switched on the heating/kettle/shower/lights/oven/etc…..

The TV adverts harp on about saving money, but Smart meters alone don’t, if you don’t already see the connection between switching “stuff” on and the size of your power bills then they aren’t really going to help you. The only thing they do well is give frequent up to date meter readings to your energy provider and that is only if the energy provider can connect to the smart meter, not always the case with Gen 1 smart meters as in the one we have!

Absolutely none! Retired at 53, lucky enough to be financially secure and had a great time ever since. Luv getting up in the morning and saying “what shall I do today?”, the options are endless.

@charlie @oldfart – I was born and brung up in South London, but moved to Dorset (small village near Dorchester) in 1990, never looked back, luv it here, with the added bonus of great trails on my doorstep :-)

50 Not Out, “well played sir”, have a good one Charlie. I have done more “stuff” since I was 50 (now 66) than I did in the previous 25-30 years when the mind was concentrating (for good reasons and in no particular order) on family, work, house, mortgage, kids, money, etc. Still riding a couple of times every week and haven’t got an e-bike (yet! :-) ).

Circuit of Portland yesterday, bright sunshine and fluffy clouds, but a bitterly cold north wind in exposed places. Coming back from the island across the Causeway straight into the wind was a dog! Dentist appointment in the afternoon meant no beer at the end of the ride, but very good coffee and brownie at The Sandsfoot Castle Cafe.

10/10 for this one @hannah :-)

Nice try @Hannah, 8/10 for effort :-)

Purbecks “killer loop” (from MBR I think) yesterday, never get tired of the view from Nine Barrow Down looking down to Corfe Castle.

Beer at the Scott Arms (Kingston), great views from their garden down the valley to Corfe Castle, very good HEC for lunch as well.

Superlative on the front in the clart

Clart?

Unfortunately my post “isn’t jumpy, it’s just grumpy!” Photo of the fly tipping we saw near Bockhampton on the way home from a 30 mile loop around the South Dorset Ridgeway and Puddletown Forest. Looks like some b*stard has cleared out a fast food shop and thought a passing place on this quiet country lane would be the ideal place to leave it!! :-(

“And These obviously because I like the brand name”

@dangeourbrain – and presumably because you are under 8 years old, which is the largest size they do :-)

Quiet bimble around Wareham Forest (Dorset) this morning, only pic was of the muddy trail and I forgot to take a pic of the slice of Orange & Chocolate cake at The Barn Cafe, it was flipping huge!!

Have a look at Montane’s Featherlite jackets, super lite and keep the wind out, I have the smock version. Cheap compared to jackets/brands already mentioned here. Now my go to jacket, unless it’s raining, been using it all winter with just a couple of thin layers underneath. Lite and packs down small enough to pop in pocket!

Cheers @rhayter I will keep an eye on it and see how it goes. I did clean that section of the tyre as much as I could so hopefully the patch will remain in place.

This thread was a couple of days too late for me. Had a small split in the tyre after a ride on Sunday, too big for the Stans Race to seal it, luckily I was home by the time the tyre started to deflate significantly. Used a piece of an old inner tube and some patch repair glue on the inside of the tyre and so far it seems to have worked ok.
Would the latex affect the glue over time?
The Tip Top Blue Cement products look good, thanks for the tip guys, will get some for any future repairs.

Purbecks yesterday, blowing a hooley, but behind us when riding up from Old Harry Rocks and east to west up Ballard Down, Godlingston Hill was a slow grind though.

When our Springer Spaniel had puppies our German Shepherd seemed to be jealous and regularly stole one for herself. When mum realised one was missing she would go find the GS and pick up the pup and take it back to the run we had built for them.

Heshe our GS with a stolen puppy …..