Try Home Farm B&B in Beachampton. About 10mins into MK via back roads through Whaddon with no traffic. Next door to the Bell pub for evening meals, log fires etc.
+1 for Bell at Beachampton. Also another +1 for Stony Stratford. MK is more your Holiday Inn for of vibe, accomodation wise. Have a look on tripadvisor.co.uk
Not meaning to deflect you all from the the important job of making remote personal attacks on people you’ve never met (!) but I seem to see an idea for a ghetto tyre mod. Liking the whole cable tie thing, and the bath chain is a nice variation but hard to get right? Has anyone tried making ghetto tyre socks with sacking fastened on the tyre with cable ties? Seems to me would also add lateral grip, would be cheap, and best of all would be ghetto. Presume has been dome before? If so, please resume the attacks. Thanks for your attention.
The Fall
Blue Aeroplanes
Pavement
Arcade Fire
Jungle Brothers
Tribe Called Quest
Public Enemy
Mogwai
Velvet Underground
Belle & Sebastian
Elbow
LCD Soundsystem
The Specials
The Beat
Portishead
Parliament
Pulp
REM
Radiohead
Talking Heads
Vampire Weekend
De La Soul
a) all the way now for me. Would prefer in the back of the car for security but currently in a saloon and a bit of a faff to load/unload. Used to use rear rack but was never happy it was safely secured. Roof is best bet for me.
You’ll make your own mind up, of course, but FWIW I went for a Zesty with alu frame (budget stretched to the max abd carbon etc. out of my league…) and so far it’s been brilliant. No issues at all, rides superbly and is far more competent than I am…
What was it they used to day – overpaid, over-biked and over here? No – that was about the yanks so must have been about Santa Cruz. 🙄
I’d be very wary of first generation FreeLander. Had a horrific reputation (there was an expose in CAR magazine based on internal docs of all the faults that LR were aware of). If you want a cheap reliable 4×4 and aren’t worried about being fashionable, I’d suggest a look at second generation Vauxhall Frontera. Just my pov.
Quick wobble around Woburn this morning. What a lovely day for a bike ride. Was optimistic that I have overnight become a complete cycling God due to massively increased speed over same place last week. However, reading some of the comments above I have to admit that perhaps the substitution of sloppy mud for hard frozen ground may have contributed. Slightly.
Will put up with Jools if it gets Arcade Fire on the TV. They weren’t at their best (previous appearance on Jools was a blinder) but on a bad day they are better than most – even that old man with the long hair who was on. Who the hell was he???
As a newcomer to Woburn (just moved to the area) I find it almost impossible to find my way around, and am lost most of the time. Doesn’t help that I am normally there in the dark. If you have any form of GPS type thingy (I use phone) I’d suggest just ride around and follow your nose on whatever looks like a nice trail, then half an hour before home time get the phone out and try and figure out how the hell you get back to where you started. And on no account do that late at night with fading lights and with your spare batteries on your kitchen worktop. Hypothetically.
I’ll be there tonight after work. As usual I will be lost within ten minutes. Took me half an hour to figure out how to get back to my car last week. Envy you the chance to go in daylight – hoping to find the time this weekend…
Am about to write my Santa list – going to ask for a voucher to get myself some Jedi skillz (as I am sure young people would say). Maybe I’ll see you there next year Jedi if Santa is feeling generous!
My Jersey ordered last weekend – arrived Wednesday. OK with me. Good quality too – never heard of Funkier before but impressed. The fit is a bit roadie but if I lay off the pies…
+1 for M520s. Under 20 quid and do the job every time. If you wish to shed a few grammes, save the exorbitant expense of the top of range models and simply empty the loose change from your pockets before you ride. Simples.
If you are using sugar, use honey instead. Also +1 for malt extract. And another +1 for a starter made day before.
Must go. Got an inexplicable desire for a sarnie…
Army surplus goretex trousers over any old thing to avoid skin contact with cold inner surface. I wear some old thermals under mine and works a treat for very little money. Had to sew on some velcro at the hems to avoid excess flappage…
For anyone reading this and wondering which is the “best” DX torch, a word of advice from my personal POV. You can spend your entire life perusing the bewildering array and still not know what to get. Best thing to do is just pick one and go for it.
All the latest LED torches using the high output emitters are bright enough for off road riding, so you can’t really get it very wrong. A P7 is VERY bright, so just pick one of those for the bars and either another for head if you want it, or maybe something a little smaller – in which case at present I’d say look for something with an CREE xpg as the emitter.
Give yourself a pre-set amount of time for messing about on the DX site and then just hit the order button or you’ll be there for weeks. I have a couple of P7s and while there may be others with “better” beam patterns, the two of them together chuck out so much light it’s not really a big deal – they are more than enough for me…
Remembered what my friends bike is – a Proflex. A profoundly strange machine (but was clearly quite the thing at one point – carbon fibre forks etc.). To make it weirder, he has a road cassette on it…
My Trek VRX went on ebay. I have a friend who has the weirdest full suss I ever saw – can’t remember what it’s called but has strange cantiliver front suspension. Interesting, but rubbish. He labours under the misapprehension it’s worth a fortune…
Know what you mean about an expensive fad gadget (wasn’t there a post about band names earlier today..?). However, nowhere near £150 (my basic model Panasonic was £70 off Amazon). At end of day, the easier it is the more likely it is you’ll bother. I can set a loaf up with start button pressed in less than five minutes, and if you want to get fancy you can just do a dough cycle then take dough out, knock back and shape before oven baking. Best kitchen gadget ever, and I think bread making is the next BBQ for “blokes” cooking. You can even take the machine apart and fix it – who could ask for more…
I just got some from convertape. They were quick and price was OK as I didn’t need much. I could have saved a couple of quid if I spent hours faffing about the interweb, but surely life is too short. Anyway, it was easy to fit and seems thick and hardwearing so very pleased. Full marks from me.
Used ’em all last winter and they were toasty. Not totally waterproof buy goon enough for 95% of rides to end with dry feet. As it happens had them on this evening for first time this year, and if anything was a bit too warm…
As someone already said, I’d put my effort more into what to wear rather than what to ride. Any bike will do if you stick to compacted trails. Watch out for north facing slopes on milder days – when all else is melting they stay frozen. Once saw eight people come off in quick succession in that circumstance – if I had it on video Jeremy Beadle would have made me a rich man. Probably.
Did it several times a week all last winter. Did not die. No-one knew where I was and usually didn’t have a phone. However, this winter have decided to be a bit more sensible and at least take a phone (especially as riding in a new area so I am usually lost).
I use two P7s – one on bars and another on head. Latter has a more spot type beam to pick out trail further ahead. Works very well, except the head spot is a bit big and heavy to be comfortable. Planning on getting something a bit lighter – probably XP-G as suggested above. Less than $15 from DX.
I have the same requirement, but not found anything yet. I want to get OS maps onto a Blackberry, but can’t find a way. There are a few apps aimed at treckers/bikers, but most seem US biased and no decent maps for UK. You can use the inbuilt mapping or google mobile maps, but neither are any good as far as I can see if you are off the beaten track. I suspect there is a way to get OS maps to work with an app called Trekbuddy, but you’d need to devote a fair bit of time and effort to do it. I can think of better ways to use my free time (like going for a bike ride, for example…)
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