7th October 2014 Old Gits Gallop 23

Gallop because we charged round hoping no more rain would arrive after a wet start.  Change of route today, heading out to Brean and the cafe at the foot of Brean Down.  We gathered at a different location today, at Royal Sands near the sea front. As we assembled, the heavens opened and we had to shelter under a couple of trees. That was a good opportunity to put our wet weather gear on before setting off.  We met one other Old Git after going through uphill and decided at that stage to cut the route short and have a tea/coffee at the Hobbs Boat on the main road.

Bird Cafe

Luckily, the rain eased off and just outside Lympsham we regrouped and decided to extend the ride and make our way into Brean. With blue skies on the horizon it made sense. When we arrived at the National Trust Cafe it was closed. Oh dear. A few yards further on is the cafe at the entrance to the Bird Exhibition. That was closed as well. That is until Norman rattled the door handle and made the appropriate signals that we were all dying of thirst. Toasted tea cake and a cup of tea followed. Sorted. On return to our bikes, Geoff, that's him in the middle found a gull had deposited a large load on his saddle. To make matters worse it had dried on whilst we were noshing. Les commenting that he should buy a lottery ticket did not help matters.

Large load times two

On the return journey, the road from Brean to Lympsham is quite narrow and very twisty. At one point a large tractor and trailer had to stop on a sharp bend because of an arctic on the otherside of the bend was loading up. Ever thoughtful and resourceful we just rode past it.

Overall a good ride. The weather was pants to start of with but cleared up nicely later. A different route to usual, I covered 23 miles today.

Oh yes. I took my laptop all the way into Bristol to the Apple Store. A complete diagnostic check of the computer and the battery showed nothing. When I got there, they plugged it and the charger in and it worked fine.  Grrrrrrr. At least there was no bill at the end of it.