Sometimes ( not often mind ) the weather gods work in your favour ..sickened by the fact that Storm Eowyn had torn to shreds our riding plans for yesterday ..I decided last night that fuggit ..I was heading out this morning and looking at the forecast it was going to get worse the longer the day progressed ..
A hard frost welcomed me as I packed the bike & gear into the car at 7.15am in the dark and 1hr 15mins later I was at the trail head in Edmundbyers, Co.Durhan to tackle a Bolts Law there & back ( thankful for the quattro system on my car after turning off onto an un-gritted road which was mainly black -ice after leaving the A68).
Even though the temperature was in the -c's I still wasn't expecting the trail to be anything other than muddy ..but not a bit of it ..frozen solid and the puddles crunchy ice ( is there a better sound while riding a bike

?) ..so the pace was lot quicker than I could have hoped for ..as I climbed steadily towards the summit of Bolts Law it became obvious that the blue sky that started the ride wasn't going to last and sure enough low cloud / fog was what greeted me at the top & beyond to the Rookhope road ..where turning back the reward is a 7km ( in the main) drop back ..fantastic !
An unexpected treat was being able to ride on top of the trail in places on 3'deep snow ..packed solid ..
One of the best winter rides Ive ever undertaken ..
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Christmas decorations still adorn this tree ( it gets decorated every year ) ..a favourite of a lot of folks standing as it does as the only tree around for miles ..
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The return journey ..
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The famous grouse ..invited me to have a nip from the bottle he had hidden in the Cairn...well it would have been rude not to..
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Cheers fella ..