It was a proper hot summers night last night: high twenties. Five of us met up at my house and headed out to do pretty much the same route as Ricky and I did on the 20th of July.
Parsley and Steve had never ridden the bridleway out from Old Guadaloupe before and He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named hadn't ridden it for donkeys years; the same as Ricky and I hadn't before we rode it on the 20th. It was good to have so many people riding a "fresh" trail right on their doorstep and they all enjoyed it.
However as we pedalled the first few yards of the bridleway Steve's left crank fell off! The bolt had come undone and it had dropped off. He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named was p*ssing himself laughing behind Steve as I caught up from having closed the gate.
With the crank re-fitted we continued on at a fairly decent pace towards the bridleway from Ashby Pastures towards Ashby Folville. As I've mentioned before this bridleway is often a bit rough. Ricky, Steve and I were all on hardtails and as we approached the bridleway He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named sprinted to the front saying "I don't want to be held up by hardtails down here!". That was the gauntlet firmly down and Ricky was on his wheel in a flash with me getting on Ricky's wheel. We stayed right on the wheel of the bouncy Lapierre all the way down the trail! At the bottom I had to give a bit of "shame about being held up by that full susser eh? Ricky?" :o)
Banter done with we continued on tarmac across to Thorpe Satchville (with a slight scare from an Alsatian bounding towards us on "Dog Bite Lane") and then on to Burrough Hill. I led into the descent of Salter's Hill which currently has a multitude of rutted lines. As I made a necessary turn across an off camber dusty section I heard Ricky shouting behind as he had a "bit of a moment" doing the same. He stayed on but his heart was in his mouth!
On the climb up Burrough Parsley was starting to feel the pace (and his two week holiday!) and walked a short section while the rest of us had a jelly bean stop. Over and down the hill just left us with the usual blast back to the pub along Sandy Lane.
