10/10/2012

Day 40 Gloucester to Lynmouth

The day started well with good weather and a straight flat ride. There was a few things you could notice coming from Wale to England, the first was the space, openness of the rolling hills and fields, in Wales everything was close together and a lot more compact. The second thing is that you could really see the changing of seasons here much more than in Wales.

This place reminded me of a band that I really liked back in the day, Portishead, I don't know if they are related.

I was flying through the the day and even got a bit over confident thinking that I'm making pudding of this day's cycling until I hit Quatock Hills in Somerset and I thought to myself, OK I didn't see that coming and battled on. I then got to Exmoor National Park and thought, I shouldn't have been so cheeky thinking I was hard, but nothing could have prepared me for what followed.

As I passed Porlock on my final stretch of about 11 miles to Lynmouth my final destination for the day I met this sign:

I thought to myself, Iv'e done hard ones in Scotland and although Iv'e been riding all day thought to give it a go, bad idea!

After taking the first corner I saw the sign 25% incline, I gave it all and took the hill, I then turned the corner and saw a second sign 25% incline and thought, goodness how am I going to do this, half way up this hill I was stopped by a farmer on a quad bike, we had a chat and I gave him my card and finished the hill to turn another corner to see a third sign 25% incline. This time I thought that this can not be for real, but gave it all and won that one too and again turned a corner to see a fourth sign and guess, yes, 25% incline, at this point every muscle in my body decided that I WILL take a moment and then by nearly biting the tip of my tongue off made it to the top.

This is my poker face to hide the pain and distress my body is in. Apart form that, the view were out of this world, I wish I could take the view and put it outside our kitchen window. I phoned Tricia to tell her to take the toll as it was sure to be easier, but she also had to feel the exhilaration and completed the hill.

We now have an in house joke, that everything that is really hard is now a Porlock.  

I still had a long way to go with no more energy in reserve and daylight was fading fast.

At the end of the line just before Lynmouth was the decent, a hair raising event that shook my skeleton so there was no time to take any photo's of making my destination as my hands was glued to the wet brakes on wet 25 mil tires on wet tarmac in near zero visibility in the dark down a 1 in 4 gradient downhill. 

Phew, made it in one piece! A run tomorrow.....