Jogle Day 7

June 11, 2010

Woke inauspiciously - both Backie and I were feeling rough.  Breakfast improved things slightly, but I turned to the cyclist's remedy - drugs (Aspirin and Piriton)!

Made great progress from Wigan to Wem - I won a closely contested sprint into Wem. Even Her Majesty The Queen popped into Wem to wish us well - actually she drove past Suzy on her way to an official engagement in the town - and it was when we reached Bewdley later in the day that we said goodbye to our own Queen of the Road: we would all like to thank Suzy very much for all she has done during the course of the last 7 days.

Contacted the legendary Pete Bird at the Bicycle Hub in Ironbridge to ask his advice on a flattish route out of Ironbridge to Bridgenorth which, coincidentally, went past his front door so he invited us in when we passed and agreed to fix one or two little niggles while we were there. But first we had to get there ...

In an effort to avoid main roads, I had put together a route which included passing through the pretty village of Little Wenlock.  What I had failed to take account of was that this took us over The Wrekin - by common consent far and away the toughest climb of the trip so far.  Pete and Alastair addressed the mechanical issues we had and set us off on the road to Bridgenorth - along the old railway line - seriously bumpy at first but thereafter a great cycle route.  Sadly that was where things started to fall apart as the quick trip into Bewdley turned into 16 miles of the hilliest riding imaginable.  We eventually pulled in at 6.45 p.m.

Daily Stats

Average speed                                             15.0

Top speed                                                      41.8

Calories                                                         2689

Miles                                                               110

NB Blog dictated by Chris at 7.00 a.m. and entered in his absence after he managed to delete last night's attempt!

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