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@Oliver Schick
Not quite the week-end, but I rode to Cambridge today. It didn't really go to plan, but it was still a lovely ride. I mainly went there to play bike tag in Cambridge:
https://www.lfgss.com/comments/15474906/
I'd looked at the weather forecast and while I saw there would be a tailwind, I didn't notice the wind speed. I left the house at about 7:45 (later than I wanted because I'm the king of faff) and could already tell the wind was strong coming out of London. Riding along the A10, A1010, and following assorted A- and B-roads, at first I tried to go reasonably slowly to leave something in the tank, because I wanted to ride back. It didn't take long before I couldn't resist any more, though. I was pretty sure I wouldn't make it back to London, and so it proved, but I had a very fun wind-assisted ride up, getting to Ware in under an hour, and to Trumpington at about 10:30.
Then I did my tagging, bimbled around Cambridge for a few hours doing sightseeing, had a delicious meal at Vegan Vice (which wasn't at all good food for riding, but great vegan junk food), and started to ride south again, but it was brutal and I knew I wouldn't last long, so I thought I'd at least ride to Audley End or Bishop's Stortford or one of the other stations on that line. Eventually, it was Audley End, after taking in some fairly hilly bits around Elmdon, a beautiful area. I had to walk up one short section because the wind was blowing down too hard. Lots of very exposed bits, notably after the roundabout on the A505, turning south to Duxford, but also some older lanes that were clearly built with some protection against the prevailing wind.
Apart from the wind, the conditions were excellent; mostly overcast and warm, then sunny in the afternoon, and apart from a short rain shower on the way up, completely dry. The countryside along most of the route felt really dry, too, despite the rain of the last week. I didn't like that. Let's hope future years will be wetter again.
The most unpleasant thing was just before the turn to Little Shelford from Great Shelford, when, I can only guess because I didn't see the vehicle, some kind of aggregate lorry must have passed me going the other way, and I got a load of gravel in the face and eyes. It took a while to scrape that off. Not surprisingly, there was an enormous amount of stuff being blown about everywhere, but most of it didn't bother me much.
Still need to do more regular riding, will hopefully get into a weekly rhythm again.