Tell us about your weekend ride

OK, so a bit of a read. TLDR: Exmouth Exodus, A challenging self supporting very small ride that ultimately was a nice day out. If you like a long ramble........

So there I was at Green Park Station Bath. Bath's redundant railway station at 9pm with about 15 other cyclists fueling up on Pizza, Beer and Coffee ahead of the Exmouth Exodus. Several visits to the loo later my nerves were jangling, could I do this ? This unsupported ride of a hundred miles across Somerset and into Devon, many climbs totalling over 1800 meters, across some remote countryside with not many bail out options. This was a real challenge for me, one of the reasons I was there, has the old boy still got it, after many years of knowing about can I actually do? Done the Dynamo but this is a lot tougher, no pop up cafes every 10 miles, 16 or so people somewhere in darkest Somset.

After a group photo we set off, within a mile the Peloton had shattered to to lots of groups all with their own idea of how to get out of Bath, I was in a group of 4 going through the two tunnels, literally two old railway tunnels now a cycle path, I have wanted to ride this for a while, fast well lit and flat nice long tunnels.

Four became two after the first big climb, me an Craig. Graig was great, he'd rode up from Otterly St. Mary to the start. He had an encyclopedic knowledge of all the local roads which he was determined to share with me which was both really useful, I had genuine concerns about getting lost in the dark, he knew where we were always. Didn't really want to know about individual humped back bridges on the B16284 at 3am, but swings and roundabouts, got mentioned too.

It rained, it pissed down coming down the long decent into Well's was an aweful expletive laden experience which was the low point. So many reflections on the ride seam to mention rain, got figure, I supose.Trying see, and not crash as well as planning how to get to Taunton to abandon. In that part of the world all roads seamed to lead to Taunton. We took shelter in a 24 hour garage, the rain did ease up and eventually stop, thank goodness!

On through the night, many empty quiet country roads, I really got into the space using lots of the road knowing there were very few motors about.We both pushed up some of the climbs, I genuinely find this more efficent than grinding up at walking pace. Craig was regretting riding up from Devon and decided to abandon in the 24 hour Macdonalds on the A303 at 5am. Being the only customers in a 24 hour, Macdonalds was an experience in it's own right. Not my natural environment.

Right I knew this moment would come, the last 40 miles solo, over the Blackdown hills, with a timed train to catch. Note to self; next time spend the extra for an anytime ticket, it's worth it! The sky was lightening, the weather was at last remembering it was August. Off I went, properly navigating with off my phone for the first time, it worked I got there but had a few melt downs after hitting a bump in the road the screen would become something else completely, grrrrrr.

Pressed on enjoying the the beautiful scenery,all up and down tired but eventuall ok when having done the last big fuck off climb it plateaued out and have several miles of suprising flat roads , that I was really grateful for, the a long rolling decent on narrow country roads that ha grass and stones in the middle of them. This was the, "yeah I'm gona do this!" moment,breath. By the sea and finally in to the urban(?), Route got really knarly on bike paths through parks and railway stations. I kept misssing turns back tracking gettin in others way. Saw Exmouth railway at decided that was my finish line, no last miles, was it through the underpass or round the roundabout? No cafe, breakfast or beach, no time, said Exmouth on the sign and at that moment that was good enough.

I did it, this (for me) very big thing, lots of labour of all sorts, emotional, mental and physical. My bike,a '97 Claude Butler Professional didn't miss a beat and felt ideal for the ride, 853 joy in my life. One guy did it on a Brompton, which stggers me, this ain't Brompton Country! Hero!

Did it! Did the difficult thing, faced the fears and did it anyway. Sure there are people on the Forum who'd do it Fixed, turn round and ride back to London, but that ain't me. This was a big un for me.

I successfully got round and I remember it as a nice day out. I do hope the Exodus continues perhaps even gets a bit bigger, it dose need someone to pick up the burden of making it a bit less Self Supporting and better known if it is to return to how it was years ago. Is that a good thing? Don't know. If you like a difficult but doable challenge, I recomemend it, might even do it myself again, one day; one day.