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Just sorted out my accomodation for me and a 'not on here' mate staying with family in Otley. I'm very excited. Apparently there's a large TV screen in the market square, probably a 32 incher or bigger but we're likely to head out of town. Otley is expecting 15-20k people along the route just in town, its going to be massive.

Word from family is there's a 'meet the teams' event in Leeds on Friday night so will go to that too.

I don't really know that part of the world, any of the LFGSS crew got any good beer and viewing spots lined up for day 1 & 2?

London Classic recce? Chapeau if you grunted up that on fixed. I assume the table tennis table is in the van.

I love that after the wettest winter ever both the rides ended in perfectly clear skies, ideal for some star gazing. I may be asking Nic to arrange my summer trip to Yorkshire to see Le Tour to guarantee good weather.

Sounds great, in like Flynn

1) Hairnet
2) dicki
3) Ultracrepidarian
4) blue fleet

At the rate you are progressing with these rides Nic I expect by years end you will be organising a forum ride into space. LFGSS goes to Mars?

I think the Australian is referring to bits of poo on a sheeps bum
#watchedneighboursasaChild

Thats what they called them in Oz is it, I've always known them as clags or winnits.
Ha! Constable Savage has heard of winnits too, bum berries is another.
#spotthepersonraisedinwales#

+1 for rhubarb and ginger jam, not had it in years but its one of those tastes that instantly transports me back to my childhood, which is quite an achievement as that was many years ago.

I'm just back from my mums in Wales who has a polytunnel and pretty big garden and its all systems go on planting now after the end of days rain thats lasted months. She got well into fruit last year, with the biggest and tastiest raspberries I've ever had. Green bean chutney was also ace depsite sounding a bit meh, but the stand out one I thought was the blackcurrent jam, omg, simply the best most zingy jam I've ever had, it was like a amphetamine rush, but nice.

Top work Mands, make sure you leave contact deets so he can give you the massive reward you are clearly now due. And now you know where he works if the reward is lame or non existent you can go again tomorrow and 'have a word'

And Hats, I think that's about as deserving of lol's as it gets.

Opie is cute, he looks massive. From a birds perspective he looks like the destroyer of worlds....

I’m up at my mums, in the wilds with no mobile phone reception. Meet my folks’ pack of hounds who are responsible for much of the alternative entertainment.
Mitz, the matriarch.

Part Staffy, other parts ?? Adopted as a yoot so exact age unknown but estimated to be about 15. Very slow on her legs now. We let her get pregnant once, the dad was a lurcher, she had 14 puppies!! It was epic. This started the accumulation of hounds. Of the 14 we kept 3, sadly Frank passed away. Two remain, now aged 10, meet brother and sister, Perry

and Fly

Fly is the brains of the outfit when it comes to chasing dinner, rabbits, which they catch enough off to avoid having to buy dog food. They do of course get extra treats, and as you can probably tell as he looks more the size of a lab than a lurcher, Perry likes treats.
Fly also had 1 lot of puppies, only 7 this time. My sister had one, Weasel, and my parents were’nt going to have any, but the runt of the litter had a cleft nose and no one wanted her, so they kept her. She is much shorter but is a stocky little pocket rocket and is also a great rabbiter. Meet the one with the double barrelled snoz, Flossy.
URL=http://s1221.photobucket.com/user/muldoon72/media/IMG_0627_zpsd9b791ab.jpg.html][/URL]
Flossy did’nt have any puppies but one of Fly’s puppies had a litter, again of 7 I think. After making the mistake of going to see them, my parents fell in love again and so now they have 5 dogs across 4 generations. The latest arrival is mischief incarnate, meet Belle.

Belle is the fastest of the gang, be very afraid rabbits. She still has much to learn but has totally the nailed the ‘what me?’ innocent puppy dog eyes look. Last time I was here she ate my sunglasses, and is chief suspect in a number of unsolved missing shoe crimes.

And I don't think the clue protocol needs to be rigid, if the game slows more clues are demanded and we always get there in the end.

The variation in clues adds to the fun, but I'm rubbish at the cryptic ones. I still lol at Middle of Nowhere's 'its the fucking millenium bridge' clue

Rep to Kingfisher for the movie, makes me gutted I did'nt tag the Upminster windmill on a recent ride. It just needs some Benny Hill music.

Amazing how the distance has racked up, we gotta have a 5000 or 10000 mile bike tag party/ride.

@ Fasih, not another chain snap! Otherwise it seems you had a better run than last time, and your photos are much better than mine. At least you'll be prepared for anything an audax can throw at you.

At least you're never too far from a bike shop on this project. I wonder if there is a map with all the bike shops inside the M25 or N/S Circ. It may have been done already. That would be a useful app/map.

And cheers Harold, the gps co-ordinates on a satellite photo would be interesting to see. I have all the rides in gpx format at the moment but they are on my laptop in London and I'm up in sticksville Wales until Sunday. If you're happy to wait until then and want a have a crack that would be great, assuming its a format you are familiar with.

While up here I met an old friend who I told about this and he may be able to help with some map stuff as he's a whizz on Mac's, so I've got to send him the gpx's when I'm back in town.

The bad news is here in Wales it appears to have stopped raining for the first time in months, its going to be lovely and sunny over the next few days and I have no bike, boooo. Gardening and mowing my mums garden is all I've done to stop muscle atrophy, and tonight I'm going out for some good old fashioned binge drinking, again, yay. Its the kind of the training camp David Icke or Glen Hoddle would come up with.

BBC3 is shit, apart from Family Guy, which is obvs good enough to be moved to BBC2 or BBC4. The rest of it can be napalmed from the schedule without remorse.

Its all ‘The boy with an arse for a face’ and ‘Stacy Dooley meets exploited children in….’

I happen to have the answer, merge both of the above programmes into one thereby halving costs and producing the much more entertaining ‘The boy with an arse for a face puts his finger up Stacey Dooley’s arse’. In fact mega mashups seems the obvious way to go. Looking at tonight schedule I can see ‘Wipeout the bride’, ‘Festivals, sex, and Jamaie private school girl’ and ‘Bad Family Dad’. Problem solved.

^Ha, and now my links not showing either, confused....ridewithgps 'trips' show fine, but it seems to have problems displaying the 'routes'?

@ Harold, haha good on him. He's a braver man than me, actually going on the tube with the great British public.

I notice he had a pic of the original tube map on his blog. I'd be interested to know how he went about getting permission for that and how long it took. I'd like to post up the original tube map here as a comparison to mine, but don't want to break any copyright and had heard TFL were fiercely protective of it.

@Fasih, I can't see your route, there's just a blank space? Could be my browser I guess. (firefox?)

I've only done a rough draft of the Piccadilly line and it came out at 70 miles. I'm a bit unsure of the Heathrow section, I had planned to ride round the whole site anti-clockwise, see here
http://ridewithgps.com/routes/3859183

But I'm glad you are doing the recce, I'll await your feedback and maybe change the route accordingly. I hope you have better luck than last time.

Woah, all the shits were given.

I live round the corner from there (top flat, phew) but thankfully notice my route to the shop won't involve wellies. And so not a single shit was given again and equilibrium is restored.

Day 5 & 6, Northern line and groundhog day.

Having botched my first attempt at the Bakerloo line I got up yesterday and planned to re-do that, and have a crack at the mountainous stage, the Northern line. It was a lovely sunny morning for the ride to the start in Morden.

I've been getting some funny looks from people as I take photos of the stations. Some commuters were looking around as if checking for some amazing spectacle they'd somehow missed, and upon seeing none, looked back at me with 'really? why?' expressions on their faces.

The first bit was a dodddle as its just A23 and A3 with no potential for errors. I decided on the City branch first so went via Bank up to Camden, before turning around and going back down the Charing Cross branch to Waterloo and rejoining south of Kennington like the original map. It was then back up the Bank branch again to Camden where the tour reached the foothills of the Alps.

As I was doing the Bakerloo line afterwards I decided to finish the Northern line in Edgware as its closer to Harrow and Wealdstone, so it was up the High Barnet branch first. I stopped for a peanut butter sandwich, stripped down to a t-shirt and basked in the sun on the benches at the top of Archway hill. An elderly lady rode by on a lovely Roberts seemingly enjoying the days riding. I hope I'm still regularly riding my bike when I get to her age. If I keep missing stations I will be her age before finishing this. I shouted out 'nice bike' and was blanked, or possibly not heard. Remounting it was up to Mill Hill and back before continuing northwards. There followed a horribly busy stretch up to High Barnet, with the right turn into the station feeling particularly vulnerable as traffic raced up and down the hill.

I got my flask out for a coffee and the heavens opened so I scurried to the covered bike rack and cowered there for 5 minutes as the rainclouds blew over.
That was the first hilly section done, no climbs to cause concern for the mono geared, just gradual inclines. I enjoyed the descent back to Camden before the Galibier of the day loomed before me, the climb up to Hampstead. As usual it was a traffic nightmare with lorries and buses inching past each other leaving no room to squeeze by, so progress was stop start but I grunted to top. A brief, predictably horrific section of Watford Way followed soon after Hendon, before the final push to Edgware.

It all went very smoothly with no wrong turns and all 50 stations visited. I'd guessed the Northern line would the have the most climbing. My version of the Central line had more at 3674ft of ascent compared to the Northerns 3460ft, but the Central line included a 6 mile stint in the wrong direction around Theydon Bois which accounts for 365ft of climbing. Once corrected the Northern line is in fact king of the mountains in terms of ascent . I like the look of the Northern line gpx.
http://ridewithgps.com/trips/2282509

It was then 3 miles over to Harrow and Wealdstone for the deja vu Bakerloo line. My first attempt had quite a few wrong turns and looked a mess. The second attempt was 6 miles shorter, half and hour quicker and seemed to go well.
http://ridewithgps.com/trips/2282508

I got back to Heffalump and Castle at 5.30 after 93.8 miles for day.
But I checked this morning and NOOOOO! I'd missed Kenton on the Bakerloo line, sob only the second bloody station on route. BOLL. OX. It seems like a case of over confidence combined with brain freeze, seemingly getting confused and taking the same turn I did doing the Metropolitan line. All in all a massive cock.....

...........up.

Fuelled by a David Banner-esque inner fury, a pint of espresso and some loud music, I hooned up there this afternoon to do the Bakerloo line for the 3rd time. The condition of Harrow Road is a disgrace, the responsible councils should hang their heads in shame. Its done more than any road I've ridden so far to convince me to get fatter tyres next time I'm in the market for new rubber. I've just checked the gpx and thankfully it seems fine.
http://ridewithgps.com/trips/2284876


So what was supposed to be one of the shorter and easier lines turned into groundhog day. Including getting to and from the start and finish points the Bakerloo line has taken 92.9 miles of riding to get right. What a shambles. Unfortunately if I do the overground lines I'll have to visit Harrow and Wealdstone again. I may be waking up in 'nam style flashbacks and be continually haunted by the bloody place.

It's becoming increasingly apparent how much of my life is being wasted waiting at traffic lights during the course of this project. I'm not advocating and won't be rjl'ing, but all that dead time is really mounting up. I feel I could be doing more with it, like learning another language or studying string theory or something. I'm doing most of my eating and drinking on the move, so the rain dodging, toilet and photo stops must have accounted for less than 20 minutes of the 5 hour 43 mins it took to do the Northern line. Yet stopped time is nearly an hour and half. By the time I've finished this I reckon I'll have been standing around like a bollard for the equivalent of a whole days riding. What a waste, and nothing but acute diesel poisoning to show for it. I'm surprised advertisers are'nt making use of all this standing around we're doing and bombarding us with adverts and infomercials on screens placed at traffic lights. shudders at the thought

So 11 of the 12 main lines done. I'm off to Wales tomorrow for 10 days with no bike, so my cycling legs will have gone away by the time I'm back for the Piccadilly line. While I'm away I'll try my first tentative steps at getting the gpx's on the same map to get a picture of what is looks like. cough If any budding design students or anyone else wants to have a play with gpx's to see what they map magic they can conjure up, please feel free.

Victoria line http://ridewithgps.com/trips/2168039

Central line http://ridewithgps.com/trips/2168037

Bakerloo line http://ridewithgps.com/trips/2168035

Jubilee line http://ridewithgps.com/trips/2179359

Metropolitan line http://ridewithgps.com/trips/2179362

Waterloo & City line http://ridewithgps.com/trips/2181152

Circle line http://ridewithgps.com/trips/2181146

District Line http://ridewithgps.com/trips/2259166

Hammersmith & City http://ridewithgps.com/trips/2259143

Northern line http://ridewithgps.com/trips/2282509
Bakerloo line, 3rd time lucky http://ridewithgps.com/trips/2284876

Total distance ridden so far = 549.7 miles
Of which there's only been brief spells of countryside on the Central and Metropolitan lines. I may need to go and lie down in field for a bit when this is finished.

I don't recall you having massive flipper feet :)

I am not sure I'll be back from Wales in time for this, but if I am I'll be a last minute entrant. Just been out in the sun and its lovely, genuinely t-shirt weather.

Old tag, tortoise sundial in the D Garden at Holland Park

New, from tortoise to Hare, kinda. Round these parts better known as 'Arry

Thanks for pub tip but planned Northern line drinks have to be tweaked as this morning as I realised I've missed Lambeth North and Elephant & Castle from the end of the Bakerloo line. There was rich and varied swearing. This will not do and is especially embarrassing as I live in Vauxhall/Oval so know this part of town very well. I don't know what came over me.

So the Bakerloo line has to be done again. Thankfully its one of the shorter lines so I'll probably do it the same day as the Northern line. I'm now likely to start the Northern line in Morden, do the loop around the city, then up to High Barnet and back down and up to Edgware, then over to Harrow & Wealstone for the Bakerloo line. So am now looking for a decent pub stop somewhere between Edgware and H&W.

Two steps forward and one step back. Must concentrate, the thought of doing the Piccadilly line twice is the stuff of nightmares.

Hello Angus. Yeah sure feel free to use any of that thread you want, routes or text.

I know I've got raw video clips of cycling around in the countryside but don't recall any clips of cycling around London, but I'm sure I've got some, I'll have a look in an old hard drive over the weekend. How do you want the clips sending to you? They can be big files.

I'm not working at the moment so don't have a commute, and partly explains having the time for riding the underground. I've just had a cursory look for the camera and could'nt find it, but I'm messy git so I'm sure its here somewhere. I'll let you know what the searches reveal over the next few days when I have more time.

Ha! Shame you're leaving it to the last minute, if you'd have given me a load of gopro batteries a month or so ago I could have filmed any sections you wanted of the entire Underground tube network that I've been doing, see here:
https://www.lfgss.com/thread120840.html

When is your deadline? I've still got the Piccadilly and Northern lines to go. I have a gopro but the battery is a bit knackered so does'nt last very long, maybe 30 mins tops. I don't have a headcam but mount it on the handlebars, but if you want me to record any sections of the above lines I can do. I'm off to Wales next week for a week but may try the Northern line before then, and will do the Piccadilly line on my return.

Anyway good luck, I'm sure there's tons of footage out there so you may well get flooded, but I'll try and help if you still need footage.

^Thanks for the DLR tip.

Yeah I have higher hopes for pubs at the ends of the Northern and Piccadilly lines. In fact the quality of boozer may determine which direction I do it in. Its the Northern line next and I've never been to any pubs in High Barnet, Edgware or Morden, any recommendations?

After a few weeks of cycling inactivity this was back on yesterday with another 2 lines, the District and Hammersmith and City lines. And an extra bonus for this leg, I had some company. Howard from these here parts clearly had nothing better to do for the day, so decided to join in this leg of the urban adventure/nightmare. I was late arriving at Richmond so he was already having a coffeee when I rolled up. A quick photo and we set off on the multi branch District line.

Plotting the District line route is like one of those maths problems you get in school, which branch should I start at and in which order should the branches be done to complete it in the shortest distance? I confess to not doing these calculations, instead I squinted at the ridewithgps plotted route, could'nt tell if there was any significant difference between starting in what I though the best start options, Richmond and Wimbledon, so decided on starting in Richmond as it was likely to have the least amount of headwinds and it just felt better doing the complete line from West to East. Though not the longest line I've done to date it has the most stations with 60, and had by far the longest list of directions, with 13 hand held Tunnocks sheets, here's a sample, District 9. (of 13)

At the first roundabout I must have thrown a dodgy signal or rode a confusing line as I sent Howard off down the wrong road, and shortly after bagging our first stop after Richmond, Kew Gardens, I took a wrong turn, went 'off Tunnocks' and ended up heading up the right road, but in the wrong direction. After that sketchy start he must of been wondering just what he'd let himself in for, but apart from another little moment of navigatory doubt somewhere between Upminster and Barking it all went to plan.

After recent months it seems to sky has run out of rain so we were left with lovely weather for February. At one point in Southfields I could feel the bright thing in the sky warming my skin, what is this death ray in the heavens? We had to do multiple visits to Earls Court which was made more problematic by the one way system. I almost got hit in the face by a paniced pigeon and a white van pulled right out across me in a crazy 10 seconds in Victoria but otherwise it was pretty smooth going, apart from the road surfaces which seemed to deteriorate as we went from West to East. It was a long old line, taking just over 7 hours including stops.

And I'm sorry to report I am still crap at taking photos. Upminster has a proper full size ye olde windmill, and despite riding past it twice, and stopping for a post District line pint and food at the adjacent pub called The Windmill I did'nt get any pictures of it, massive fail. The food was underwhelming, Howard's coleslaw did'nt arrive, and nor did any refund or other offer which was a bit poor. I think Howard may also have already contacted Trading Standards to enquire as to what the minimum legal requirements are for the dish known as side salad. And strangely the fries were more expensive than the chips.

So after refreshments it was time to head back to Barking for the start of the Hammersmith and City line. As we were losing the sun the temperature had dropped so Howard unpacked his jacket only to find the zip had broken, leaving him rather draughty for the return leg into the headwind, and bringing his drag coefficient a tad closer to my flappy trousers and fleece.

Rather than the A124 I opted for a ride through the Chase nature reserve. The big 5 were notable by their absence, it was'nt the Serengeti, it was'nt even Longleat. Who even knew Dagenham had a nature reserve, or is nature reserve estate agent speak for wasteland? But it had a short section of mud path for some slip slding fun and we saw some moorhens a heron, neither of which we'd seen elsewhere. Though we did'nt see any I've since discovered it has some rare bird visitors such as pine bunting, great snipe and spotted crake, and has notable plants like spiny restharrow, warty cabbage and black mustard. It was definitely better than the A124 and a nice break from the otherwise relentless urban jungle.

We arrive in Barking

...and its total gridlock, loads of rozzers about so looked like something had just gone down. Howard was in for another treat and example of how classy I am as I detoured us down by the bins of a dark dingy back alley where grim criminal things must have happened, and they did again as my rest stop lager leaked out. Not being in a official public toilet I was able to look up and around to examine my surroundings, and saw a 2 pack of unopened sausages on the wall in front of me. Were they for the bin? Had someone got them out of the bin? Did the last person who'd rushed down this alley for a piss get home an hour later and bellow 'fuuuuuu the sausages!' Who knows or even cares.

During the course of the day and in doffed cap reverence to the original tube map I made Howard do some seemingly pointless detours and there were a few points where I chose to avoid the road route. At Victoria we dismounted and walked across onto Victoria St rather than do the 1 way system of horror and we did the cycling equivalent of tiptoeing down the cut through from Ravenscourt Park to Glenthorne Road. We took a naughty right turn just after Aldgate East up Old Castle St, so the line loops up and around Algate station like the orignal map and we also did a loop just after Euston Square to ensure the line remained above Warren Street and Regents Park stations like the original map. However in doing this and in my quest to squeeze in a cobbled mews section I'd not ridden before I went down Pelo Place, and I have come uncomfortably close (to me at least) to missing Great Portland St but you can see the station across the road, and as I can't be arsed to ride the line again I'm claiming it.

We finally arrived back in Hammersmith at 8pm, which after leaving Richmond at 9.20am meant another long day in the saddle. My total mileage for the day came out at 116 miles and Howard did 130.

So thats a total so 278 of 381 station stops done so far on 9 out of the 11 main lines, with just the Northern line and Piccadilly line to go.

Victoria line http://ridewithgps.com/trips/2168039

Central line http://ridewithgps.com/trips/2168037

Bakerloo line http://ridewithgps.com/trips/2168035

Jubilee line http://ridewithgps.com/trips/2179359

Metropolitan line http://ridewithgps.com/trips/2179362

Waterloo & City line http://ridewithgps.com/trips/2181152

Circle line http://ridewithgps.com/trips/2181146

District Line http://ridewithgps.com/trips/2259166

Hammersmith & City http://ridewithgps.com/trips/2259143

Days ridden so far = 4
Distance cycled drawing tube lines so far = 340 miles
Total distance ridden on this project including riding to and from home and between lines = 420.8 miles
P****ures = 1
Traffic lights encountered = seems like all of them
Years taken off life = unknown

I can't do tomorrow now so the District and Hammersmith & City lines will take place on Friday instead. 9am meet out front of Richmond Station for coffee break and aim to depart at 9.15am

My new year's resolution for this year is to ride 25km farther each month; I did a 225 in January, so I needed a 250 in February. As today was dry and hurricane-free and some of England is still not underwater, I snaped it up and jumped on the canyon for a run up to Bishop's Stortford and back.

It felt good, not even getting lost on the way back and accidentally visiting Tottenham could dampen my spirits.

http://www.strava.com/activities/113792971

I know you've got lights that can see far far into deep space but building to a 500km in December, ooof rather you than me.