Friday, 30 December 2011

the twitter arranged FoD ride

heard about this ride from some twitter buddies a while ago and it must be 10 years since i last rode at the Forest of Dean (FoD) so i decided to go along. i've only ridden there twice anyway, both times on a Singletrackworld.com arranged singlespeeds only rides, these were great and were guided by locals so i got shown all the good bits, but at no time did i actually know where i was! This time the idea was to ride the new blue graded "Vederers trail" the idea was to meet in the carpark at 10:30, the only drawbacks being 1) i don't know what the guys look like, we've never met before and 2) there was absolutely no 3G reception to contact them via twitter. so i waited until 11:15, got bored and went for a lap, the trail is great, the climbs not at all bad and the downhill bits well designed and flowy using the best of the terrain. i had a few chats to riders around the trail, everyone seemed friendly without the egos you sometimes get at busy trail centres (or maybe it was because they didn't feel threatened by my rigid forked 69er!) then came the final downhil section, i have to say it was a lot of fun, downhill, flowy bermy loveliness! i don't tend to get my wheels off the ground normally but i was going so fast over the yumps i got involuntary air and realised i was giggling to myself. it's a great finish to a nice trail and i thoroughly enjoyed myself. back in the carpark i loitered trying to spot the other guys but to no avail so i did a bit of exploring on some of the trails off the main one and managed to navigate myself back to the start of the final downhill again, this time i videoed it

whilst at the top of the hill i got some signal and had a message that the guys were by the cafe, sadly it had been sent 20 mins before and they had gone by the time i got down. so better luck next time i guess (unless they are just a figment of my Twitimagination!)
ride 145
10 miles
total 2344
commute 1036
total+commute 3380

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