Brian Chapman photos

[juliet]

Further to my ride report of the Brian Chapman (619k bike ride the length of Wales & back, or 470k bike ride + v expensive taxi if you're me): photos!. Featuring me looking v silly in bike kit, & lots of pictures of Wales being pretty.

Things I would never have seen without audaxing: Welsh hills at sunrise.

Comments

[babysimon]

You manage to look remarkably cheerful in those...

[juliet]

That's because they were taken during the first 350k, before I started crying & falling over & so on :-)

I remember feeling v cheerful indeed at Harlech, because the ride along the coast was fast & the sun setting was beautiful, & then Harlech Castle just suddenly APPEARED around a corner, with the sun setting behind it & I thought how enormously fortunate I was to be riding my lovely bike in such a beautiful place.

I really did see an owl fly over just after that photo was taken. It had its dinner in its beak.

[lovelybug.livejournal.com]

Them are some very pretty pics lady :)

[juliet]

It really was gorgeous. The stars over Snowdon (no photo for obvious reasons :-) ) & the sunset by the coast were well worth the ride all by themselves, never mind all the pretty green valleys.

I did get "The Ballad of Green & Grey" in my head for Some Time during the bit where I was riding along the side of one of those valleys & it was raining on me.

[catsgomiaow.livejournal.com]

Aw! I love the one of you with the head-torch :)

[mrs-leroy-brown.livejournal.com]

IAWTC! :)

[juliet]

See Reply To Katie :-)

Maybe I should make it into an icon. Strange headgrowth ahoy!

[juliet]

When you say "love" you mean "laugh at immoderately", right? ;-)

I am v smiley in that one, anyway :-)

[catsgomiaow.livejournal.com]

It's the smiliness that I like! (and the super castle in the BG, and the SHINY SHINY reflective bits of yr top!) to be honest I only really noticed the headtorch the second time I looked at the pic as it's the smiliness that really comes through :)

[bootpunk.livejournal.com]

Must join you on a summer ride or two later on. I intend to get back on the bike, oh, around Thursday ...

[juliet]

Dun Run! Gwan gwan.

Definitely up for that, though bear in mind that I may have a certain amount of stamina, but I am slow as a slow thing (12h35 for the hilly-ish 200k I did on Sunday, including stops for lunch, flapjack, having a pee, etc etc). Drop me an email after you're done exam-ing & we could maybe sort out a day we're both free for a ride?

[damerell.livejournal.com]

That's quite a lot of luggage! What was in it?

[juliet]

It's not as much as it looks - it's just that I only have the one bag (which normally holds my laptop, change of clothes, lunch, book, 2 x locks, etc etc for commuting) so stuff has to go in there even if it's rattling around.

Seatpack has mechanical stuff (multitool, 2 x inner tubes, tyre boot, spare cables, headtorch, spoke key, cable ties, etc). Pannier has spare clothes & food, primarily. Given that this was a 600k, even allowing for the drop bag at Dolgellau (change of shorts, shirt, & socks, & Sunday's flapjack supply), I had about 8 flapjacks, couple of sandwiches, LS jersey in case of cold (needed on night stage), armwarmers ditto, raincape, rainlegs thingies, waterproof gloves, glasses, phone, camera, small medical kit (mostly ibuprofen :-) ), couple of other random things. It would pack into a space about half that (a third if you squished the flapjacks a bit :-) ).

The top-tube bag is tiny & contains only tissues, brevet card, pen, & money

[friend-of-tofu.livejournal.com]

Lovely pics. And you really don't look silly.

I have had much bicycling wistfulness from alextiefling already this week, so perhaps it will be a summer of everyone else biking while I (being unable to ride) pootle at home. That wouldn't be all bad.

[juliet]

Thank you!

Do you mean unable to ride as in do not at present know how, or cannot/would not full stop? Because if the former, we can assist :-) (I taught uon to ride a bike about 7 months ago! And now he rides to work :-) )

[friend-of-tofu.livejournal.com]

I can't ride a 2-wheeled bike, something to do with my terrible balance. I tried several times when younger and always fell off :¬( Dyspraxia is rubbish.

It's a very kind offer mind you, if you really think I could learn. I'm quite tempted, except for the possibility that I would drive any teacher absolutely loopy by being repeatedly dense...

Thank you!

Incidentally, have you ever been to the bike workshops they run at the 56a Centre?

[juliet]

No idea whether you could learn or not offhand :-) except that Marna claims to have bad balance (as does Pete), but both ride fine... You'd prob need to borrow Marna's bike though, or Bec's, as mine would be too big (plus these days I do not have beginner-suitable bike). I would be happy to assist, though, if you come round the park sometime!

I started uon off IIRC by lowering the saddle enough that he could more or less push it along with his feet - that way you get the idea of the balance before having to also think about pedalling.

I do not know what the 56a Centre is, so no :-)

[friend-of-tofu.livejournal.com]

ariiadne left her bike behind on account of it needing repair. alextiefling is planning to fix it, ideally for himself as a spare bike. I expect I could fit on that one, as she was 1" shorter than I am.

I could probably be persuaded to come round the park, as even if I don't learn to ride at all, I would probably still be having a nice time in good company :¬)

Oooh, I think you would like the 56a Infoshop! It's a sort of anarcho-hippy affair which has a variety of functions - there's a VERY reasonably-priced food co-op selling organic vegan stuffs for cheap (seriously worth checking out), as well as a zine archive and a bike repair group. Some info on them on the London Action Resource Centre website, but they're not far from you at all. It's at 56 Crampton Street, Walworth, in that maze of little streets between the Walworth and Old Kent roads. Not open v often, but prob worth a visit. (I think I have bleated some about the vegan food co-op before.)

[mstevens.livejournal.com]

470k?!

Scared now.

[juliet]

It was a Very Long Way.

Anyway, that's nothing, the people who finished it did 619k :-)

[i-ludicrous.livejournal.com]

Great photos! At the weekend I finally got around to getting a speedo for my bike, so I can now get on with working out whether I would be irritatingly slow if I were to join you for one of these... You'd have to agree to disappear off into the distance if so :-)

I've never had a speedo before. It has some slightly disturbing effects on me: I spend all my time trying to keep the little up arrow that says I'm beating my average speed showing...

[juliet]

I am pretty damn slow myself, tbh :-)

I am not always convinced that bike computers are useful - I don't have one on the fixie (although I do on the audax bike - rode the Ruislip 300k without it though as it had stopped working). I think it might be that it is less stressful without...