Ruin Mikey's Life

In June of 2010 we (myself, my housemate Happy and our athletic friend James) cycled to the highest pub in Britain in aid of Barnados for which we raised £210. Our planned trip was 75 miles and involved cycling up (and sometimes, but not often down) some monumentally steep and precipitous inclines. It turned out, due to a few errors in map reading we cycled more than 100 miles, but it was still one of the best things we’d ever done. I wrote about it on this blog, it was one of the challenges and the blog as how we went on, click on the list and feel free to look for it.

Seeing as we really enjoyed the first trip, Happy and I decided to set off on another cycling adventure in March of 2011. This time, rather than take James with us (who frankly made us look bad with his stamina and ability) and took Nikki with us instead. Nikki is both lithe and athletic, but happily had a bike that was made out of lead, so we assumed that the playing field might be a tad more level.

Settling off from Bolton

Coincidentally this route is once again 75 miles and had considerably less chance of us cycle off the beaten path as we had to follow a single road. The A58 from Prescot, Merseyside to Wetherby, West Yorkshire, if we got lost then we were idiots.  Frankly.

This time we’re supporting the Alzheimer’s Society and hoped to equal our efforts cycling to the highest pub.

We set off as it got light and cycled to the train station from my house. I don’t live in Prescot, so we had to travel a fair distance before we even travelled our first official mile. The train journey took about an hour and after a short ride from Prescot Train station we were off. The going was good.  Those of you who recall our previous efforts, will recall that getting out of Bolton on a bike is heavy work. Bolton is in a valley and which ever way you go, to escape it, you need to cycle uphill. Prescott was nothing like that and after the first hour, we’d made it nearly 10 miles without so much of a hitch.

After the first hour, things were going well.

The roads were still relatively quiet and we enjoyed the open stretch of road as it wound back towards Bolton.  Yes, that’s right, to get to the other end of the A58, we had to travel back the way we came to Bolton and beyond. I recalled the hills on the way out of the town with dread and hoped that by that time, we would be enough into our stride not to have the same problems we had trying to escape it on the way to the highest pub in Britain.

Prescott to Bolton was generally rather easy, we got into Bolton after two hours and twenty minutes and my little navigation computer told me we’d travelled 22.8 miles.  We were now less than a mile from where we’d set off and already we were flagging, but we pressed on regardless, pushing ourselves up and out of Bolton, with the understanding that a breakfast would be waiting for us in Bury.

That was the deal.  If we got to Bury, we’d stop for some breakfast and a cup of coffee. I needed to keep up my end of the bargain but secretly, I really needed that cuppa. It drove me on and before long we were approaching Bury.

Bury is confusing and it’s roads are both unlabelled and wide.  We got lost a couple of times before figuring out where the A58 had gone and set off towards Rochdale.

The glorious sunshine

It had started to rain as we left Bury but frankly it was a welcome change.  The morning had turned out gloriously and the rain, whilst cold, was refreshing, the rain held off as we cycled up toward Rochdale and I have to admit being surprised by the glorious countryside that confronted us. But before we considered tackling the climb towards the pennies, I first had to honour a deal I’d stuck as we left Bury.

We made it out towards Asda a supermarket that boasts (amongst other things) somewhere to get breakfast and a cup of coffee.  With the bikes locked, we ordered breakfast.  I had kept up my end of the bargain, but Nikki had let us down by ordering a cup of tea rather than a cup of coffee.  I felt betrayed. How would I trust her on our epic journey across the Pennines if she makes deals about coffee and then get a cup of tea instead. Happy told me I was making too big a thing of it and I’ll admit, he was completely correct, I stopped trying to add drama to our morning and after a much needed toilet break, we set off towards the countryside.

We passed village after village and as we approached the 4th hour of our cycle, we approached Rochdale.  The last 10 miles had taken an hour and a half due to the incline we were travelling, but that was nothing compared to the hills we were to expect crossing the Pennines.

We passed through Rochdale easily enough, it was nowhere near as dangerous and confusing as Bury and starting the soft incline into the hills. It was getting towards lunch time as we left the houses behind us and we were getting hungry. We’d been travelling now since 6am and have lasted thus far on a small breakfast and a cup of unspecific hot beverage in a supermarket café .  We needed something to keep us going.

As we reached Littleborough we started looking around for a pub to feed our increasing  hunger. As we reached the otherside of the village we spotted a pub at the base of the Pennines.  The Moorcock Inn.  It looked nice enough and as I spied the expanse of hills before us, Happy and Nikki went inside to consider our options.

I made a video whilst I waited. I’m going to have to apologise for the windy sound quality.  It was windy and there was nothing I could do about it.  As you might have guessed from my dulcet tones we did not stop at the Moorcock Inn for Lunch. To do so would have been insane.  The hill before us was amazingly steep and we would not have enjoyed out meal looking at it in all it’s horrific picturesqueness. We set off up the road, following the path by the side of the road as a safer alternative to sharing the road with the insane drivers who shot past us as we cycled.

By the side of the A58 enjoying chocolate instead of a nice pub lunch

We made it to the top after what seemed like an age.  The hill already looked like a monumental climb, but what we had not realised is that the winding nature of the road had made what was probably a mile as the crow flies into a 3 mile slog up hill. We were tired, we were hungry and we were hoping that the large white building at the top of the hill was a pub.

The White House. Was not serving food. Bastards.

It was! We cycled up to The White House relieved that we had made it, only to be dismayed that the bloody place had stopped serving food and would not serve food again until dinner time! Dismayed we ate the last of the packet of Mars Bars I had brought with me and took heart to see that the road had flatted off and actually looked like it might lead downhill for once. We pressed on, but not before vowing never to step foot in a pub named The White House ever again.

The cycle towards Ripponden was easy enough as it was mostly downhill.  Still exhausted and hungry we looked for pubs that would hopefully keep us going. Fortunately for us we found the Old Bridge Inn, that served good food and who’s only downside was that the football was in.  But we didn’t mind, we had been fed and that was all that matters. We pressed on into Yorkshire.

The rest of the trip down towards Halifax was singularly uneventful the big push just after Littleborough had been the worst of it and as we passed the beautiful village of Sowerby Bridge, the road started to threaten an incline once again.  But this did not deter us.  We knew we’d that the worse was behind us and pressed on.

In Leeds, on the way to Wetherby

As we reached Halifax we had a dilemma. The pain had kicked in before us a massive hill to get us on the slope towards Wyke. We passed the train station in Halifax and I knew that we all felt a secret wish to get on the train to continue our journey. I knew it we were on the home stretch though and we compromised, pushing our bikes up the hill and over to enjoy the down hill slopes that lay before us.

We passed into Leeds after a relaxing ride and after negotiating the horrendous one way system managed to meet the A58 on the other side. By now the road was called Wetherby Road and it was Wetherby that was our destination only twelve miles ahead of us. Gone now were the quaint little villages, but as a welcome site we enjoyed a plethora of convenience stores and newsagents that we could legitimately buy energy drinks from. Pressing on we had a few worrying moments with Ninja bus drivers sneaking up on us, but before long, we had reached our goal.

Wetherby at last!

It was getting dark as we reached the end of the A58 and I was utterly exhausted. We’d travelled 83.9 miles and it had taken us a little over 11 hours from start to finish.  We raised £80.00 for the Alzheimer’s Society and whilst that didn’t come close to our £210 for cycling to Tann Hill, it was certainly money they would not have got if we didn’t attempt the challenge.

Sadly unlike the previous cycling challenges there was no well deserved pint to be had. We pressed on towards the seven miles Harrogate Railway Station and aching, and tired we board a train back to Leeds to visit my parents.  It had been dark for a couple of hours by the time we reached our final destination and after several helpings of an appreciated Chilli we settled down, battered and bruised for an very well deserved night’s rest.

A quick google search shows me that the highest pub in Britain is the Tan Hill Inn, a pub in the amazingly breathtaking North Yorkshire Dales. Tan Hill is approximately 85 miles from Bolton (where I currently live) and at 1732 feet above sea level. Which  is  roughly 1500 feet higher than my home town. It was obvious that this would not be an easy ride. Training was needed. Training was vital. Training was in a word.  Essential.

So after weeks of virtually no training I left Bolton early one sunny Saturday morning with my cycling team. We were a trio a band of travellers, me (my name is Mikey, if you’d not guessed that already), Happy (which I am reliably informed is not his real name), my then house-mate  and James (which I am reliably informed is probably his real name), a friend of ours who we all agreed, out of the three of us, has the greatest chance of making it to the pub.

The plan was a vague one. Armed only with maps printed from the internet and a phone that possessed the power of Google maps we were to headed out of Bolton and then along the A666. From there we would head into the wilderness that is the peak district and with a little luck (and a little Energon) we’d get to the pub sometime that afternoon. I cannot stress enough how woefully unprepared we were.  Woefully.

Stopping for a group photo and so we can breath

As you might expect from the amount of training we’d had, the first few miles were hard. Very hard. I’m significantly asthmatic and I’m always a little bad in the mornings and when we’d decided to set off at 6am, I knew that I’d likely to suffer. And our difficulty did not stop at my passable Darth Vadar impression. The town we’d set off from was Bolton, a nice northern town, which I discoverer later derives it’s name from “Bowl Town”  or “the town in the bowl”. In essence, if you want to escape Bolton cycling, you’ve got to cycle up a big hill.

Fortunately Happy’s bike gave up before I did. In the weeks leading up to the challenge Happy had been cycling on his very own bike, sadly the day before the ride Happy’s bike had a catastrophic failure and Happy resorted to borrowing a bike from our good friend Chris. It was a beast of a bike and weight (if I recall correctly) six metric tonnes. I remember thinking that Happy was insane to undertake the task on such monstrous frame, but Happy seemed confident that we could make it.  I was less so.

The cycle out of Bolton was it’s first test and the bike did not fail to let us down. Fortunately however it did not fail badly (it was saving that for later) and with a few minutes of adjustments and a significant amount of me getting my breath back and we were on our way!

Happy

Soon we were out into open countryside and on our way to Blackburn. Tragically in the first hour we’d travelled only five and a half miles and with that in mind, it was not looking good for the rest of our journey. Essentially if we continued on the pace we had set getting out of Bolton, our ride to Tann Hill would take us approximately 17 hours. The pub would be shut by then and we would not be able to complete the challenge. Something had to be done!

Happily we picked up the pace rather well after that, whilst the hills continued to hit us with frightful and annoying regularity but we’d fallen into our stride by then. The inhaler that I had needed with alarming frequency in the first five miles was forgotten in my rucksack and the next five and then ten miles came and went within the next hour. It was the begining of hour two and we’d travelled 15 miles to just outside Blackburn. Things were looking promising that we would make it to the pub in time for last orders and more importantly it was less and less likely that I would stop breathing as we travelled.

I liked the idea of continuing breathing. It’s so much easier to enjoy a pint of what the landlord recommends when you can breath.

Around Blackburn

(Distance Travelled 15.3 miles)

Happy

As we finally reached Blackburn I checked the directions that we had printed off the internet before we left. They were a wonderfully complex beast having nine steps to getting through Blackburn and back on the A666. Which we followed, for the next  hour.

Of course in hindsight I now know what it should have said was “Follow the signs to the A666. Ignore the extra couple of miles of one way streets that take of all the way around the town.” It took us an hour to get out of Blackburn. It really shouldn’t have, but Happy’s bike failed us again and we had a much needed rest whilst we fiddled with the brakes. The beast complained significantly, insisting that it needed it’s breaks pressing against the wheel arches continuously, but we managed to convince them that we needed to press on and left Blackburn behind us, frustrated withthe wasted time we had spent there.

Seven miles outside Blackburn we turned off the A666 and joined the A59. At the Whalley roundabout it was vitally important that took the third exit. We did not.

Wipeout in Whalley

(Distance Travelled 24.3 miles)

Little did we know at this point we were going the wrong way. As we cycled into the lovely village of Whalley we were getting further and further off the beaten track. Fortunately a newly laid road surface and a lapse in concentration whilst I fumbled in my pocket for my GPS solved that. To reduce the speed through the village and around the local school, the road narrows sharply into a bottleneck for traffic.

Happy saw this.

James saw this.

I did not.

Apparently chicks dig scars. I am not entirely convinced.

It was the first time I’d used the front brakes and I did it more out of panic than control so it was unsurprising I came off the bike. Fortunately I didn’t fall badly too but scraped my elbow, my shoulder, my knee and cut open my fingers. I felt pain yes. But mostly I felt like a bit of a fool.The locals were lovely. A couple of passers-by helped me to my feet, checked I was okay, sat me on a nearby wall, made sure I had water and were generally very kind.It was at this point, we realised we’d not brought anything to bind my wounds. We didn’t expect to fall off, as I had personally took it upon myself to challenge fate and ensure our safety. Naturally (by the way) when anybody challenges fate it never turns out well for them.Fortunately I had brought a few spare T-Shirts and we sacrificed one of these to the gods of not bleeding all over the place and it was wisely decided that we would take a few minutes out for me to stop my legs from shaking, so we sat on a wall and I checked my maps. Realised our mistake and recalibrated. We were adding a few miles to our journey, but as Happy remarked “I’d like retire here”  I think maybe because it reminded him of the time I got hurt.  Rest assured I’ll be watching him.

Drink in Bolton

(Distance Travelled 35.5 miles) 

Ignoring the numbing pain we travelled through Whalley stopping off at a local Pharmacy to get some bandages. That’s right, for some reason we decided that we did not need a first aid kit on our epic journey, we’re not proud and painfully trying to ignore the first of our cycling hindsight related faux pas, we ventured on and forced our way back onto the A59.

Passing through into the “Historic West Riding of Yorkshire” and after around 10 miles of motorway like terror we turned off the A59 towards the lovely village of Sawley.

A happy Yorkshireman at passport control

The plan was to eat in Sawley, but it was a truly lovely day so we decided to push on and travelled across wonderfully named River Ribble through seven miles of countryside into Bolton-by-Bowlands.

Sadly at Bolton-by-Bowlands with were met with naught but disappointment. After passing a number of very rustic gypsy caravans. We were getting rather hungry and after cycling over 35 miles our party knew we now wanted some good solid food, hearty grub and something that would help us as we travelled the rest of our epic journey.

Bolton-by-Bowlands failed us completely.

The only pub we found was distressingly, tragically and monumentally expensive. Worst still, the pub sold none of plates of the good solid food we needed or were expecting. Begrudgingly and somewhat sadly we each bought a pint of soft drink and retired to the pub car park to relax and consider our options.

Fortunately crisps and my emergency sandwiches were on hand and in short order we’d decided that we would press on, with a plan to boldly investigate each village as we came to it for signs of decent pub food. This was a good plan. A plan we could get behind, a plan in which hunger was a motivating factor. It was time to ride.

The Best Sandwiches in the World

(Distance Travelled 47.1 miles)

And Ride we did. The countryside through the Yorkshire Dales is magnificent and whilst the hills were getting more and more significant as time went on, a good proportion of downhill made the uphill struggle all the more rewarding.

If you ever see this sign, stop and get a sandwich

One such downhill took us straight into the entertainingly named Wigglesworth where at the cross roads towards the equally entertaining Giggleswick we spied The Plough Inn and parked the bikes with a mind to sating our impressive appetites.

Sadly the menu looked pretty much the same as all the other menu’s we’d seen the past twelve miles, but by this point it was nearly half past one and our ravenous hunger had gotten to the better of us. James ordered a plate of chips and Happy and I each bought an incredibly expensive sandwich in mind that Settle wasn’t too far town the road and we’d be able to sate our appetites when we arrived there.

We didn’t need to. The Plough Inn makes the best sandwiches in the world. Seriously. The Best! If ever you find yourself in Wigglesworth in need of a sandwich I cannot recommend more vehemently the sandwiches of the Plough Inn. My roast beef sandwich had three thick slices of perfectly cooked roast beef, a generous proportion of home-made pickle, fresh bloomer bread and outweighed any two sandwiches from any other pub.

It was exactly what we needed and I have made sure that The Plough Inn has sent a glowing email informing them of their fine contribution to noble art of  sandwich

This is a Happy, Happy

making. Thus sated we happily we set off towards Settle with full bellies and confident that we were half way to our destination (how wrong we were).

Settle Down

(Travelled 55.5 miles)

The Plough to Settle was a particularly easy ride, full of the particularly good food we’d just had, we cycled on with new found vigour.  Whilst the road ahead failed to sympathetically threw us a gentle downward hill as we expected it to, the weight of the best sandwiches in the world made even the climb towards the charmingly named town Giggleswick relatively painless where made the bold decision to get us lost. Now don’t get me wrong, it was only a little lost and it gave Happy the perfect opportunity to raise the shares prices for whatever corporation made Deep Heat. I try and jolly us along. Happy is apparently “fine”. I choose wisely to believe him.

We cycling in and through Settle easily and decide as I was also feeling “fine” by that point, to push our bikes up the huge hill out of Settle and onto the open road.

Well and truly lost

(Travelled 61.8 miles)

There was no doubt about it, we were now most definitely in the North Yorkshire Moors. Until this point I had been directing on our journey through the GPS application on my very clever phone. It was working well and up until now I had, on numerous occasions I had commented on the cleverness of said phone whilst retrieving it to determine our exact location..

“It was invaluable,” I had announced.

Unsettling hills

“It was our navigator,” I had exclaimed.

“It was no longer working,” I explained (very) approximately 6 miles outside of Settle.

I decided at this point that is was important not to panic and told my fellow cyclists the same. I could see by their expressions that this was some comfort to them. I risked telling them that it wasn’t my fault. This went down as you might expect. We were now essentially flying blind.

Now that’s not entirely true. The phone’s GPS was working perfectly. What we were missing was a frame of reference. The maps that the GPS worked on were downloaded, not through the GPS signal but through the normal phone signal which now we were cycling through the middle of nowhere was none existent.

Thankfully, for the next 10 miles our road was mercilessly straight. I told the chaps not to panic again and we set off towards our destiny.

Crossroads to Hawes

(Travelled 72.6 miles)

Despondent and on a big hill

At this point, I’ll admit it. We were lost. We had cycled for the past 18 miles without a map and thankfully without  much directional option. We also knew that we’d now cycled over 70 miles and had become rather incorrectly confident that we were virtually at our destination. Sadly at this point we’d come to a very real problem.

A crossroads.

We had two choices. To the right the humorously named town of Hawes. To the left, the less humorously named, but familiar sounding town of Ingleton. We had no phone signal. We were lost. Fortunately for us the crossroads was a popular site for tourists and both James and I returned to the bikes confident that we needed to head towards Hawes, but somewhat less confident that we had “a way to go yet” and “It’s all up hill from here”

Hawes was twelve miles way, so tired, hungry and broken we cycled on.

Five Miles to Hawes

(Travelled 79.7 miles)

The journey was now starting to take it’s toil. The first five miles towards Hawes has been an arduous climb that had completely drained my remaining strength. I was utterly exhausted and could see from the faces of my companions that I was not alone. I was certainly that it was only my stubbornness that was keeping me going and I was starting to think that  it was going to take a miracle to get us to Hawes, never mind our Tan Hill destination.

Sometimes when you ask for a miracle, that’s exactly what you get. Five miles from Hawes, the relentless  incline fell away and the next five miles left us free wheeling into to the town. It was glorious. We’d been given an break and rejuvenated. Our willpower regained we cycled through the town stopping only to enjoy a celebratory ice cream, update the maps on my phone and head towards Thwaite.

Thwaite

(Travelled 95.4 miles)

Ten miles down the road we cycled in to the tiny village of Thwaite. Confident that we were on the right track we had made good time and despite the terrain getting more than more and more exhausting with each mile, we pressed on through some of the more beautiful countryside I have ever seen.  We were all completely drained and had taken to pushing our bikes over everything except the ever diminishing number downward slopes.

It had become increasingly clear that despite our best efforts the sun has started to set and whilst pushing our bikes up one of the more onerous hills I tentatively broached the idea of sleeping in one of the many old abandoned barns we saw along road side.  It was a lovely night and mild weather was certainly making the prospect of continuing our journey in the morning more and more appealing.

Fortunately at this point, Fate gave us a sign.

Four miles to TAN HILL.

FOUR!

Four miles to TAN HILL!!

I can say with no word of a lie that this was honestly is the finest sign I had ever seen as until then as over the past couple of miles I had started to formulate the idea that Tan Hill didn’t really exist at all and that the highest pub in Britain was merely an invention up by mapmakers who realised that there was bugger all to draw in the middle of the North Yorkshire Dales and wanted to spice things up a bit. It was the modern day equivalent of “Here be Dragons” and many a cyclist had met their doom and the machinations of Mr Ordinance and Mr Survey due to it’s enticing addition to the map. Seeing this sign therefore was wondrous! It was nearly over!

The last four miles were honestly some of the most punishing and dreadful hills I have ever had the misfortune to cycle up, but I just didn’t care, Tan Hill was real and I was nearly there! We’d nearly done it.

Tan Hill Inn

(Travelled 103.2 miles)

You may recall (and if you don’t, then I’m worried, it was only a paragraph or so ago) when I said that the “Tan Hill 4″ sign was the finest sign I had ever seen? Well, whilst this was entirely true it did not stay on the top spot for very long.

Tann Hill! Pay no attention to how dark it is in the picture.

WE HAD MADE IT!

We arrived at the pub not long after darkness and was greeted by the smiling and relieved faces of friends who had decided to walk to meet us from the “local” train station. I hugged everybody, friends, fellow cyclists, random strangers, everybody. We locked up the bikes  and stumbled into the inviting Inn exhausted and euphoric.

The barman suggested a pint of “Ewe Juice” which is the local ale, unique to the Tan Hill Inn, brewed in Dentdale and quite, quite delicious. So delicious in fact that we had a further pint  before carefully and painfully making our way from the warm and welcoming bar to the bunk-room for the finest nights sleep I had ever had.

Incidentally we raised £210 for Barnardo’s doing our bike ride.