Wednesday 23rd May

The morning was nice and warm and I set off early, about 7ish after my breakfast and headed towards Murton , going around the back of the A66, and then on to Dufton and Knock which were pleasant small places before I turned off to go past the Christian Centre and towards what looked on the map as a long hard slog up to the top of Knock Fell.

Now the road up was long and winding and a bit of a slog but joy upon joy someone had built a proper road, the reason I found out when I got to the top, because perched on the top of the hill was a radar station, after Green Castle. At the top the road to the radar station turned left and the bridleway went north-eastish, level at first before a bit of drop and then I followed the river. The top had been in the cloud line but once I'd dropped a few metres I was soon out of it. Tracing the river was interesting, some of the riding was great, some a little dodgy with such a peaty/boggy surface and at other points the river bank had collapsed into the river. On numerous occasions I had to cross the river to keep on the path, sometimes that was easy and sometimes not so but overall an enjoyable ride and well worth doing if you're in the area but a little too rough to make a special trip.

Once the path reached Hole House it improved and the ride down was straight and fast, only worrying about the odd gate. From the end of the track I headed off to Nenthead where stopped to eat outside the old mine museum. From there I made my way to Greenends, through a gate and up a grassy field. The track went straight up but the map showed it heading to the centre of a wood, luckily the farmer was in the field and he pointed in the direction I had to go so off I went, over the crest and found the gate into the wood, The wood had a large open track through it and then another across the hill side, navigating was quite easy until I had reached the tack intersection, here I couldn't see the tack I had to use and so after having a couple of miserable attempts, trudging through marshy ground I got the compass out and plotted my route properly.

Once over the hill the view and terrain were great, far harder than the ground in Yorkshire so faster to ride on and the way across the open moor was waymarked. Up to a point. Why is it always the way? It seems that everyone thinks '...they'll figure it out from here..', either way mark it or don't but don't lull people into a false sense of security. Off I went waiting for way markers to point in the right direction and nothing. There was a large sheep pen on top of one of the hills and I eventually found the route, after descending the hill twice and climbing back up, and went around the pen and off to the farm houses on the west side of the valley of Allen Dale (I think I know him...).

After riding through Ninebanks I looked for my first encounter ever with a 'path', the simple black dashed paths on OS maps that aren't shown as rights of way specifically. My first attempt to get on the path at the brook crossing before Whitfield Hall met with a private property sign and as I could see another way in I thought stuff it I'll head around to Park Head and get on the path that way.

And that's exactly what I did, taking the farm track just before Bearsbridge and heading around the back of the wood, although the gate at the top of the field by the wood had been blocked with barbed wire (should have had alarm bells ringing) I thought it would be alright so on I went, around the wood and picking up the farm track to field at the north side. Not it got difficult,I followed a boggy track, through gates and onwards until there were no more gates and try as I might I couldn't find a single gate for hundreds of metres along the fence. I wasn't going back, I was two thirds of the way so I climbed over the fence, stayed as close to the wall as I could ignoring the path on the map and headed off to the road I could see on the other side at Agarshill Fell.

I was knackered when I got to the other side, having to trudge the bike through clumped grass which is never easy as either the back, the front of both wheels catch a clump continuously.

Well, once onto the road I decided to ignore any more paths that I had planned that day and took the road route down into Haltwhistle. Now I'd noticed that my front wheel had a bit of a wobble on it and I remember someone telling me that Haltwhistle had a garage that sold bike parts so off I went to get some more cash and to find the garage.

The garage is on the A69 but only sells basic spares, some wheels but not disk wheels so I had to wait and I set off down the A69 to Greenhead where I booked into the Youth Hostel (via the pub) and got myself cleaned up.

There was a number of people in the hostel but it wasn't busy, in fact there was only me in the dorm and first before a German arrived to bunk down at the other end. I'd put all my stuff on the bunk next to the plug sockets so I could plug my phone in over night. He had a lot of stuff, what looked like four duffel bags but in black and red and a large satchel/bag also in black and red. You wouldn't forget that in a hurry, and as it was I didn't but that's another day. I also took full advantage of the washing machine and did the last bit of washing before the finish.

It was the European Cup Final that night so I went off to the pub to get something to eat and to watch the game but it was the most boring game I'd seen in years and I was tried so I headed back to the hostel, read for an hour and got my head down, I was starting to like the early starts and I was heading off at 6 the next day.

Didn't get the camera out all day so, unfortunately no pictures today.

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