C2C - Morning Campers!

*AAAARRRGGGHHH!!!!*  'Quick nurse!  Quickly!  Get the foreceps!  It's a breech birth!'  *Aaaarghh! Woo! Woo! Puff! Pant!*  'Don't stop pushing Mr Tyssen, you can do it!  Breathe!  Breathe!  C'mon now you little bugger, out you come'.  

There we all were in pools of sweat.  I'm crouched on the toilet seat unable to use my now broken legs to reposition my half sunburnt carcass to help make the birth process any easier or faster.  With a *gnnnn!* I bit hard on my clenched fist rueing the day I decided to have long distance sex with my bike during a heatwave.  

With a *FWUMP!* out it came.  It hit the porcelain like a rock hammer.  Oooh the little shit did have sharp edges.  What have I got?  Let me see please nurse, I begged.  Swaddled in toilet paper she handed it to me...  Looks like a London Brick Dappled Light with a few budgie seeds mixed in.  A gentle round of COVID type applause erupted all around the campsite for a jobbie well done.  Thank You!  Thank You!  

I popped my eyes back into their sockets, mopped my fevered brow, gave my sniggering testicles a stern look and then proceeded to wipe everything, starting with my eyeballs; cos there is no way I want any of the gritty remains of yesterday in 'em...  

The whole shitty birth process also reminded me of the day when one of Penny's Velociraptor dogs (that's the wrong name for that breed but it sounds similar; way too cute and hairy and small in real life - the dogs not Penny that is...)  wandered about the house whining and licking close to its bits.  On inspection I found it similarly had a large rough pebble of a hairball and dog food turd wedged tight in its *ahem*.  So I tucked it under my arm with its head down and carefully but firmly pulled it out with a pop like a turd cork out of a small hairy dog shaped bottle.  There's one happy dog for ya :-)

The combination of not drinking enough water every day and so becoming rather dehydrated during the mini heat wave was quite foreseeable.  All of the moisture taken in was only ever ejected from my pregnant lump of a fat body through my pores, so no where near my Uretha Franklin frankly.  That in combination with the wholemeal multi-husk, sesame seed and trill combination lock Tescos curry meal meant that a successful escape the next morning from Stalag 19's toilet block around an S bend was not on the cards.  I know this is what happens.  Always.  Simply because a dehydrated body will do its best to take moisture out of anything that it can to protect ones vitals.  And so the resultant brick.

Yes, truly a fecking idiot.  Here's a video of me coming to the end of my ride across the top of the North York Moors with my mule of a bike teasing me with an empty water bottle..

Ok so that's the North Yorkshire 200 done.  Plus a bit more cos the route up to Leyburn took me through a bit of Richmondshire too.  Again I curse myself.  The number of times that I've been up this neck of the woods on my motorbike couldn't be counted even if all of you took your shoes and socks off to help me figure out the total.  For sure a motorbike flattens everything.  The effortless way one breezes up to the top of a hill; well, it's almost like its not there.  But oh feck, yes it is.  Nonetheless, it's great thinking back as I write about the ride and some of the important moments in the journey:

Day 1 was the wind in yer face run into Scarborough across the top of the Yorkshire Wolds.  With Brad along for the journey.  It's great that he has finally emerged from the crysalis of his bedroom into the world and has taken a keen interest in cycling with me.  He's improving every time we go out, now with me chasing him most of the time.  This was his first run to any place other than a loop out and back to home.  Fantastic and well done young un!  We made it to Scarbados for ice cream and fish and chips just before he got the train home and I searched atop cramping legs for the campsite. 

I suggested that he should join a cycling club as there is no comparison between a set of 22 year brand new out of the box legs and mine.  No says he.  I'm very happy just going out for rides with my uncle Wayne.  I like that.  For many years I've wondered what it might be that we might get interested in together like a good uncle should.  Whether computing or astronomy for example.  So it is great to hear that this might just be one of the things going forward.  I'm made up by the fact that he has now asked if he possibly could go on long rides with all the camping gear too with his uncle Wayne!  Yes, of course you can young man :-).

By the end of day 2 I'm struck by my leg strength after a horrendous day riding across the scorched earth atop the North Yorkshire Moors.  Here I am, 60 years old next year.  Weighing in at more than the mass of a small black hole.  Punting a 5 bar gate loaded with everything 'cept for the kitchen sink up every fecking Garrowby type hill in Yorkshire.  I still don't understand how this body works.  Strained to hell legs at the end of the day which give me problems getting into and out of the tent after a hard days ride; legs that can recuperate and have the energy and strength and resilience in them for the next hard day.  You have to admire the God given things we're, er, given which even at my age still continue to work well.  Perhaps not many more years ahead of me before my first ebike?  Nah, not yet.  Until then I'll carry on.  

Whilst staying in Bedale at the end of day 3 - the campsite owner - Ross - nice guy, told me about the other cyclist on site who's bike was in for repair.  It was nice to chat to Christine, a lady free to roam the land whilst her husband is away on the rigs.  She's now just into her 60's - I presume newly as she referred to her bus pass on more than one occasion like it's that unwanted badge of honour off her last milestone birthday card.  An ex-forces lady who borrowed her tent from an ex-SAS friend.  I presume she's someone who is used to the harsh outdoor life; or was perhaps just giving me sufficient clues to not get too forward with her.  Safety first.  I guess you never know who you might bump in to when out and about.  

Anyway, all I intended was to make her a cup of tea seeing as I had my stove and tea bags out and perhaps have a friendly chat.  She was down from Perth on her e-bike following Sustrans route 1 (I hope significantly better than route 166) and was soon to be going back home on the train. 

It was day 4 going in to Leyburn.  Why did I add another climb into the Yorkshire Dales to this mad loop of a ride?  Could it be because I'm a fecking idiot?  Yes.  Unsurprisingly because it is in the Dales Leyburn is nearly 600ft above sea level.  There I am powering up a sharp gradient and a truck pulls up close behind.  Its throbbing engine trailing me; both of us are diesel units in low gear.  Right up my chuff he was but bollocks to that I don't do intimidation any more.  I'm not riding in the gutter because I know that would result in a visit to the hedge 'cos a slow heavy bike can meander wildly on a gnarly road surface.  

The road widens and one of the bin men leans out and with a 'yeee-haaa!' cheers me on to keep pushing as the whole shitty mess of a truck whines loudly, goes up a gear and disappears around the next bend in a cloud of dust with the bin men a whooping and a hollering, shooting their salvaged water pistols into the cloudless arid sky.  

The number of people staring at this ageing bag of blubber as I arrived in Leyburn, well, had me thinking that I’m that man with no name, arriving in a remote wild west town where the in-breeding had resulted in more mashed-up banjo playing damaged bodies than the faulty transporter machine in Star Trek, the Motion Picture could ever have.  Quite a few folk have wandered over to me throughout the week saying just one word like "impressive" or "awesome" [that one must have been an American] which reminded me of the whoops hollers and comments from their descendants when me and London Alan did the Bealach-na-ba in 2019.  For sure, in all the days riding I've been the only fully loaded biker on the road.

It's a rollercoaster of a ride from Leyburn to Masham but without the candy floss.  A quick tea and ice cream break in Masham passes, er, quickly. The last 7 miles or so into the final camp site at Kirkby Malzeard was again up hill so finishing the day at another site atop the biggest hill in the area.  I arrived early so no problems finding a plot.  However, and contrary to the other sites who always have cheap back packer rate plots available for cyclists, this greedy bugger charged me double the rate for the pleasure of staying on a dump.  

Yep it has grass.  Good start.  But the amenities looked like something made from pallets nailed together.  Similar for the 'shop' and one sink crockery cleaning area.  With an old double decker bus converted for 'glamping' and another old horsebox having similar treatment so a site to go back to?  Well no, this one is not on my Christmas card list.  And I recon will be a disappointment for many visitors.  

I'm scoffing one of them Nature Valley bars at the top of one of nature's valleys when the hoards descended.  School must be out cos I'm immediately surrounded by the COVID carrying injuns; carloads of kids, all out on the field playing ball games, chasing each other around and generally carpet bombing the place.  Squealing, laughing, whoo whoo whoo whooping all around me with pretend bows and arrows in an attempt to surround me whilst mum and dad get on with setting up the tent.. you know - making a bloody nuisance of themselves.  Well, I say that but there is in fact something magical about hearing happy children.  I come from a big family yet I have none.  Perhaps there were moments in time in the distant past...  Perhaps I would have been a good dad..

This site has a theme.  You can hire for a fiver a half steel barrel and buy a box of logs for a tenner and have yourselves a barbie.  26 quid to get in per person and 15 quid before you even start doing anything on a site built out of a few nails and a pile of driftwood?  Falmer Palmer here has for sure figured out how to make a killing and so get rich quick during these COVID times.  I very much assume he is not being pressed by the local council to get a licence / improve the site, so anything goes.  Compared to the other sites it's a poor mans home with crap facilities and is expensive.  Avoid the Ivy Bank Campsite.

Later, I'm on my back in the sunshine outside of the tent.  I hear a bee in perfect stereo move from one side of me to the other as though it's just flown through the vacant space between my ears.  As you know I shot myself between the ears with a Nazi sponsored roughage loaded Doctor Bob meal before retiring early with headphones stuffed in to cut out the external noises which I expected to go on all night.  I play this piece of music, amongst others...

Tears stream from my eyes, wetting my ears before hitting the pillow.  There is something beautiful in this music, melancholic too; that, and having too much time to think whilst waiting for the Sun to go down and so to sleep; reflecting on ones life, the hits and the misses, the lack of children with all their ups and downs, means I have reasons to both celebrate and regret the passing of the years.  Enough said.... 

I don't sleep well when camping.  My carcass is too heavy for most packable mattresses and whilst the current Thermarest inflatable solution is the lightest and most comfortable so far I still ache through the night.  It's the best I can find / so far found without trying to carry a complete bed on my bike.  Nonetheless, I still awoke on more than one occasion aching, repositioning and then somehow finding the ever elusive sleep again.  

I'm awoken very early on Day 5.  Will someone please stone the fecking crows?  Noisy bar-stewards first thing this morning.  I'm up early with the chorus.  Aching all over.  I roll over onto my front and note that I'm as stiff as a board.  You know, an old Victorian floorboard.  And whilst I am not, it feels like I have been nailed down.  I notice my breath on the canvass floor, similar in tone and frequency to the cow the other day.  I smell the cool freshness of the morning air, cept I'm not about to eat breakfast.   But boy is it hard work getting up.  I'm as taught as a cat gut string on a Stradivarius, similarly making yeowling sounds as I try to twist and reshape my un-contortable body enough to be able to fold myself so that I can get out of the tent door.

Anyway I was up and cos no milk it was a priority to get off the site and down into Ripon for breakfast number 1.  I've got the packing and unpacking of all bits down to an art now and so was away before most of the camp had come to life.  Travel to York was only 35 miles or so, mainly downhill into Ripon for which I had to wear my cycling jacket for the first time as I would say it was 'fresh'.  With breakfast number 1 inside me I checked the Bikemonger shop but looks like they are closed on a weekend so no more checking out bike frames with them today. 

I hit Boroughbridge some 45 minutes later so have another pot of tea and a small sandwich - breakfast number 2 - then cruise the back roads to Aldwark bridge, cycle past RAF Linton On Ouse and find elevensies number 1 at Benningbrough Hall cafe.  Surrounded by cows.  Just has me thinking again about that calf, plugged onto mums teat the other day.  I had also seen it on the grass and then later laid down chewing the cud which had me wondering...  How does that happen?  Was the poor thing laid there the other day and without warning it's body launched a mouthful of partially digested grass back into its mouth?  How did it react the first time?  A wide eyed surprised look on its face?  Taste nice?  Did it spit?  Did it swallow?  What on earth told it to start chewing it again?  Don't you ever wonder about these things?  No? Oh, OK..

Anyway I'm back home just after midday and that's it.  The NY200 and a bit is complete.  So that's riding through the Wolds, the Moors and the Dales all done in 5 days cycling and 4 nights camping.  Approx 190 miles of hill work.  11000 ft ascended.  15700 additional calories consumed.  Thighs and calf muscles feel supremely strong.  They've improved with every passing day.  Arse is OK - check.  Testicles incredibly are OK - check - check.  Knees no longer ache so that's a result and the achy right hip has completely disappeared - the ache not the hip.  It feels great like I could cycle on forever!  

I did have the momentary thought back in Leyburn to 'go west old man' and try for the west coast via Hawes, Ingleton and Morecambe Bay.  It really wasn't that far away.  But no, it was time to stop playing, come home for a bit and sort things out.  There will be more days like these this year for sure.  

I'm staring at my reflection in the bathroom mirror.  The first one that I've seen in 5 days.  For sure the sun has had a dramatic effect on me.  Dark tanned skin with white coconut textured hair, a deep stubble and lighter finger ends, simply because they are always hidden from the midday sun whilst curled around the handlebar.  Nonetheless a proper bum on a bike look...  

I went to bed early Saturday evening.  I do not remember my head hitting the pillow.  The dreams that normally invade my nights were not there.  I felt fine most days but for sure the lack of sleep each night, whilst being enough for the following day, had left me dog tired.  I blame the camping and only the camping for that. 

In just a few weeks or so I'm gonna do the coast to coast from Blackpool to Scarborough.  

I'm so looking forward to it.

I'll be using Bed and Breakfast all the way :-)

Ciao for now.