Last Sunday 2 Muni riders, 1 mountain biker, 1 walker and my dog took a trip too Rivington Pike (UK) for an early morning ride.
We were only the 3rd car in the carpark when we arrived at 9.15am (perhaps the poor forcast had scared some people off) and after gearing up set off.
Now I had never ridden with a biker (David) before while on the Muni, and what with the dog (Sefton) and a walker (Paula) I thought it could prove to be an interesting experiment in how fast and how slow the Muni riders (Neil & Craig) could go.
The route we choose was a 9 mile loop which had the first 1/4 on country roads. This proved to be not such a great idea with (what seemed) every motorbike in the North using the lanes for TT training. The dog suffered the worse amongst us (didn’t like the noises) It’s amazing however, how slow a bike will go when you point a camera at it .
After the road it became much for fun with some nice hills leading up to the Pike (summit). One thing I did find was there was a limit to how slow I could go (staying with Paula who was walking) when going up rutty hills as it made UPD’s more likely.
Up to now we had only meet one other person (on a mountain bike) but with the sun shinning and the climb to the Pike lots more people were about. A few ‘other wheel comments’ were exchanged with some walkers, quite a few ‘good efforts’ from the mountain bikers and one ‘it’s very silly’ comment from an elderly lady .
The climb up to the Pike provided some very interesting rock stone steps that were just begging to be tried on the way down.
After some food at the top and some comical looks we started the journey back. The steps were tackled with at least 20 on lookers. See the gallery vid for the attempt (note attempt!).
The journey back was excellent with flowing hills and some challenging technical bits. We were following by two horse riders nearly the whole way, who kept catching us up every time we stopped to let Paula catch us up.
By the time we reached the car park it was completely full ensuring lots more comments about ‘mono-cycles’!. The café there provided much needed tea and cake and a place to rest my sore butt.
All in all a top day Muning, even managed to tire out the dog for the car ride home.
I'm not too far away from you in Macclesfield. Are you going to BUC? If you fancy a ride in the peak district give me a shout. I usually ride Muni with a friend of mine who also lives in Macc.
Simon, I was in the lakes a little while ago and bumped into a lad in Ambleside who rode with the Cumbria club who's name has slipped my memory. He was about 16 and had an onza 24" Muni with a miyata saddle with him. He gave me his number so I could give him a ring and go riding whilst I was there. However I lost my wallet which I'd put his number in shortly afterwards(a regular occurence for me I lost another wallet last weekend...doh). If you could say a hello to him from me and send my apologies for not ringing it'd be much appreciated.
Kit
-- MrBoogiejuice - Loyal subject of the crown
The problem you discussed may be alleviated by wearing some sort of scrotal support garment.
Cumbria_Muni&Trials_Club 6 April 2005 10:21:41 [ permanent link ]
Norry, they all post here - Mark Lever and Rick Else from Bolton and Steve Colligan lives around Manchester somewhere - he also goes up to Rivi Pike ocassionally. Steve is a member of Duc Denton Unicycle Club as am I (I work in Manchester)
Kit, sounds like Kyle - I will pass your message onto him.
Regards
Simon
-- Cumbria_Muni&Trials_Club - The home of Mountain Uni in Cumbria
Welcome to Cumbria - take only pictures, leave only one wheel track
Myself and Mark Lever ride around Rivington Pike fairly regularly. Sundays are always inundated with bikers, especially around the cafe. If you want, we could arrange a ride sometime (probably after BUC). We know a few decent routes in that area.
Cheers Rick that would be cool. Weekends are getting v hetic at the moment with my wedding looming in June but I'd love to arrange a ride sometime, my friend Craig would also be up for it.
Steve.Colligan 10 April 2005 01:12:49 [ permanent link ]
Hi Norry, Rick & Mark,
I ride up and around Rivington practically every weekend, usually on Sunday mornings. I've been riding up there for about 1 1/2 years now and there's some great muni to be had. I've switched my muni training to xc now in readiness for this years 'Red Bull'. You've possibly not seen me up there as I start my training rides quite early, at about 6.30am, finishing round about 9am.
You're all more than welcome to join me on a ride anytime you want to. Just to remind you though - the 2 1/2 hour ride I'm doing at the moment is xc (29")and is definitely hard going as it's non-stop for the whole time, with 500 metres of ascent. It would be great to ride with others up there - if not during my xc season, then maybe later in the year when I switch back to muni.
I'll be at this year's BUC in a couple of week's. Maybe I'll see you, Rick & Mark there. Shame you can't make it Norry as it's a great convention. I'll see you up at Rivington some time though.
Theamazingmolio 11 April 2005 18:09:37 [ permanent link ]
we used to sometimes go to the black dog at the bottom of the road to belmont from rivington and watch all the boy racers going past, some of them were really funny.
-- theamazingmolio - A Unicylist, a juggler, and a prat
Luke Duller (lduller@t-email.co.uk) Never trust anything you read on the internet '~*~*Random Forums*~*~ ' (www.randomforums.tk)
