blog

Since our magazine was discontinued a few years ago very few people have written about their rides or tours, which seems a pity. So here’s a mainly photographic account of a ride a bit outside our area.

The weather forecast for Saturday, 26th June was a bit better than for the Sunday, so I decided to use the train to extend my exploration of the K&A. In a couple of rides in recent years I had ridden it between Reading and Great Bedwyn. The 8:46 from Woking whisked me to Andover in 40 minutes, whence I rode north through Charlton and Wildhern on pleasant lanes to Upton in the Bourne valley, which then took me up to the escarpment for the fast descent to Great Bedwyn, where the community cafe provided coffee and cake.

After a couple of miles of towpath you see Crofton Engine House on the hillside to your right and Wilton Water on your left. The beam engines pump water from this reservoir into the canal. It’s not quite as simple as it sounds, though, because the summit pound of the canal starts about a mile further west, after five more locks. The engineer, the great John Rennie, had to take water from where it was available to where it was needed, which is why the engine house is up the hillside. The water is conveyed by a very gradually descending leat to enter the canal at the eastern end of the summit pound. Nowadays electric pumps are used except when the steam engines are fired up to entertain the public. The top of the Crofton chimney is just visible in this view:

Remains of an overbridge formerly carrying the railway from Andover via Ludgershall to Marlborough:

Crofton leat entering the summit pound next to its eastern lock:

The Bruce Tunnel (500 yards long) marks the transition from the Kennet river basin to the Avon basin, but not the Avon which gives the canal its name:

It is the Salisbury Avon which flows through Pewsey, the next town. The K&A Canal does not enter the basin of the Bath and Bristol Avon until Devizes, where it descends the most impressive lock staircase at Caen Hill, which we visited during the WSCC stay at Sutton Benger in May 2018.

The village of Wootton Rivers, a couple of miles beyond the tunnel, provided lunch, at The Royal Oak:

I continued along the towpath, past Pewsey, to Honeystreet, near Alton Barnes (with its white horse), where we cycled in May 2018:

This completed my towpath ride and I headed back on NCN 4 through Woodborough to Pewsey, up the hill (past my second White Horse of the day) to return to Andover via Everleigh, Ludgershall, Appleshaw and Penton Mewsey.

It was lovely to traverse the broad landscapes of Hampshire and Wiltshire, with their delightful villages with both timber framed and brick and flint thatched cottages. I was using 35mm touring tyres; something a bit fatter and knobblier would have better for the 13 miles of towpath but would have been a bit of a drag on the majority of miles (a bit over 40) on road. I may offer something similar as a SADI train-assisted ride a bit later this year.

With summer now upon us (we hope), this seems like a good time to provide an update on developments in the club, and to highlight a few upcoming dates and events.  Those of you who were on line for the virtual AGM on 8 May (and thanks to the more than 40 of you who were) will have heard some of this already.

Tour of the Hills, Sunday 8 August 2021

The 2021 Tour of the Hills has now been registered with Audax, and the usual venue of Shere Village Hall has been booked.  The first few entries have started to come in over the last week, so it is all systems go.  The details on the Audax calendar can be accessed at:

https://audax.uk/event-details?eventId=8721

This year will be the 39^th time our club has staged the event.  Anyone who has been involved in it before will know that it is a most enjoyable day that creates tremendous goodwill for our club.  It also provides a vital source of income that we use to fund club activities such as first aid courses, equipment, ride leader workshops and the like.  

However, our ability to run the Tour of the Hills depends on your help!  We will need club members to assist in marshalling the checkpoints around the course, registering riders and finishers, and to help out with the catering at Shere Village Hall on the day.  Jill has bravely volunteered to manage the catering, and thanks also to Don Gray for volunteering to organise the marshals – they will both need assistance from club members, so please make a note of Sunday 8 August in your diaries and stand by for requests to contribute.  I can assure you that volunteering is much less painful than riding the event!

Weekend Awayday Riders

This summer the club plans to run a series of monthly Saturday all day rides outside our normal areas.  Jerry Sender is taking the lead in organising this relatively new group, and details of the rides will be posted on the club website.  The Weekend Awayday Riders are intended to fill a gap in the club’s schedule for weekend rides at the G3 level, but there is plenty of scope for members who normally ride at other levels to come along and enjoy these events.  Last year, for example, the Salisbury ride also attracted several G2 and G4 regulars, and Jerry organised us into a number of groups with a choice of coffee shops, all converging on the same pub lunch stop.  Everyone is welcome.

This year the Weekend Awayday Riders rides will kick off with the Salisbury Wheel ride (59 miles/3300 ft climbing) on Saturday 10 July, and then a ride from Sevenoaks on Saturday 21 August.  Then on Saturday 18 September the plan is for the group to ride the Phil Hampton Memorial ride from Medstead Village Hall (see https://www.cyclinguk-northhampshire.org.uk/index.php/2021/01/03/phil-hampton-memorial-ride-2021/).  This event is open to all, with 30 and 50 mile route options (more details to be available closer to the time).

New Members

At the AGM we mentioned our aspiration to attract new members to the club, and we’re delighted that Neil McIntyre has taken on a new post on the committee to coordinate the vital function of making new members feel welcome and ensuring that we have suitable rides and mentoring available to them.  In the first weeks after the easing of the Covid lockdown we have already welcomed several new riders to our groups across the club.  As our ride schedules get back towards normality, we’re very hopeful that we can build on this encouraging start.

With help from Alison Warren and others on the committee, we have started to advertise the club and its rides in local media, and we plan to distribute WSCC “business cards” in local cafés and bike shops throughout our area.  If you have suggestions on how we could best promote the club to new riders, we’d be happy to hear your ideas.

Club Centenary Event and Annual Dinner

Finally, please note a couple of other dates for your diaries later in the year:

• On Sunday 5 September, we plan to organise a day of club rides and refreshments to celebrate the 100^th anniversary of CTC/CUK ride group activities in our area.  Alison Warren and Mark Waters have kindly volunteered to lead the planning for this event, so watch out for further details.

• On the evening of Saturday 23 October, we hope to organise our annual WSCC dinner at the Princess Royal in Farnham, and Angela Byrne has once again volunteered to take charge of this (further details to follow).  Let’s hope that we all have a good, safe and sociable summer of cycling to look back on once this date comes around.

Derek

You are cordially invited to the 2021 AGM which will take place as a (virtual) Zoom meeting at 5 pm on Saturday 8th May. We hope as many club members as possible will be able to join. The full details of how to connect have already been emailed to all Groups. Further details can be found under Members>Club Governance>Minutes & Reports.