What Crayons for the Lakes?

Friday night saw 5 entrepid bikers head north to the Lakes, at various speeds and departure points. Ian and I got on the road by 4:30 and we were in the pub by 10 after unpacking our kit and spending 45mins playing "hunt the key" around the back of some cottages.
The straglers - Mike, Lex, and Ginger Darren rocked up well after closing time and by which point Ian and I were back at the Camping Barn drinking the beers we had brought with us.
We crawled into our sleeping bags at around 1am or so.

After a fairly good nights sleep we rose, some of us more quickly than others and breakfast was consumed, Lex whipped up some Espresso for the Coffee-heads to consume.

By 9am we were out of the door and started the long climb/hike/carry to the top of Sticks Pass. Having being ill fior the previous 2 weeks I was really feeling the pace and was struggling quite badly but the top came soon enough and we started to head towards Helvellyn. With the weather closing in we decided to decend off the ridge just before Helvellyn and we were rewarded with a nice techy descent with a few comedy tumbles and hairy moments.
We then climbed back up sticks pass from the other direction, which was hard as we were puhing the bikes constantly for about an hour and a half, we then headed back towards Helvellyn but turned off the ridge and shot down the switchbacking descent down to the Barn. The weather for the second ridge ride and the top of the descent was really wet and windy, at one point , myself, Lex and Mike found ourselves at the the side of trail after being blown 2 metres off it!

The Ian summary of the route:

Saturday was 18.3km with 1373m of climbing (higher than Ben Nevis) and took
in the 15th and 20th highest peaks in England twice. We also climbed to the
highest pass that is still in use in the Lakes, twice!

At the bottom of the descent I tried to unclip my right foot but couldn't as one of my cleat bolts had come out of my shoe and the cleat was rotating. Great.
We all got dry and had a quick brew/snack and Ian and I were off to Ambleside and Biketreks to solve my cleat issue.
We got the bits I needed as well as a couple of other things and headed vback to be greeted by Mike and Lex walking around outside trying to warm up.

So it was straight down the (very warm) pub and we settled in for a lot of Old Speckled Hen and good food and chips.
At some point during the evening Woja, the long haired hippy code monkey showed up and we stole his chips and onion rings. He also had some interesting publications with him. And MBR.


The rest of the night was a bit of a blur but we found Ian leaning against a dry stone wall asleep and Darren likes his beer with added crayons.

I was quite "merry" yet managed to sort out my cleat issue and it was straight too. Miraculous.

After getting out of bed on the Sunday morning I realised I was still drunk, however there was riding to be done and after a fair bit of faffing we were off to climb over the hills to Ullswater then ride around the Lake on some great Singletrack.

Ian summary:
Sunday was great and 16km and 535m of climb.

After a pretty chilled ride we were back at the Cars and it was time to head home but not before a trip to beer shop for some ale for the home fridge and a baked potato with cheese and beans to fill our aching stomachs.

A great weekend was had by all and I wonder if Darren has found all of the crayons yet???

Piccies here and here , I'll upload mine tonight hopefully.



Dan