October 2001

Unfortunately, for Gerald, the ice cream run had one of the best turnouts ever. A veritable multitude are able to lay witness to the unbelievable navigational skills of that man of the mountains, a munroist no less, who led us all up a dead end road!!! All this within ten minutes of starting and in his home town.

But Martin and Julie made Gerald’s day complete later on when they sustained a puncture. Indeed he could barely contain his glee at not being the victim for once.

Apart from these two unfortunate incidents all went to plan. We cruised the lanes of Cheshire and ate ice cream followed by the obligatory dash to Cholmondley Castle for yet more cake. The weather blessed us with warmth and the company was, as always, entertaining.

Oh, and Aunty Sue plied us with yet more cake at Chez Davison. My perfect day.

Bretton Youth Hostel (25^th-27^th January 2002)

This is now a firm booking. There are 18 beds for which I have already received six deposits. To secure a bed you need to send a cheque to myself for £5 per head. If you’re wondering where Bretton is then look North East of Buxton on your map of the Peak District.

Attractions will include Eyam ( the plague village), a donkey sanctuary, and a visit to the legendary Grindleford caff. There’ll be a slide show on the Saturday night and we’ll be celebrating a birthday or two!!

Alan and Jean Ashcroft have kindly made arrangements for us to dine at the Princes Arms in Trefriw on Sunday 2^nd of December. Booking forms are enclosed with this newsletter, please return them to Alan by the 16^th of November. Alan and Jean are making all the arrangements with the Princes Arms so please contact Alan (number via Luke and Becky), if you have any queries.

Alan has suggested a run prior to lunch to work up an appetite. Meet at the Princes Arms at 10am for a short tour of the area. Or….just meet for lunch at 1pm.

All the usual awards will be up for grabs, nominations on a postcard, please, to the Tandemfuhrer at the Tandembunker.

PLUS… Some NEW and EXCITING presentations. I bet you can hardly control your excitement!!

It is becoming obvious that we are running out of places to go!! So doff your thinking caps and start looking for routes. It has been suggested that we may have to start devising routes to accommodate those wishing to go a little further whilst still including those who don’t. This has already been happening, as we saw on the last run when some took a more direct route back from the lunch stop. This arrangement merely requires that a map ( of the relevant area I hasten to add) be carried by the concerned parties.

I would like to get the ball rolling for next Summer by suggesting a camping weekend on Anglesey as we rarely ride on the island and the completion of the A55 has drawn a lot of traffic away from the smaller roads, you can even ride on the old A5 in relative safety.

Another idea that has been mooted is a mass exodus to York Rally.