Monday – May 24
Well, not quite, but we came close!
So, Cookie says the ride from Bath to Wells is a “nice” ride. We have breakfast and leave the YMCA in Bath, headed for Wells. The beginning part of the ride is quite pleasant. Beautiful scenery, nice riding, We see an idyllic, picture-postcard of rolling hills and a two-car train coming around the curve that is just far enough away to look like a toy train. Did I say “rolling hills?”
That's when it started, or I should say, they started... the HILLS that is. One after another. And they kept coming. We would get to the top of one, and no sooner would we ease off, than another one appears! Did I mention that they are ALL GOING UP? What the heck happened here? Hey Cookie, what happened to, “It's a nice ride”?
These are “walking” hills. That is to say, I cannot ride up most of them, too steep. It takes more effort to try to stay on the bike in first gear (yes, even the granny gear) than it does to walk. Not to say that walking is easy. Easier than riding, but not easy. Not with 60 pounds of bike and panniers to push up the hill. After a while, even Cookie must walk.
Remember that I mentioned that it was hot in Bath? Well, it is HOT today too. We walk up part of the hill, stop in the shade for a moment, then continue on. It is grueling. I swear that one hill had at least a thirty degree incline. This is worse than the mile-long hill on the way to Rouen. This is brutal!
Eventually, and by that I mean after about four hours, we are at the pinnacle, just before our descent into Wells. My GPS says we have risen 850 feet in about 10-12 miles. Now we descend 600 feet in two miles. Yikes, that is a scary ride. My hand got sore just holing on to the brake!
Now, here's the kicker. After all that riding and walking in the noon-day sun, something happened that I didn't think could ever happen in England... I got sun-burned!
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