Back on the moors (Day 5 part 1)

Friday Morning, The Last Day. We were looking forward to the prospect of more time on the moors. If it was anything like Thursday evening this would be a great way to finish. The quickest way back up was along the road up Castleton Rigg, which was very exposed, so our enthusiasm got knocked out of us within a few miles.

As we approached Rosedale Head we could see quite a few pairs of walkers at what appeared to be regular intervals, coming from Farndale moor in the West and making their way east along the road we were about to turn onto. There was a car in the car park with a couple of ladies drinking from a flask of tea, so we stopped and asked them what was happening. It wasn't an organised event as we'd thought. The ladies were patiently waiting for their husbands who had started walking at 4 o'clock in the morning in order to walk the lykewake walk within the 24 hour time limit.

We rode on, passing a few of the walkers as we went. Martin had ridden some of this route before and had been telling me all week about a really difficult section we'd have to negotiate and how he was both dreading it and looking forward to it. Tootling along the road didn't seem too hard, and I was daydreaming, leaving the navigation to him, when he just stopped. "I think this is it" he said. I looked around. As far as I could see we were on a moorland road with no distinguishing features. Then I saw the Bridleway sign. Now some of the bridleways we'd ridden would easliy have accomodated a team of horses pulling a carriage complete with footmen and petticoated ladies. This one would have been a squeeze for a donkey, but I had complete faith in Martin and followed him meekly as he directed his steed along the bridleway.

Like the Lake District and the Cleveland way, the path was laid out with a paved track of rough stones. Unlike the previous two tracks, this was on flat ground, and was easy to ride. the stones had been laid end to end on top of the peat soil, presumably to stop travellers from sinking into the earth, never to be seen again.
Martin's warnings increased as we cycled. He related the story of how, somewhere along the bridleway the stones were spaced further apart. The first time he'd been here he tried to bunny-hop his bike from one to the next, missed and ended up neck deep in mud. At least, it was neck deep on the third telling.

We didn't run into that problem. Yes, the stone blocks were spaced further apart, some were missing, and yes, it would have been possible to slip off the stones to the mud below. It wouldn't have been a problem though, because it hadn't rained for a week and the peat was as dry as a Yorkshireman's sense of humour.

It was a great path. Easy, fast riding for miles on a clearly marked path with nobody about. We stopped briefly at one point to watch a couple of eurofighters having a mock dogfight before deciding to head in the direction of Beck Hole to try and get some lunch.