At eight o’clock on Friday evening my very understanding wife bundled a couple of the wains into the car and drove me to Ballynure with all my stuff. I saddled up and headed up the hill towards Ballyboley. I quickly caught up with a lady who was riding up the road ahead of me.
We got chatting, and she’s usually a runner but has started cycling while she recovers from an injury. As we passed the
pipe band all standing out in the middle of the road practising, I dragged it out of her that she’s run the London marathon twice, the Dublin marathon twice, and this year was the second time she’d run the Belfast marathon. Some people do the craziest things. I ran a leg of the Belfast marathon this year and I think I’ll stick to riding the bike up trackless heather-covered mountains in future.
After we parted I kept on zig-zagging up the hill, the views becoming more and more spectacular as I gained height. Past Ballyboley orange hall where one of the members was painting the door bright red, on past the school and turned off into the forest.
The trees in Ballyboley have been infected with the destructive fungal infection Phytophthora ramorum,
So the place is a mess. I took two wrong paths before I got the right one, because the Forest Service have been adding new paths to access the trees that need felled. They’ve also laid stones on the path to minimize the damage by the increase in heavy machinery, and the loose stones are more difficult to ride on than the usual forest paths.
Once I got away from the destruction near the entrance, Ballyboley is a pleasant wee forest and I enjoyed my ride through it. I didn’t venture off the path because I was just passing through, and also because of the diseased larches. Even the main path had some challenging steep climbs though, even if they weren’t overly technical.
At the other end I was expecting to see more forest paths through the trees across the road, but the path through there is something totally different. The ‘path is marked by only an occasional footprint visible in the dirt through the long grass. Then I lifted the bike up a bank and the Way led up a fire break through the trees. No risk of fire today, as the tyres sank three inches into the sodden earth. The going was tough and I pushed most of the way through, only riding when the path was dry enough. My feet were squelching through the bog as I plodded forwards, the gps on my phone reading just under 2mph. I was going to have to pick up the time somewhere else to make the 10mph average I was hoping for.
The forest suddenly ended and I lifted the bike over a high stile, and was met with the barren bogland that’s such a feature of the Antrim Hills. The floor was deep, thick sphagnum moss, thriving on the moisture-rich peat beneath. Memories washed over me because when I was a child my family spent many summers turning, stacking, drying and bagging peat very near here to keep the house warm through the winter. Although I probably complained bitterly at the time, I have good memories of those summers.
Picking my way along the slightly drier ridges, a path crossed my route. On the map it doubled back and re-crossed the Way a few hundred yards further on. The calculation of ‘extra distance’ versus ‘easily rideable’ was an easy one and I took the path. It was coming up to 9pm so I was looking for somewhere sheltered to bed down for the night, and with the wind blowing down the exposed valley, Shane’s Hill was not ideal.
Turning back off the ‘road’ which was no more than a double track path, the cattle watched my progress inquisitively. I didn’t take much notice of them, until one heifer moved aside and behind her stood a young bull! A herd of cattle can be a dangerous thing if they’re startled and you get in their way, but a single bull, if he takes a dislike to you, raises the danger to a whole different level. I shifted my direction slightly so I was walking in a straight line, my path moving away from the group, trying to look big and strong, and gentle and non-threatening all at once. He never took his eyes off me until, with relief, I climbed over the next fence and up towards the rocky ridges of Hightown.
We got chatting, and she’s usually a runner but has started cycling while she recovers from an injury. As we passed the
pipe band all standing out in the middle of the road practising, I dragged it out of her that she’s run the London marathon twice, the Dublin marathon twice, and this year was the second time she’d run the Belfast marathon. Some people do the craziest things. I ran a leg of the Belfast marathon this year and I think I’ll stick to riding the bike up trackless heather-covered mountains in future.
After we parted I kept on zig-zagging up the hill, the views becoming more and more spectacular as I gained height. Past Ballyboley orange hall where one of the members was painting the door bright red, on past the school and turned off into the forest.
The trees in Ballyboley have been infected with the destructive fungal infection Phytophthora ramorum,
So the place is a mess. I took two wrong paths before I got the right one, because the Forest Service have been adding new paths to access the trees that need felled. They’ve also laid stones on the path to minimize the damage by the increase in heavy machinery, and the loose stones are more difficult to ride on than the usual forest paths.
Once I got away from the destruction near the entrance, Ballyboley is a pleasant wee forest and I enjoyed my ride through it. I didn’t venture off the path because I was just passing through, and also because of the diseased larches. Even the main path had some challenging steep climbs though, even if they weren’t overly technical.
At the other end I was expecting to see more forest paths through the trees across the road, but the path through there is something totally different. The ‘path is marked by only an occasional footprint visible in the dirt through the long grass. Then I lifted the bike up a bank and the Way led up a fire break through the trees. No risk of fire today, as the tyres sank three inches into the sodden earth. The going was tough and I pushed most of the way through, only riding when the path was dry enough. My feet were squelching through the bog as I plodded forwards, the gps on my phone reading just under 2mph. I was going to have to pick up the time somewhere else to make the 10mph average I was hoping for.
The forest suddenly ended and I lifted the bike over a high stile, and was met with the barren bogland that’s such a feature of the Antrim Hills. The floor was deep, thick sphagnum moss, thriving on the moisture-rich peat beneath. Memories washed over me because when I was a child my family spent many summers turning, stacking, drying and bagging peat very near here to keep the house warm through the winter. Although I probably complained bitterly at the time, I have good memories of those summers.
Picking my way along the slightly drier ridges, a path crossed my route. On the map it doubled back and re-crossed the Way a few hundred yards further on. The calculation of ‘extra distance’ versus ‘easily rideable’ was an easy one and I took the path. It was coming up to 9pm so I was looking for somewhere sheltered to bed down for the night, and with the wind blowing down the exposed valley, Shane’s Hill was not ideal.
Turning back off the ‘road’ which was no more than a double track path, the cattle watched my progress inquisitively. I didn’t take much notice of them, until one heifer moved aside and behind her stood a young bull! A herd of cattle can be a dangerous thing if they’re startled and you get in their way, but a single bull, if he takes a dislike to you, raises the danger to a whole different level. I shifted my direction slightly so I was walking in a straight line, my path moving away from the group, trying to look big and strong, and gentle and non-threatening all at once. He never took his eyes off me until, with relief, I climbed over the next fence and up towards the rocky ridges of Hightown.
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