By Charlie Mortleman

We came, we saw, we fell off……..

The format was the usual mix of Trail Centre and natural back country riding. The protagonists – Morts, Alan Lewis, Pete Williams, Rich Bryant. Motorbike Karl, and some combination of Linneys (would it be both, neither, or either…………?).

A rather ambitious plan (who, me?) saw a few of us pitching ourselves into impending gloom at Cwmcarn at about 330pm on Friday. We plugged up the climb, Pete’s specs spectacularly steamed up, as the fog and dark descended, lights making little impression. Then the skies opened and we bailed down the road, quickly discovering the limitations of Windstopper softshell. 

And off to Brecon youth hostel (posh us, innit) and some not so well earned beer n’ curry.

To accommodate the lunchtime arrival of the Linney’s, we headed for Afan trail centre on Saturday, the thinking being that 2 hour loops with a café in the middle would be more conducive to a successful meet than a grid reference in the middle of nowhere (I know the Linney’s well, you see).

So all was going swimmingly until Sally decided to lob herself into the well documented Welsh rock, and our heroic “Into the void”–esque piggy back rescue. Well random-bloke-called-Antony’s heroic rescue, as he did nearly all the carrying. “Ooooh he was so much easier to hold onto you than you, because his hips are slimmer………..”.

So our arrival at the bottom coincided with that of a) an ambulance, and b) the Linneys, and off Sal swanned to Swansea a & e.

The upshot of this was that Andy could dump his clunker in the car park for the afternoon (“hopefully someone will nick it, but I doubt it”) and could use my bike, Cath on Tamsin’s (Andy refused to go with her if she used her own bag of spanners). “This bike is uncrashable” he exclaimed, on helmet cam, then crashed it.

Meanwhile off I swanned to Swansea to try to track down err indoors amidst the wrecked rugby players and crushed cross country runners, and eventually found her and her newly diagnosed double fractured ankle and busted rib. “So I’ll get the stuff and we’ll head home, then?” “Sod that, we’ve got beer and curry tonight, and you’ve got a ride to lead tomorrow”.

One thing you can’t accuse Sal of is milking an injury.

So Sunday was the Gap road, one of the Welsh classic routes. Pete headed off early as he had to get back, managed a mile or so up the first bouldery climb, then headed back a) to retrieve his teeth; and b) to scour ebay for a full suspension bike. I kind of knew the way, and was equipped with a supa-doopa Garmin, so what could possibly go wrong? Actually, apart from a run in with some ramblers, who objected to us not having bells, all went swimmingly until we got to a junction. “Well I know the way to the right, and its pretty good, but left looks interesting”. A good old fashioned bog slog duly ensued, with the Garmin resolutely telling me I was on the right route as I sank to my ‘nads in one section. If this was a bridleway, gawd knows how you’d get a horse through – suspect it would still be there.

Our hour log effort was rewarded with a 2 minute plummet down what can best be described as a waterfall. By this point, I was fully expecting a sense of humour failure. Cath though was still smiling, and had become firmly attached to Sally’s new full bounce Yeti – “I like this, think I’ll keep it. She won’t be needing it for a while”.

So up the Gap, a 3 mile climb followed by a 4 mile boulder fest down the other side, which pretty much saw the end of Linney Mr, much to the amusement of Linney Mrs.

And that’s about it. Anyway, must dash – domestic goddess duties await. I have rabbits to tumble dry, children to dishwash, carpets to iron, and washing to hoover…………………