Betws or bust

Loads of mile over the last week. Saturday morning at 7:30 Dean arrived at my garage with his Gixxer carrying a tent, a sleeping bag and overnight stuff. I loaded up the Viffer with it's panniers and we set off towards North Wales. We managed a good pace in the misty morning and soon we were heading up through Gloucester, Hereford and Leominster. We picked up the A49 then the beautiful A470 all the way up to Betws. I love this road, it's a mixture of open fast sections and tight 2nd gear twisty bits. I lead and Dean was keeping up easily. Only one dodgy overtake around the outside of a long hairpin scraping the pegs made the buttocks pucker up a little. After about 10-15 miles of "hard" riding the brakes started to get spongy, not surprising as hauling 300+Kg of bike and rider takes a lot of effort.

We rolled up to Swallow Falls and had time to put up the tents and down a pint before the footy kicked off at 3. A few more pints, a power nap, some curry and a couple of Jacks and we grabbed an early night.

We woke and packed up the tents before brekkie (a small Full Welsh). We loaded the bikes once again and decided to head north through Llanberis towards the north coast before cutting back south alongside Llyn Brenig. This is an amazing road with great scenery and it was easy to get into a rhythm. We picked up the A5 and heading east stopped at the burger van place which is always packed with bikers everytime I pass (I can't remember the name). We soon realised that we only had about 3 hours to do the 180 miles home so that Dean could learn some songs for the Proper Panda so we got back on the bike and got back on the road (not before laughing at the Sunday riders in their full Strongbad balaclavas!). The A5 was closed at Shrewsbury, not sure why, so after some scary "Wide Load" filtering we picked up the A49 and headed South. We soon on familiar roads and except for a little spirited chasing of an Escort Cossie the ride was uneventful.

525 miles and a good laugh. Why would anyone want to spend their weekend doing anything else?

On Monday evening, after giving the bike a half bucket special to wash off the Welsh road grime, me and Limby rode down to So'ton to grab a coffee (Not to self, coffee shops in So'ton shut at 6:30). A quick ride around the city stopping at St Mary's and we headed home. This little ride has reignited the idea of a London midnight run. This will be done before the weather gets BCF.