I’m very good I am.  I know, you’re looking at my stats thinking there’s nothing that unusual about them, aren’t you?  Well, let me enlighten you as to my route, and then you’ll see why I’m feeling so proud of myself…

Cycling time: 2:33:20
Distance: 38.88 miles
Avs: 15.1 mph
ODO: 4020 miles

First off I went up Shipham Hill which, again, went really well.  Slightly faster than last time if anything.  I went at a fairly steady pace up to the top, engaging the quarry lorries in one-sided conversations that, on balance, it’s just as well they couldn’t hear…  I took the extra wiggle up and over Rowberrow, and then swooped down to the Churchill traffic lights.  I took the usual little detour before getting back to the main road and taking the right up Burrington Coombe.  Cue more pottering, with plenty of time to admire the wind tunnel effect in certain places, amongst other things.

Like  why badgers haven’t learnt to cross the road better – they need a Gumbie Cat – because they’re clearly very bad at it, as you can smell from a mile off now that the weather is warmer.  And for quite a long time when you’re going by slowly…  *ick*.

And like why Burrington Coombe is THE way to get to Wells – something which I always forget – and the traffic did its usual job of narrowly avoiding me with rather too little margin for my liking, due to the lack of visibility up there…

So, I turned off, headed down through Compton Martin to West Harptree, where something very inconsiderately stung me on the neck.  Not sure what, and it doesn’t seem to have left much of a mark, but it didn’t half hurt for a bit.  I headed down that way because I wanted to do the whole upwards A39 slog from Chewton Mendip to Wells, which I duly did.  Slowly again.  But not as slowly as it has been known to be done.

I crested the top, waved at Romulus and Remus, and enjoyed the long fabulous down to Wells.  I was trying to do it without braking, but my nerve was broken by the very large yellow artic that followed me for a while.  Some of you may know how I feel about going downhill with traffic behind me…  Still, once he was past, I enjoyed the rest of it to the best of my limited ability 😛

From there life got a lot flatter – I just came straight home at speed, from Wells to Wedmore, to Cheddar, and home.  There wasn’t a lot of wind, and that which there was was from the south, which made the last drag up Upper New Road much nicer than usual.

The whole route is here, if you be interested.  It was a very lovely ride.  I didn’t find any of it too hard, spent a lot of time hurtling along down on the drops generally enjoying myself, and, as an added bonus, sun-tanning as I went along.

Oh, and have you seen my average speed?  All things considered…I rock *grin*.