"To B road or not to B road"

Day 3

‘To B Road or not to B Road…’

Route – Chagford to Street

Stats:

Distance: 76 miles

Time: 5hr 28 mins

Top Speed:  Too fast for digits….

The team awoke to the smell of frying bacon and sausages this morning, a nice change from the early morning sounds of the YHA which have greeted us every other 7am so far this trip. The Dooley’s put on an impressive spread for breakfast which set us up fantastically for the massive day of cycling ahead. We were all so appreciative to the Dooley’s for their fantastic hospitality and sad to say goodbye knowing our night at Street YHA would pale in comparison. Mary with her fresh legs led the way from Chagford to Exeter having cycled the route last night, and we were all pretty impressed with her efforts up the 6 mile hill as we sped down it en route to Exeter. Such speeds were reached in fact that the next page of the map, needed to navigate our way through town, was torn from Joss’s pocket and we arrived in the middle of Exeter map-less….not a great start to the day. Luckily Rosie was on stand by in Chagford and text us a route through of lovely B roads and picturesque towns. Sadly we were unable to find this nice B road route and ended up on the A30 from Exeter to Honinton, and had a rather perilous 10 mile cycle up the hard shoulder which was quite possibly the most horrible 10 miles of the trip so far. We finally managed to get off to A30 and back onto the B road, and after a brief B road style 2 miles to Honinton we arrived in Honinton with 37 miles under our belts.  We reconvened with Jerry there for some much needed sustenance before heading off for the afternoon stint to Street, with the new page of the map safely tucked down my top to avoid any more A road stints. The first part of the afternoon was spent navigating our way through some fairly dodgy roads in the Somerset countryside, which saw our average mile per hour drop from 13 to 6. Needless to say we were all rather happy to finally join up again with the A road despite the morning’s events and it was a fairly straightforward ride to Somerton where we were to say goodbye to Mary, who had a train to catch back to London. I was most sad to say goodbye to my fellow female cycling companion, especially as it turned out she was heading back to a rather unsettled London town. Camillo, Joss and I cycled on another 5 miles to the Street hostel, up what was apparently the ‘steepest hill in Somerset’ (as we were informed by a local at the Somerton pub where we stopped for a brief tea) however after the Cornish and Dartmoor terrain it was a mere hillock for us experienced cyclists. Seventy six miles done; our longest cycle so far and for all members of the team, the longest cycle ever completed. Needless to say we were all pretty exhausted, particularly after looking at the map for tomorrow’s route – another 70 plus stint.