Early Sunday morning, it was a bit fresh, infact I could see my breath as I started peddaling!
The forecast was for a cloudy start but with a few sunny spells, so I was hopeful it would warm up.
Leaving home I headed out towards Ringwood, crossing over the junction at the Cat and Fiddle - Here you take your life into your hands, a terrible junction with many accidents.
Thankfully being fairly early on a Sunday morning traffic was light and I managed to get across ok.
Heading towards Bransgore, the road has a few twists and turns and has a few gentle inclines. Nothing to worry about, but my legs were tired right from the start.
I hoped that as I warmed up they would come back to life.
As I left Bransgore I started to notice cycling event signs, these I followed nearly all the way round on my trip, not intentionally, they just happened to be going the same way as me!
Straight through Bransgore and towards Ringwood, turning right at North Kingston and heading for Crow.
Skirting round the edges of Ringwood and up and over the A31 - here I stopped for a few minutes.
From here I took the lanes - these run almost parallel to the A338 Ringwood to Salisbury road, but a million times safer - as long as you avoid the pigs which are currently out on the forest. I should of stopped to take a picture of them, but they are even more unpredictable than horses so managed to get through them without incident.
The villages rolled by, Rockford, Mockbeggar, South Gorley, North Gorley and finally Stuckton before I turned left into Fordingbridge.
I cycled into the town, hoping to find a coffee shop, I did find one but it looked rather posh so did not bother to go in. Instead I had my camelbak flask which contained my tea with honey and I sat on the bench and watched the world go by for a while.
I must say that at some point I will do a review on the camelbak flask, a bit expensive but keeps things hot for hours and is very rugged but the best bit is it does not leak at all!
Not the warmest of places to stop, the air still had a chill to it.
At this point I was torn with which direction to take next.
I could either continued North and head into Salisbury, this would of been another 40km to get back to Fordingbridge or head towards Godshill and return via the New Forest.
My legs were still tired and I really wasn't sure if I had the legs to carry on, so decided to head back via the New Forest.
However, now being home and having looked at the mileage and the stats, it would of probably been shorter to go to Salisbury! So could of done it easily!
Heading towards Godshill on the B3078 the climb was steady but long, I made it - still haven't been beaten on a climb yet! Had to have a rest at the top though!
Once up on the hill it was relatively flat, thankfully there was only a light wind, it would of been nasty up there with head wind and rain!
Towards Telegraph Hill - I stopped to take a few pictures, but the light was against me so they did not come out very well, but the views across the forest were lovely.
Continuing on till I reached the cross roads of Forest Road, here I turned off right, and continued till the next right on the road which leads to Cadman's Pool - On this junction was WW2 RAF Stoney Cross. By clicking the link you can clearly still see the old runways on Google Maps Satellite.
It is marked on the map but I saw no plaque or anything as I went by. However the road is as straight as an arrow and goes on for what feels like miles!
I eventually came to a T junction with Milkham Car Park being opposite, I turned left here as this road would take me back under the A31.
A long descent down to the A31 but with a climb the other side, brought up to the Canadian War Memorial.
It was not just WW2 that the Canadians helped us out in this part of the world, during WW1 lumberjacks came over to help with the felling of tree's in the area.
Not only Canadians but also Portuguese lumberjacks, there is a Portuguese fire place somewhere near by left to recognise their part. I didn't manage to see this though.
From here it was only a short distance to Bolderwood, where I rode to just the other day, I stopped here for lunch, knowing that for the next 10 minutes or so it was all down hill.
Heading back through Rhinefield Ornamental Drive, the tree's really do look spectacular.
On the outskirts of Brockenhurst I turned right down a gravel track, which brought me back out on the road to Wilverley Plain, up over the Plain, one more descent then the final climb up to the Rising Sun Pub.
It was all a gentle down here, so big gears and powered my way home.
Like I said earlier, as the day wore on I felt better and better and by not going to Salisbury I ended up going further!
So, that ride was 69.2km which brought my total for the week up to 248km, and a monthly figure of 563.9km.
Rather pleased with that, in my wildest dreams I would not of been able to do that 6 months ago!
My target for October is to complete a 100 mile or 161km ride in a day. Breaking my monthly target figure of 600km's.
Ride safe.....
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