King Alfreds way off road adventure day 1. Reading to Hindhead

 King Alfreds way day 1

Big George loves his gravel bike so was excited to find the first official gravel bike circular route in England had been opened. It is called the King Alfred way and is 220 miles all the way round. He was extremely keen to cycle it and organise a trip. In case I haven't mentioned it I had long covid for 9 months which had given him plenty of time to put a post lock down trip into action. But history tells us that Big George is more of an ideas man so not surprisingly it was left to me to put it all together. Which I did.

The route officially starts in Winchester but as Reading is nearest point to Norwich we decided to start from there.

The King Alfred way route

We plan to take 4 days but no idea how long each day will take as we have never ridden this far off road before, but how hard can it be? As it turned out, very.

Big George had used his randomising app to decide who drove and it chose him. 

On arrival in Reading we attempted to park at our booked space only to find we need a permit which had not been provided so we cancelled the booking and eventually found an off street spot instead but had wasted an hour of our riding day.

I promised Big George the first cafe stop would be only a few miles into the ride so we set off to see what an offroad experience offered. I would also being using science to see if cafes on a gravel route are better than road based ones. 

About to set off

We left Reading along the River and soon found ourselves on the first off-road sector. 

Early river section

It is a very different experience riding on bumpy tracks with a bike with luggage so progress was slower than expected. Although as the tracks our narrow you can’t chat as you go along which we were both rather pleased about as we had run out of conversation about an hour into the car journey down.

Start of sector 1

After 10 miles we arrived at the Wellington park farm shop and cafe which was heaving. However the service was excellent and we were offered a table with stunning views which upped the atmosphere and ambiance score.

View at Wellington park cafe

The cake selection was a bit too flan based for my liking but they did have posh egg on toast (off nine quid!) which I opted for as part of my continuing hunt for egg on toast of the year which had started pre pandemic and I’ve no idea when it will end.

Expensive and average posh egg on toast

Fortunately the eggs were not runny and sour dough toast very hard so it didn’t score well saving me a long trip if it had got into finals week.

Despite it being a baking hot day I still stepped up and ordered a hot chocolate and chocolate tart. Big george had a flat white and full English. The food was quite nice but very expensive so science would say that so far road bike cafes beat gravel bike ones, but it’s early days.

We still had forty miles to go and it was now gone 1pm. However a steady 10mph was easily achievable on the this terrain so we should be at our accommodation by 5:00pm. Oh how wrong I was.

We were straight on to the next off-road sector and progress was slow.

Start of first post lunch sector

Then just as we were starting to get the feel for it Big George hit a big bump and flew off his bike.

I obviously dashed over but disaster. Before I had a chance to take a photo he had got up so I can only offer this one from just after the event.

Big George recovering after falling off

For the next few miles I shouted bump ahead and suggested he fill in a risk assessment form every time we came to a lumpy bit. Apparently this wasn’t funny or clever even though it was.

One of many bumpy section

With our finishing time continuing to slip on the difficult rutted and muddy tracks we then hit a long section along nice country lanes. I’m sure you all know what a country lane looks like but here is a photo of one anyway.

A feature on my bike gps is how many climbs you have on the route. In Norfolk this feature never gets activated but today there were two. And the first a short steep one was coming up.

It was particularly tricky as half way up it turned up through the woods for the steepest bit. I struggled to the top but no sign of Big George. After a few minutes I got a text saying he had gone the wrong way. 10 mins later still no sign but a further text conversation established he had abandoned difficult wood section and gone up the road thus bypassing my waiting spot. 

Eventually we worked out where we both were and I cycled to him with more time gone and the chance of a pampering in the spa a distant memory.

We cycled Into Farnham and decided to have an unscheduled stop at the at blue bear book shop. As it was unscheduled  and very hot, I decided it was ok not to have a hot chocolate and have tea with my banana and chocolate loaf while big george surprisingly had a flat white.

It was all very nice but as the cafe was in a town by a busy road it wasn’t really a gravel bike stop so I excluded it from my experiment 

We had a table at the pub booked for 7:15 and it was now 5:00 and we had 15miles to go. We were averaging 10 mph so should be at hotel by 6:30 and to the pub on time. Simple. Or was it. We decided to have a check at 6:00pm and decide what to do.

Back on to the paths through the trees

However suddenly I noticed I had a flat back tyre. I sent Big George on ahead while I dealt with it putting us further behind the clock. Then the wire holding my front bag decided it couldn’t take anymore shaking and snapped leading to emergency repair.

Next we entered the forest to find we were cycling on sand. It was very slow and hard work and big george kept getting off to push. I did technically fall off twice in the sand but as my cycling guest was walking at the time it didn’t count. 

One of the few occasions Big George actually rode his bike on the sandy sector

By this time we had put our table at the pub back by 30 mins. But it turned out this wasn’t enough. I knew we had a 4 mile hill to tackle at the end of the day. I didn’t realise it would be off road and sandy again making it very slow progress. 

Big George rebooking pub

Now hot, out of water and very late the final straw was that my back tyre gave up and went totally flat. I had to pump it up 3 times in the last 2 miles as we crawled in at 8 o’clock. (Don’t tell Big George that I feel off my bike again cycling up hill and snapped my sun galasses as he was so far behind he missed it.)

4 mile long sandy, stoney hill at end of dayNow experienced gravel bikers we should smash tomorrow (if we can move).

Map of todays route

Day 1 route

Click here to download King Alfreds way day 1 gpx file to your gps

Day 1 Elevation

Cafe ratings

Cafe	Hot Choc Quality	Guest Hot Drink Quality	Cake Selection	Cake Taste Quality	Atmosphere and Ambiance	Total
Wellington Farm Shop	7.2	6	6.8	7	7.8	6.96
Brown bear book shop Farnham		8	7.3	8.6	5	7.23
Queen Elizabeth Country Park
Heale Garden tearoom
St Arbucks cafe
Three Trees Farm shop cafe
Saddlebank farm cafe

Stats 

Route	Miles	Average Mph	Time on Bike	Metres climbed
Reading to Hindhead	47.6	9.81	4:50	791
Hindhead to Winchester
Winchester to East Kennett
East Kennett to Reading
Totals

 

 

 

 

 

Goats and buns. (The Goat Shed, Honingham)

Goat Shed,

Honingham,

Everyday 09:00-3:00,

Recommended

It had been awhile since I had visited a new cafe so it was about time I did. I had often seen signs to the Goat Shed farm shop but hadn't realised there was a cafe there too, but there was, so this seemed an ideal opportunity to check it out..

I had planned a 38 mile loop to Honingham with regular cycling guest; Big George.  

But first, yesterday, as a warm up, I went up to Hard to Please House in Aylsham to meet up with Andrew (who is notoriously hard to please) for a trip to Holkham Hall Court Yard Cafe. I was curious to see if Andrew continued to be notoriously hard to please after the country opened up on Monday and very much to my surprise he was. But that’s not the point of this story.

Holkham Hall on Yesterdays ride

Because 10 miles into yesterdays ride we spied a familiar figure sitting on a bench looking at the view. It was only Big George with his friend Andrew. They had also come to Aylsham to cycle my route out to Wiveton Hall (see my useful routes feature for lots of cycling cafe routes throughout Norfolk and Suffolk).

I couldn’t believe my eyes, no not the coincidence of them being there BUT THAT ANYONE WOULD STOP FOR A REST AFTER ONLY 10 MILES. I was appalled especially when they added they had stopped for a bun. Does anyone even use the word bun outside of Enid Blyton stories. It was more than I could take so we quickly made our excuses and continued on our way. It did not bode well for todays ride.

When Big George arrived this morning we spoken little of yesterdays fiasco rather exchanged pleasantries to confirm we had both had a nice ride. The route today was the long way round via Wymondham and done under nice blue skies. We found the Goat Shed down a little country lane and I was surprised how big both the farm shop and cafe bit were. Not that I checked but it looked like somewhere that would have a good selection of chutney.

Outside Goat Shed in the out front out door seating area by the Goats

I was also very pleased to see some real goats in the car park to justify its name.

The Goats

There was a choice of two out door seating areas although we could have also sat indoors for the first time post latest opening up. We opted for the out front outdoor seating area by the goats.

Outdoor seating area we didn't sit in

The cake selection was a good one which included some very large sponge cakes with cream, although tempted I opted for a chocolate brownie with my hot chocolate while Big George had an americano with a sausage sandwich. I was glad to see no buns were on offer although his choice of a sausage sandwich is clearly not cake so once again Big George was excluded from any cake rating activity this day.

Good cake selection with some large sponges

Our refreshments soon arrived and it was a split decision. I found my hot chocolate and brownie to be nice but nothing special while Big George thought his coffee and Sausage sandwich where outstanding. 

Today's refreshments

The Goat shed had been a good find and I plan to return again soon to attempt to tackle the good looking enormous sponge cakes and I recommend a visit.

Big George had performed better than expected which was important as in less than two weeks time we are off for a 4 day off road cycling adventure in Wessex which I’m sure you are already looking forward to reading about.

Scores

Hot Choc Quality	Guest Hot Drink Quality	Effective Cake Selection	Cake Quality	Ambiance and Atmosphere	Café Rating
6.2	8.0	7.8	7.0	7.1	7.22

Map of route   

Click here to download 38 Mile Norwich Honingham Loop gpx file for your gps

Egg Hunt. ( Station Cafe, Reepham)

Station Cafe,

Reepham,

Everyday 10-4:00 ,

Recommended

Lockdown has obviously been a difficult time for cafes and tearooms and although I try and do my bit every week there is only so much takeaway cake you can eat and sadly some of my favourite venues have shut down. I was therefore very happy to hear that the Railway café at Reepham was still going strong after a change of management last summer, so I felt it was time for a visit.

As it was Easter Sunday I was surprised that Big George had agreed to be todays cycling guest because each year he is normally out looking for presents from the Easter bunny but he promised he would complete his search in time for our departure. Sadly he reported that for the 50th year running the Easter bunny had not left him anything but he thought it may have been because he hadn't looked hard enough and would continue his search on our return.

As I hadn't been sure that Big George would make it I had also invited Alastair as back up cycling guest and upon his arrival at Crusader Towers the three of us set off toward Reepham.

On the way to Reepham

The café is situated on the Marriotts way but we took a road based route as we enjoyed the lovely Spring sunshine and blue skies.

Lovely spring weather for todays ride

When we got there I was pleased to see there were lots of other cyclists littering the site. It was obviously a bit of a cycling Mecca but fortunately the café was very efficient so people didn't have a long to wait for their drinks. 

Lots of cyclists could be found all round the café

Social distancing and mask wearing was also being properly observed.

Outside the café ready to venture in 

The cake selection was a good one and I chose a blondie with mini eggs, in order to get into the Easter spirit. Sadly Big George had led Alistair astray and they both went for a sausage sandwich which was neither cake or very Easterie. 

A very good cake selection

We did better on the drinks front and covered all the bases of Hot Chocolate, Coffee and Tea. 

Todays drink selection

Once outside our refreshments were soon delivered and we all thought the food was excellent with my cake scoring very well. The drinks were not so good and all on the weak side. My Hot Chocolate was Cadburys or similar which, as you know, gets a standard 5 out of 10 as its not my favourite.

However we all very much enjoyed our visit to the Station Cafe and I recommend a visit, especially if you are on the Marriotts way. Me and Big George decided we would do that trip in the near future and definitely stop off here again.

As we set off back to Norwich we saw a sign to Reepham's other disused station at Whitwell. It seemed surprising that a village of this size could have ever needed two stations but a quick bit of research on Google said they were part of infrastructure improvements made in the 1930's as part of Reepham's failed Olympic games bid.

The journey home was uneventful although the promised wind behind seemed to be straight into our faces making the going surprisingly hard. Big George was keen to get back quickly so he could continue his egg hunt but as I write there has been no news of any successful finds. Maybe next year.

Scores

Hot Choc Quality	Guest Hot Drink Quality	Effective Cake Selection	Cake Quality	Ambiance and Atmosphere	Café Rating
5	5	7.7	8.0	7.8	6.70

Route

Click here to download 35 mile Norwich Reepham loop gpx to your GPS

New Friend. (The Front Room, Bungay)

Front Room,

Bungay,

Opening times Tue- Sat 9 - 4:00,

Highly Recommended

It has certainly been a long time since I have been able to post about a new (to me) cafe so I was very excited when Howard put a comment on my Facebook page to point me in the direction of the Front Room in Bungay as I was an aware of it. 

I selected Big George to be my cycling guest on this adventure as he can normally be relied upon and so on a chilly and misty spring day we set off to cover the 40 mile round trip.

A cold and misty day in Norfolk, which was very quite.

Big George informed me that he had done a lot of baking during lockdown and asked if I would like to meet his new friends Mr and Mrs Scone-Hands. He proceeded to whip off his gloves and make me have a conversation with his hand about his latest fruit scone action, whilst he put on a “funny” Mr Scone-Hands voice (apparently Mrs Scone-Hands doesn’t speak). Note to self, find different cycling guest until after lockdown.

As it was rather cold Big George put his gloves back on so with baking based chat with Mr Scone-Hands curtailed we continued in silence until we arrived in Bungay where we found the Front Room at the Earsham end of the high street

Outside the Front Room before joining the wrong queue

It is a takeaway only establishment which of course makes no difference in these times. They seemed to be doing good business with a queue for orders and a separate one waiting for their drinks. Unfortunately we picked the wrong queue delaying our refreshments and opportunity to warm up until gently pointed in the right direction.

I checked out the window cake display which had a reasonable selection all of which I liked the look off but eventually picked the orange polenta cake to have with my hot chocolate. Big George had a flat white and a slice of frittata. Big George wasn't fooling me and even though frittata is cake shaped it isn't cake so he would play no further part in any exciting cake rating activities today.

Good Cake selection displayed in the window

We collected our stuff from the correct queue and headed to the local park behind Bungay Castle. I know the rules and insisted we continued to exercise whilst we had our drinks and cake. We did put them down on a bench between star jumps and push ups which may have been illegal but I wasn't sure.

Cakes and drinks possibly illegally sitting on a bench

My hot chocolate and cake were both excellent and worth another trip to the Front Room to try more of their cake range. Big George said his coffee was very good too. I would highly recommend a visit, especially at the moment.

Big George had taken off his gloves to consume his frittata so I was able to have a nice chat with Mr Scone-Hands who had apparently had never been to Bungay Castle before.

Bungay Castle which Mr Scone-Hand had never been to.

The return trip had wind behind so was speedier and warmer. Mr and Mrs Scone-Hands were both allowed out and told me they might be doing some baking this afternoon. I had rather warmed to them and certainly found Mr Scone-Hands more interesting and easier to understand than Big George so hopefully he will be able to come cycling with us again.

Final part of ride by which time Big George had sadly put his gloves on again

Scores

Hot Choc Quality	Guest Hot Drink Quality	Effective Cake Selection	Cake Quality	Ambiance and Atmosphere	Café Rating
8.2	7.5	7.0	8.6	6.0	7.46

The Dark Knit Rises. (Long term corona virus update 4)

Long Term Corona Virus update 4

I should have learnt by now that you never tell anyone you're over your long term corona virus (LTCV) as it only ever ends in disappointment. This was certainly the case for me. I had started to regularly cycle again during September and was confident enough to say that, after 6 months, I had finally put the LTCV behind me. My how the virus must have been laughing as within a couple of days I was feeling ill again and spent most of October and November on the sofa.

It wasn't all bad news as with cycling on hold I decided I needed something else to occupy me on my road back to health and happiness. So I headed to my secret underground bicycle workshop to plan a new activity. After much thinking I decided knitting was the way forward and went in search of wool, needles and Youtube videos.

So this is what I have been up to since I became the Dark Knit and transformed the bike cave into an arts and crafts area. Sadly the one downside is that you can't knit and eat cake at the same time as its hard to operate the needles with sticky fingers.

Knitting area at Crusader Towers

I found that a bit of knitting everyday was good distraction from feeling unwell and set myself the task of knitting all my running friends bobble hats (like it or not). After 4 practice hats of various quality I was happy to wear one in public and felt my winter knitwear collection was complete.

The Dark Knit Winter 2020 collection

I therefore offered to knit my first hats for the running group. Both Jet and Sharon opted for a hat in my most ambitious stitch, the Moss, and on delivery they claimed they were happy to wear them, at least in my presence. 

So with the bobble hat production line in full swing I have also turned my attention to a new cape (or possibly blanket) and have set off on a 63 square, 3 colour, 4 stitch adventure which I hope to have complete by the start of the next pandemic in a few years time.

The start of the Cape Crusaders new 63 square knitted cape

One other bonus of knitting is being able to join in a knit and natter session, which you can do on zoom at the moment. Although cycling maintenance and football chat are rather light on the agenda you do pick up some top knitting tips. 

Knit and natter top knitting tip no 1. Don't knit with dark wool as it is more difficult to see what you are doing, especially if it goes wrong.

Having missed lockdowns one and two, which were more of lie downs for me, I am pleased to report I'm feeling a lot better and enjoying my daily exercise in lockdown 3. Obviously there is no opportunity for cycle cafe adventures but hopefully that will be back on the agenda soon. But in the meantime you will just have to make do with knitting tips and ideas.

BTW I'm still not saying I'm over LTCV yet as that is just asking for trouble.

Double puncture day (Brickyard cafe, Hedenham)

Brickyard Café,

Hedenham,

Tue- Sat 8-3.30, Sun 10-3.30

Highly Recommended

Not surprisingly visits to new cafes have been in short supply recently so it was good to have the opportunity to go somewhere new (ish) today. However I haven't been idle as I have revisited many of my favourite cafes to see how they are operating in these difficult times. So if you want to know which cafes are currently open check out my guide (see Latest post lockdown cafe info).

Today I was off to Hedenham near Bungay where the Every days a Picnic café (EDAP) has changed hands and is now The Brickyard Café. After the recent wet and windy weather I have had to refresh some of my wet weather gear so today I was modelling my new cycling boots. They looked great but had an unfathomable foot entry system which I couldn't work out so even though todays cycling guest, Big George, turned up 10 minutes late my feet were still not ready to go. When I did eventually get them on I must say they were worth the effort and kept my feet warm and dry all ride.

New winter boots with unfathomable feet entry system and gloves

We eventually set off and caught up on stuff before our next incident. About a year ago I changed to tubeless tyres which has pretty much offered me a puncture free cycling experience. Big George also tried to change over to the latest technology but didn't get on with them so had gone back to tyres with inner tubes.

A few miles before the café stop  Big George demanded we stop and I wasn't at all smug when he had a front wheel puncture. I always come prepared for such events and got out a short novel to read while he changed the tube. When this was eventually complete he went to reinflate only to discover his pump must have fallen off earlier on the ride. Fortunately I have a small emergency one which I was prepared to offer him, for free, on this occasion.

Big George starts the repair process while I settle down to read my book

As I reminded him of the benefits of inner tube free wheels we completed the short distance to the Brickyard cafe which we found on the Norwich Bungay Road.

Outside the Brickyard cafe in my smart new cycling boots

As is the way now it was masks on as we were accompanied to our seats for a full table service experience, the first part of which was to scan the track and trace QR code. I did manage to snap the cakes on the way past and was able to allocate a high effective cake selection score.

Todays good looking cake selection

I was glad to see a choice of hot chocolates on the menu and, as always, went dark. I also went for the chocolate Guinness cake. (Note. Back in 2015 EDAP won my cake of the year with their Chocolate Guinness cake and had kept their winners certificate on display until they moved on. Hopefully this one will be as good).

Big George had an Americano and Norfolk Rabbit (or cheese on toast to you) as he never has cake.

Our drinks soon arrived and were both excellent attracting high marks.

Todays good looking hot drinks

My cake arrived but everything was not quite perfect as part of the napkin was under the cake and it had icing sugar sprinkled on it. It was now useless for finger/lip crumb wiping duties. Although not the worst example of this by any means I feel I have to keep my #Keepcakeoffserviettes campaign standards up.

Remember keep cake (and icing sugar) off serviettes

With serviette removed I settled down to enjoy my cake but when Big George heard it had Guinness in it he wanted to try some. Eating cake was totally out of character but he claimed it was excellent. As he has no cake based tasting reference point to comment from then I had to ignore his input, although he was quiet right, it was excellent cake.

Very good cake indeed

It had been a very good cafe stop and although its currently difficult to get a full café experience anywhere the Brickyard Cafe had performed well and maintained the high standards EDAP had previously set. The food and drink were excellent and staff very friendly so I highly recommend a visit.

After a quick sanitisation we set off for the return ride and would you believe it Big George got another puncture. This time in his rear. I was secretly pleased on two fronts. Firstly I could read some more of my book and secondly I felt it was reasonable to charge Big George for use of my bike pump this time. I'm not totally unreasonable as I charge by the minute (£5) rather than per pump, which also encourages faster pumping. £10 later we were good to go as we completed the ride in stony silence.

Big Georges 2nd puncture of the day

It was great to be able to try somewhere new again and I'm already looking forward to my next ride by which time I hope to have worked out how to take my new cycle boots off. 

Scores based on 2 visits, most recent 16/11/2021

Hot Choc Quality	Guest Hot Drink Quality	Effective Cake Selection	Cake Quality	Ambiance and Atmosphere	Café Rating
7.85	7.50	6.90	7.35	6.9	7.30

Route

Click on link to download 31 mile Norwich Hedenham loop GPX file for your GPS