Distance: 36 miles

Time: 3:46

Elevation: 2156 feet

I awoke to the news that the GBDURO cycling race had finished during the night. It was a 2000 km race on mixed terrain, that had started at Land’s End the day before me and the leaders were now in John O’Groats. I seemed to be slacking a little.

I’d reached a stretch of the route I was looking forward to, skirting the edge of the Yorkshire Dales before passing through the Lune Valley and cutting the corner of the Lake District on the way out of England. It was still overcast when I left the campsite at just after half 10, and rolled back to the A6, where I stopped for breakfast.

The route began climbing instantly, as it turned away from Lancaster and headed inland. Soon there were tantalising glimpses of Morecambe Bay behind me, as I passed through the Forest of Bowland.

The next flatter section to Caton was lovely riding and the stone dykes lining the fields looked so much more appealing than the hedges further south. Reaching the small village, I stopped for an ice cream and iced tea in the warm sun, before a short section of cycle path led to a lovely climb up a tree-lined avenue through Halton Park.

More enjoyable pedalling took me along undulating country lanes to Gressingham and then, eventually, Kirkby Lonsdale, 26 miles in.

I was keen to stop here for lunch, so headed into the town centre, selecting Botanica as my restaurant of choice and opting for a very nice chicken and pesto pizza.

On the way out of town, I stumbled upon the local beach, as I crossed the River Lune on the bridge high above. A narrow climb up an old broken road led to better things and the eventual road led to the tiny village of Barbon.

Shortly after leaving Barbon and passing through beautiful countryside on the edge of the Yorkshire Dales I started to hear creaking from my back wheel once more. Investigating, I discovered a couple of loose spokes and set about putting it right.

Just after I’d fixed the wheel, a walker ambled up the road and sat on the wall opposite me. He’d been climbing Calf Top, a hill which he told me had recently been reclassified as a 2000 foot mountain. This seemed fairly niche knowledge about a hill he’d travelled 3 hours to climb, and when I mentioned that I was climbing the Munros, it turned out he’d climbed all of them, 3 times. And the Munro tops, and the Corbetts and the Grahams and the Donalds. Had I heard of the full house, he asked? It was all of the above, plus significant tops in the rest of the British Isles, and when he was registering his second round, only one other person had done them. But he must be getting back, as he had a knee operation in the morning.

By this time it was after 6, and I set off to do the last few miles to Sedbergh. I was still feeling like I had many miles left in me, but I knew of Holme Open Farm campsite, and then I wasn’t too sure of my options after that. Passing by the entrance to the farm, it was obvious that the campsite was relatively quiet and looked to be in a great spot, so I turned in off the road, and scheduled in some extra miles for another day.

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