We had a visit from Mark this last weekend, so after a day of prepping bikes & sorting out a few things for Lucy's KTM which meant all day Saturday was taken up, (it kept raining anyway!!) we opted for all day Sunday as our play day... which was a good idea in hindsight as it was nearly 10pm when Mark had finished with the DR650...
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| Nighttime DR tyre fitting |
Roughly 120 miles of a loop around the North & Eastern Lakes with a few new lanes thrown in for good measure, happy days...
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| Fettled & ready to play... |
We headed down to
Latrigg to ride up there, the views were fabulous, the light really lit up the hills & lakes around us, what a great day to be out! After a quick pass through Keswick we headed round to the Coach Road where Lucy got to try out the new bike on the tricky uphill section that has been her nemesis on the old Honda... She cleaned it up easily, shows how much her riding has come on recently plus how much easier the KTM is to ride off road compared to what was really a road bike.
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| Mark with a sparkle at his fingertips... |
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| Team Orange member No:1 |
The Coach Road has changed a fair bit since the last time we rode it, the recent heavy rain has left it's mark with several runnels changing & deepening although surprisingly there was very little standing water on the trail.
From here we headed to
Great Mell Fell where we'd discovered a new lane but not had time to ride it last trip out, so unfinished business which is always good to tick off! What a little cracker this turned out to be, narrow, technical & a little ford too... great stuff!
We headed to Pooley Bridge for a sandwich lunch then off to Melmerby for the next new lane, this links into several others so we had a fair old time rolling around quiet lanes with the sound of bikes & cars heading up Hartside Pass to the cafe on this beautiful Sunday of fun.
The Chicken & the Turtle came out to play properly today & we found a Pelican for Mark, which he's christened Paula, she's now mounted onto the front mudguard so she can see all that goes on as they ride out together...
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| Paula the Pelican |
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| The Gang saying hi... |
We retraced some old known lanes for the afternoon, doing them in reverse to our normal route, which made them seem new before a final blast back home so that Mark could get back home & ready for work on Monday, another great day out on the bikes in a beautiful part of the UK!
Lucy has decided she is totally in love with her bike...
Geoff has just bought a KTM 450EXC-F, so he's member number two of Club Orange at the moment... once he's got it sorted to his liking we're planning a trip to the North York Moors for some muddy fun... can't wait!
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| KTM 450EXC-F |
We've also got a new member to the crew, although it could be awhile till he's out playing as he lives in Spain! Graham has just bought a Yamaha XT 600, it needs a lowering kit as he's missing about 6 inches off the bottom of his legs, (It's a birth thing... :-)) otherwise it's a lovely looking mint bike, Morocco trip maybe???
Keep on rolling!!
