Ride report

In theory from the list, it was 18 riding to coffee, and 14 there after. In fact, 1 joined us near the ring road, 5 joined at coffee, a slightly different 5 made their own way from coffee to lunch, with 2 continuing from lunch to reconnoitre a route for a future ride and some peeling off early in the afternoon to return to homes away from Oxford. So in reality, I am not quite sure how many people we had when! Still, we saw lots of people and the weather was good which, is what counts. The weather slightly under-performed the forecast until shortly after coffee, after which quite a few shorts were visible. We took the slightly less interesting B480 out of Oxford, which allowed more time out in the Chilterns. After Crowmarsh, we used the farm track/bridleway south to South Stock, thus avoiding a fair stretch of busy road. Due to recent rain, the track had a few more puddles than the last time we used it, but wasn’t too bad, though the separate group of 5 apparently “mentioned” my name in respect of the mud. A few took the road instead and we met up at the appointed place. After getting to the top of the Chilterns we came across a rather flooded corner in the road, so we gingerly walked round the edge on slippery tree routes. Quentin rode though, deep enough for wet feet and he discovered the bottom of the water was full of runoff (some might call it slurry?……) from the adjoining pig field. We passed through some lovely beech woods with new lime green spring leaves and lots of blue bells.The Black Horse was its usual busy self, with many walkers and cyclists. Most of the mountain bikes parked looked as though they had gone through Quentin’s slurry pit.After lunch we returned by Ewelme and
Chalgrove. John S and I found a yarn bombed post box in Sandford On Thames with Charles and Camilla on the top.