50mile (well almost!) bike ride

Ages ago Meg suggested that we should all do the Fall Foliage 50 mile bike ride in The Berkshires, so on Friday night Meg, Luke and I headed off with all the bikes, helmets and kit!

Friday night we got to Pittsburg and after a pasta supper we headed to our 'lovely' motel - yep exactly like the ones that you see in the movies including the nice plastic covered pillows!!
Saturday morning we were up at 7am and we headed for breakfast before going to the start. At the start I suddenly realised that this was a fairly serious ride - here I was with my mountain bike and off road tyres and not wearing 'biking gear'.... (Meg and Luke were one up on me as they had road tyres!) but everyone else was riding cannondale bikes with super skinny road tyres and they were all wearing really attractive lycra!!

Here's me in front of the map where we are going - thank god we're not doing the 100 mile!!

Here we all are waiting for the off!!

So off we went and it was beautiful scenery - the fall was just starting so some of the leaves were starting to turn. I cannot wait to see what the fall is like in a few weeks time when all the leaves have turned. At mile 16 we stopped and Meg and I caught up with Luke at the drink stop. Then it was off again.

It apple picking time and Meg and I spotted this sign!

Luke had gone on ahead of Meg and I but we thought that we would catch up together at the next drink stop but somehow the drink stop never came..... we stopped at one point and some other cyclists told us that we only had 5 miles to the finish.... that seemed odd we had totally missed the check point and Luke!! So we carried on to the finish and we waited and waited and waited... and eventually about an hour later Luke arrived. It seems that Meg and I probably took a short cut..... oooooooppppps!!!

After a BBQ lunch we put the bikes on the back of the car, took off the lovely padded shorts and headed to the apple squeeze in nearby Lennox! Very cute!

Then it was time to head home for supper and a long sleep.... nice!!

It was so lovely to spend a day outside in the countryside being active with friends and it really reminded me of home in the New Forest... all the lovely trees and them turning from summer into autumn colours. There was even a road like Exbury road Mum and Dad! Made me miss you!!

Thanks Meg and Luke for a lovely weekend!