A Random Ride Pics Thread.... Post 'em up!

[Notty]

First ride for 5 months as lockdown travel allowed within Wales 

[DP1400]

Nice one Notty - what a cracking view too! Great pic, great location, great bike. Perfect day out.....

[Kiwifruit]

Good looking photo there Notty. Pleased you blokes can get out and about again. Enjoy 

[grog]

Well done Notty, good scenery. Whos the young bloke with your bike? 😎

[Kiwifruit]

Well done Notty, good scenery. Whos the young bloke with your bike? 😎

Was thinking the same grog 

[KiwiCol]

Notty!! some gnome has knicked yer bike & is posting pictures of himself on the froum




oh wait,



never mind, ignore that.

@Notty

[Notty]

Nice one Notty - what a cracking view too! Great pic, great location, great bike. Perfect day out.....

On the edge of the Brecon Beacons looking North. 100 yards away from the Army firing range where the SAS train 
@DP1400

[Rynglieder]

31/03/2021 St Briavels, Forest of Dean (c. 138 miles)

Another nice day on the cards so it was time to pull out the GTR. Like most Englishmen I am currently banned from Wales but there was a bit of scope to flirt with the border.
My ride took me down the A38 through Worcester, Tewksbury and onward toward Gloucester. Aside from the couple of town / city centres this is a nice road to exercise the bike on as it was once the main artery between the midlands and south-west, before someone hit upon the idea of building the M5. It is therefore fairly wide and free flowing without too many hazards and has the bulk of the Malverns as a backdrop to the west and the Cotswolds rising to the east.

Once at the Gloucester bypass I swung onto the A48 and ran along the west bank of the River Severn. This is not a road I have used that often as when I am going the Forest of Dean or Chepstow I would normally go via Monmouth and the Wye Valley but the border restrictions at least gave me a chance to take a less familiar road. It turned out quite an enjoyable ride and I must factor it in again for a future run.

There was a brief stop in Lydney to feed the inner man before climbing up into the hills that form the Forest of Dean and then some B Roads into my planned destination of St Briavels. This small border town has a castle which in more normal times serves as a Youth Hostel although in these Covid days it is of course closed. I took a quiet walk around the moat and a few snaps with the camera before embarking on the return journey.

I managed to remain in England through the Forest of Dean taking in Coleford and Ross on Wye and then continuing north through Ledbury before climbing the Malverns. There was another brief break from the bike in Great Malvern where I parked up the bike to take a look at the exterior of Malvern Priory. I seem to have a lot of photos of ruined abbeys and priories in my photo collection, it is a bit of a change to see one with the roof still on.

In not much more than an hour I was back through Worcester and home again.

Additional photos: https://www.flickr.com/photos/rynglieder/albums/72157718520005184

[Rynglieder]

04/04/2021 The Cotswolds / Chipping Camden (c. 90 miles)

Easter Sunday – Somehow a lot of the day had disappeared in mundane things like washing the car and clearing away a lot of old decking we had ripped up to replace. All of a sudden it was three o'clock, but it was still warm and sunny so there was no way I was going to pass up the chance to use up the rest of the afternoon on the bike. It was only going to be an hour, but as usual I got carried away.

As two of my grand fleet of bikes are still on SORN due to Covid and work being needed I am alternating between the GSX and GTR, today was a GSX day (and probably the better bike for a warm afternoon).

I glanced over Google Maps looking for something that would take me in a different direction from the last two rides. My eyes settled on Chipping Camden and I couldn't remember if I had ever been there. A look at Google Street view confirmed that I had not, so I decided to set about filling this void in my life.

For variety I dodged Worcester by going through Droitwich and then on A Roads toward Evesham There is then only a short bit of the dull section of the A46 before I turned off to bypass Broadway but take in Fish Hill with its steep climb and the sort of hairpins that are rarely found in the southern part of England.

As it was late in the day most of the visitors had gone from Chipping Camden but at least there was somewhere open for a take-away coffee while the bike cooled down. I hadn't bothered to take out the camera as it was not intended to be a big day out, but the market hall and high street were recorded on the smart phone as a reminder of my visit.

To avoid going over the same ground my return took me through Honeybourne and up to Biford-on –Avon and then home via an over-familiar route though Redditch and Bromsgrove.

Chipping Camden has been crossed off the list, but I am now motivated to dig a bit deeper into the Cotswolds later in the year.

[Globalrider]

My old stomping grounds Notty - Loved riding the Brecons!

Stan

[Rynglieder]

24/04/2021 Flintshire (c. 180 miles)

Since my last ride out to chipping Camden the weather had broken down a little (and these days I have the luxury of time to be a fair-weather biker), followed by the partial ending of lock-down which meant that I could at last spend a week down at my place in Devon. The result was the bikes had been neglected for a couple of weeks and as the weather had picked up again I was itching to get out.

Although it was the turn of the GTR to come out I had another ride planned with friends for the following Tuesday so I thought I would save the camera for that run and pulled out the GSX again. (The Z1000 and Z1300 are still on SORN but hope fully will make their appearances next month).

As per my usual practice, a monument or two was picked off a map as somewhere to aim for and hopefully take me down some new roads.

Once I had cleared the over familiar run past Telford I was able to enjoy the roads of North Shropshire and the first stop on the itinerary was the Raven Café at Prees Heath, just south of Whitchurch and a popular biker's haunt. I was not sure that it would be open but it turns out that I was not to be disappointed and managed to secure a Covid complaint mug of coffee.
From here it was very new riding for me, I passed through the village of Malpas and continued on bike friendly B- Roads just over the Welsh border to the village of Holt in the Wrexham area. The bike was parked up in the centre of the village and I took the short walk along the footpath to the castle on the banks of the River Dee so that I could take a few snaps.

Once back on the bike it was barely two minutes before I crossed back into England over the Dee via the Farndon Bridge where I jumped off again to grab another photo.
The ride then took me to the outskirts of Chester before taking a quick blast down some of the A55 North Wales Expressway although it was not long before I left it to enter the village of Ewole. The bike was secured in a lay-by at the south edge of Werpe Country Park from where a 10 minute walk through wood land brought me to the remains of Ewole Castle. It's a very hidden and tranquil spot and the park would probably have stood a much longer exploration if I was not clad in bike gear on a warn day.

Having had my fill of it I returned to the bike and began the return journey. To make a bit of a loop of it I rode past Mold and on to Ruthin where I selected the road that would take me over the Horseshoe Pass and drop in Llangollen. I was expecting to see a few bikes at the Ponderosa Café at the summit of the pass but it looked closed up and no one was around. It is possible that it has not yet reopened but to be fair it was late in the day now (getting on for 5 O'clock) so they may have done their trade and packed up.

Once through Llangollen it was rapid spin down the A5 just stopping for a coffee outside Chirk (and a moment to ring the wife to explain that I was going to be late again). Even when this road is busy there are plenty of good safe overtaking opportunities on a bike so rapid progress was made back down to Shrewsbury.

A quick fuel stop at Much Wenlock was the last event of the ride.
It had turned out to be another good day, the bike and the route that had linked the points I had selected had proved a good one.

[Notty]

apparently caught on camera on a recent ride out with my mates, Frank on an XJR1300 and Mark on an 1000 Fazer and posted on Facebook !!

[GSXKING]

Photographic evidence @Notty I'm impressed 

[Kiwifruit]

Photographic evidence @Notty I'm impressed 

Could be photoshopped     

[Mick_J]

It was on police camera action, they are looking for these three as they are suspected of being ugly, and are also suspected of riding unnecessarily slow.