Wednesday Club Run - Riding the Ridges to Cheddleton

A fine dry day with a bit of sunshine, not too cold and not too windy provided another opportunity for four of us, Moray, Steve, Eddie and Raph, to ride out along the ridges, stop for lunch at Cheddleton and back home via Lask Edge and Bosley Cloud

After a climb past the ancient way marker stone on Meg Lane the main climb of the day took us to Morridge where we totally ignored the Red warning flags for the MOD firing range. Apparently scheduled activities for Wed 15th included general military tactical training, training with pyrotechnics and blank ammunition however if the army were there they were very well camouflaged. Successfully surviving riding across the firing range we then had a long descent to Warslow and a ride along the Manifold Valley to Butterton. Here, as the Hoo Brook was in full flow, we opted to walk along the footpath rather than risk riding along the stream that runs through the centre of the village. Another climb from Winkhill took us to Ipstone Edge, a long descent to the Churnet Valley railway and a short stretch along the Caldon canal towpath before stopping at the Cheddleton Old School tearooms for lunch. As we were now well over halfway and within site of the telecoms tower on Sutton Common and Jodrell Bank it wasn't long before we were back in Macc. A fine day riding the ridges (about 54 miles with 5400 ft of climbing).

Raph