Sunday Easy Ride to Grasslands

15 of us were out on a surprisingly dry easy ride from Macclesfield to the ever popular Snowdrop cafe at Grasslands.

Phil B had a puncture about 5 minutes after Siddington, this worked out well for Jim who had missed us at Siddington X roads (his ride from home had been into a strong head wind). We had a fairly uneventful ride out, until shortly before the cafe. We had a breakaway group in front with a gap, and Lucia and myself leading the rest along a narrow lane. An Audi came around a bend towards us at speed, and nearly took Lucia out. The front group had shouted, but not loud enough for us to hear. After that we got the front group to shout a little louder! We arrived at the cafe just behind a group of 70 to 80 somethings out on their bikes, as well as John J who had finished his overnight shift supporting the Windsor Chester audax. Simon R turned up by car, and then the Stretford Wheelers arrived, so a very long queue! We eventually all got served, ate and were back on our bikes by 1pm, although a few of the full English breakfasts had to be eaten a little quickly. We took a longer route back, for some reason I kept finding myself having to navigate from the middle and some times the back of the group. This approach finally failed near Siddington when the front part of the group went the right way, and the back half missed a turn. We managed to reconnect at Siddington X roads though. Five of us decided to cycle to Alderley Edge for a second cafe stop, whilst the rest headed over to Macc.

Katherine