Friday was another day for riding, went out in the afternoon, went for a ride across the local heath then into Delph Woods then down the Castleman Train to the Roman Road at Upton, then up the hill until I turned off on to Upton Heath. I have only ridden this bit once before and I thought the turn off was in the first quarter of the hill not the last. This part of Upton Heath is the part that was featured on the national news earlier in the year when it went up in flames due to a suspected arson attack. The whole area has now started to regrow, the only sign of the fire is the blacken trunks and branches of the trees and bushes. Apparently the wild life has moved back into the area, I met a photographer who was stalking a deer which after I came rattling down a hill had moved into a clump of trees and out of site, opps

Saturday I had to work, only made worse by the fact that I had to travel to the head office in Worcs. so no riding. I was supposed to be riding with the son today but he stayed over at the mother in-laws last night and did not want to come back for a ride, add to that it has been raining all day so I did not go in the end. Definitely going out riding tomorrow morning regardless of the weather. Going with the wife to Moors Valley where we will both ride the Through the Tree trail and then I will shoot off and ride some other bits while she pootles back to the van. I am not back to work till Wednesday so I am hoping to get another ride then.

I got a Muvi micro digital camera and yes it is really that small. Currently doing some secret recording of the wife doing Wii fit while I type this (she won’t be happy), just to testing purpose’s honest

Hopefully the new chain for my bike will arrive tomorrow and I can then finish prepping the bike ready for the weekend rides. Decided to put the mud tyres on the Whyte, with the amount of rain we have had the last two days and the amount they are forecasting till Friday, maybe a rubber dingy and life belt would be a better option.

Apparently they have been waiting for me to return the “Missing Item Confirmation Form”, you know the one, the one I e-mailed back to them on the 23rd December at 9:44am which was 26 minutes after receiving their e-mail requesting me to sign the form and send it back to them!

So I have duly send it again tonight and will keep an eye on my account to see if it appear on there as being posted, if not they can expect another phone call from me.

I guess this is where buying from your local store has its benefits, if you get a problem you can go back to the store. But then you pay for that at the local store which is why buying on-line can be cheaper. Having said that I have been buying online since 2005 (if not before) and this is the first major problem I have had with any online store.

just some of the mud on the jockey wheels, a large clump fell off as I moved the bike onto the stand

I won’t be riding the Cannodale for a few week as the chain has reached the end of its life and any further use will only wreck the cassette and chain rings. A new chain has been ordered this evening but I don’t expect to see it until the end of the coming week. So tomorrow I will be riding the Whyte which I have not ridden now for nearly four weeks. I am intending to go out to Moor Valley County Park, I have not been out there for a couple of months so it should be fun. The wife and son are coming as well although the wife is still not riding. This means we will be parking in the main car park as opposed do down the road in one of those forest pull-in’s as I don’t think the wife fancies the walk to and from the visitor centre. I will take a quick ride around the their little laid out trail route and then go off and find some new routes to ride.

With just about everybody back to work on Tuesday, maybe I might have a chance of getting my Muvi camera delivered. I ordered this from Play.com on the 4th Decemebr after seeing a cracking deal, I received two parts of the order, 8gb memory card and extreme sports pack but for what ever reason known only to Play,com they did not bother to send the camera out until I contacted them 7 days later (according to my order status it was being processed). By this time the christmas rush had started and then we had all the bad weather. I have lodged a undelivered item report with them on the 23rd after complaining again about the non delivery. If I have not heard anything by Wednesday\Thursday I they will get another e-mail from me.

Tomorrow night is weigh in night, I have not been since the 20th and to be perfectly honest I am not looking forward to it. I could if I was so inclined not bother to go to the weigh in tomorrow night and instead wait until the following Monday and hopefully loose more of the christmas excess, but the only person I am kidding is myself. I am whatever I have eaten over christmas like it or hate it, so be it. I have ridden 117 miles since my last weigh-in (more to come tomorrow) I just hope this bike riding has countered some of the christmas excess.

Ready for a bit of TLC

I decided to ride some local area’s that I had never ridden, I had already worked out that they were only small areas but I was looking at ways of possibly linking some or all of them into a ride or adding to other existing rides I do. There were four different areas I tried, some of the areas were more successful than others, all had a bit of road riding to get between each area. A couple of the rides look like they will be a mud fest once the wet weather sets in. I finished the ride off with half a loop along the river at Throop. All in all an enjoyable 3 hours, apart from the walk through the undergrowth, I have spent several painful minutes extracting brambles from my finger since I got home. Total distance for the ride was 15.8 miles.

Yesterday I went to Southampton with the family, wife wanted to check out a couple of job agencies and the kids like visiting particular shops in the area so that was a day out for us. Unfortunately the bear with a sore head (BSH) tried to make an appearance, brought on by the large crowds (school half term) and petty family squabbling. Once things had settled down the BSH was soon dispatched and an enjoyable meal at Pizza Hut was had (ok not diet friendly but it was a treat for the daughter and her birthday).

I find it quite strange, I can do a 25 mile ride and my knees are OK, wander round the shops for a couple of hours and they ache like hell, probably my bodies way of telling me there still a lot of weight to shift yet (or I don’t like shopping which is probably closer to the point).

Tomorrow I am repairing a roof apparently, one of those jobs I was volunteered for!

It seems as though everybody is moving to using the WordPress blogging software, you can either go to WordPress.com for WordPress to host the blog for you or WordPress.org for the software to host the blog yourself (you will need a hosting package from an Internet service provider if you want to do it yourself). Three of the sites I follow Massive MTBer, Welsh Cyclist and Lezz (the moon walking bear) (there is probably more) have recently moved over to WordPress (not sure who using hosted or self hosting). I have been using WordPress for around 8 months now and once you have your feet under the table it is so simple to use.

Todays entertainment, well today started early about 6am in fact when I bashed the alarm clock for going off when I am on holiday. When I eventually dragged myself out of bed it was *issing down, option one early morning ride out the window. The daughter was working this evening so we stayed local today and drove to Poole and then walked down to the old town, along the quay and around the shopping centre, funny while we were out it never rained.

I had to go the the local bike shop this afternoon which is over the other side of Bournemouth so once we were all back in the car I headed for the other side of Bournemouth. About half way along to the shop my daughter tells me that she need to catch the early bus to get to work on time and with going to the shop and the wife wanting to do some more shopping for one item (make note) she would miss her bus and be late for work, so I had to turn round and head back towards home, oh hum.

A quick visit to the cycle shop (a long visit can get expensive) and I was on my way out the door but this caught my eye Team Sky Replica road bike, it looks lovely but look at the price !!!

Anyway as I mentioned earlier the wife wanted to go to one shop for one item, why then did we come out with 8 items, if I had gone into the bike shop for one item and come out with 8……….well either I would not have got out the shop door alive or told not to come home!!

When we got home, the daughter was still there, apparently lunch took longer to cook and she will get a later bus!!

As the rain had cleared off I decide to finish the bike clean I gave up on on Sunday due to the rain, got the bike out the shed and it started to rain again, I just can’t win. The bike is now already for the off tomorrow, the GPS has the map and route downloaded ready. I have done part of tomorrows route in the past but that involved driving some 8 miles to a country pub, starting and finishing the ride there. Tomorrow I will be riding from home. A little apprehensive over my back but a little peddle down the road tonight seemed to be OK.

And finally (a curve ball), how many 50 years olds do you know that like Pendulum?? Currently listening to Pendulum Live at the Brixton Academy, already listen to their latest Album (there showing my age, CD), Immersion

I have done the drive down that way several times to one of the companies site just outside Plymouth and it takes me about two and half hours, so leaving at 9am I had expected to arrive about 11-ish, it soon became apparent that the caravanner’s of the UK were going to put an end to that idea. With rain falling from the start and progressively getting worse as we headed west, our lovely winding “A” road do not lend themselves to overtaking caravans, so we joined the que behind each caravan till the opportunity to pass presented itself. I had hoped thing would improve from Honiton where we picked up the A30 dual carriageway, but the rain got heavier and the traffic got slower.

By now I was fighting a battle in the car to keep the windscreen clear from fogging up, the only way was to run with the air conditioning on but I was getting to cold, so we opted for switching it on and off to keep the screen clear and the occupants just of frozen. Around 2hrs 40 minutes later we pull into one of Trago Mills large car parks and is by now absolutely *issing down.

The first purchase in the store was an umbrella, not having one with us and knowing the kids will want to go around the leisure park it was a wise investment. We spent a couple of hours (and a few pounds) browsing the aisles. I am pretty sure it has shrunk in size since our last trip (they had a major fire there about 12 months ago and there is a lot of building working taking place at the rear of the store) as we soon found ourself out in the rain again and looking at the food outlets. After feeding time and kids being kids it was of to the leisure park. The rain did not seem to detract them from them wanting to wander around the park. To be perfectly honest many of the rides were closed due to the weather, the daughter wanted to go on the mega slide (a 15ft vertical drop down) but this was closed as it was under repair so the kids opted for the smaller slide (both indoors). Finally we opted for a ride on the train around the park, at least the carriage has a roof even if it did leak.

If we thought is was *issing down when we arrived it was definitely lashing it down now, the sky had that dark foreboding storm colour to it. Once again the battle of the steamy windows started not helped by the fact that we were all wet but this time I decided on raising the temperature in the car so now we would be slowly cooked on the way home. Once the heat was in the car I turned the temperature down and manage to keep the screen clear. The drive home was easier than the drive down despite a diversion due to a road closure (accident). The rain rather than relenting got worse as we got closer to home, standing water was now a major issue.

Not far from home the daughter got a phone call asking her why she was not at work, turns out the manager had asked her if she wanted overtime for Thursday night and forgot to ask her about Wednesday night but put her down for both nights, so now we had to race home, change out of our now drying cloths, drop the daughter of at work and then go shopping.

I eventually got to sit down at about 8:30 last night, I slept well last night!!

Not sure what we are doing today, I want to get my bike finished and lubed up from the weekend and maybe a test ride to see if I am up for the ride tomorrow. My back is feeling a lot better but there is still a twinge every now and again to remind me.

While writing last nights brief interlude I noticed that 95% my blogs for the last few weeks (or more) have concentrated either on my bike riding or my dieting (or not as the case may be). Well there is more to my life than just those two thing and I am quite happy to blast those who upset me (see the bus drive incident from a couple of blogs ago) so here my latest blast.

Evans Cycles, a major Internet cycle retailers as well as having high street stores. Well on the 4th June I ordered a pair of knee pads from them online, the order stated they were out of stock at the warehouse but were available in store at one of their shops so they would call the knee pads back from the shop and post them onto me.

OK first question, why not post it direct from the shop to me??

Anyway the stated delivery was 10 to 14 days, I was in no hurry for them so I was happy to go with the flow.

On Friday the 19th having heard anything from Evans and not being in possession of any knee pads I checked my online account with them to see if there was any info on my order. I found no detail of my order (apart from it being placed) but they had already charged my credit card for the purchase.

Second question, why charge my credit card when you are not in any position to send the items to me?

So I send Evans customer service department an e-mail asking why they had already charged me and when could I expect delivery, the auto responder on screen said to expect a reply within 24hrs. OK it was Friday night so I was happy to wait till Monday. So Monday 21st came and went and Tuesday evening arrived so I decided to phone customer services. I was told that a second request had been sent to the store and it should be with me by the end of the week. I was also told it was normal procedure to take the money at time of order regardless of delivery time.

Well the end of the week arrived and there was still not the owner of a pair of knee pads. So I phoned customer services. I was told that the department the customer service rep needed to talk to had gone home for the weekend and that he would chase it up for me on Monday 28th for me and promised to call me back on Monday, sounded OK but I was not going to hold my breath. when I asked why the shop could not send the knee pads to me directly, he then let himself down, apparently it was company policy that they had to come back to the warehouse and the probable reason they had not come back yet was there was no room on the van!! for f*** shake they are a pair of knee pads not a complete bloody bike.

Monday dawned and I was working from home and about to pack up for the day when the mobile rang. I did not recognise the number, it was the customer service guy from Evans with the promised return phone call (I had forgotten all about it to be honest). Apparently the department that handles the call back from stores had sorted out the problem and I could expect them by the end of the week (2nd July).

So I come home this afternoon and what do I find has been delivered, yep my knee pads, no explanation as to why it had taken over three weeks. I don’t even know if this was the knee pads the guy was talking about yesterday although I doubt it based on time scale of telling me and them arriving.

So why did it take so long, I have never had this problem with other items I have ordered online with Evans in the past. Then their is customer service, either they do not know what they were talking about or were just fobbing me off?

Ordering on line is a game of trust, you trust the supplier to supply the items at the correct price, to handle the financial transaction appropriately and to supply said goods in a timely fashion or keep you informed if problems arise. In this case Evans failed on all counts. In future I will think twice before I make another purchase from Evans online or recommend them to somebody else. Once you lose trust it is not easy to get back.

Despite the clocks changing earlier this morning, I was up and out early on my bike again. Decided to do the Throop loop, remembered to stretch my knee this morning. I was expecting mud and was not disappointed, certain parts of the route were very muddy. At one point I had to negotiate small group of cows (5 cows don’t seem to be enough to be called a herd) that decided the best place to sit was on the path in front of the gate out of their enclosure, fortunately they were not to bothered about some idiot with a mountain bike walking through ankle deep mud!! I was pretty worn out by the time I got home, guess that the mud and the fact that I am still getting back into the swing of riding.

I must admit the weather has been better than I expected this weekend, when I looked earlier in the week it was forecasting rain for the weekend, but apart from a few small shower late yesterday afternoon and the same again now, it has not been a bad weekend weather wise.

I decided to ride the heath this morning, as I only wanted to do a short run as this was my first ride in two weeks. Started well, got up the long drag to the main road without to much of a problem. The first section of the heath was in a better condition than I had expected considering the rain we have had, the condition on the rest of the ride were what I had expected – mud. It was not long before I was wondering where my energy had gone, my legs were like lead. I had already to decided to take a the short route home. This saved having to try climbing a large hill which I generally have to walk anyway. But I even had to walk up the hill on the short route which I normally clear with ease. I’m just glad I decided not to ride the other route I was considering this morning, the Throop loop (22 miles), I thought about riding this as the weather tomorrow was looking iffy.

The other reason I was out early is we have to go bed hunting for the daughter and she wants to go to Ikea in Southampton, oh joy………………..

I was supposed to drive to head office for work yesterday (near Evesham Worcs.) but with the overnight snow fall I decided to work from home, today I was booked to go to Northampton, I waited until 8:45 this morning before deciding to go, I listen to the travel news, weather forecast and then decided to go for it. I made sure that I had coats and hats etc. in the car but after I left I realised I had forgotten two important items, one was a bottle of water for the windscreen as my screen washer froze up, at minus 6 degrees I am not surprised. The other item was my lunch!! Tomorrow I have a trip to Portsmouth and a stop off at the bosses house on the way back to resolve his wireless Internet issue, just hope is it not to icy.

A couple of my birthday present turned up today (birthday is on Saturday), they were only ordered online last weekend and they arrived today, not bad considering how the UK has ground to a halt this week. I have a pair of tyre for the mud (think I should of considered getting some studded ice tyres) and a bike maintenance stand. The bike stand was recommend to me by a guy who does mobile cycle repairs as a job, it is the same one he uses everyday and I must admit it sure is a chunky stand and no where near as expensive as the Park Tool ones.

Being back at work I am missing the bike riding I did over the Xmas break, been watching some videos of other people out riding in proper snow (proper snow as in 12+ inches) and it looks fun, certainly seems to beat the couple of inches we have and the frozen conditions. The current weather has put pay to my ride in Berkshire on Saturday, the event is now cancelled. I want to ride this weekend but I am not to sure about the frozen conditions, about 30% of my ride is on road (I ride from my house). I would like to do the route I did in the New Forest over the Xmas period again but with these freezing conditions I think ice skating would be more likely.

Well to finish here is a picture from late last year when it was a little warmer

Just crossed the stream and heading up the small incline towards the roots

To those of you that don’t leave a comment I have one thing to say to you:

to you too!!

As is customary of late we were out cycling this morning, we went out early as A) we were expecting rain this afternoon (started raining about 6:00pm) and B) had to go shopping this after. Todays ride was a first, in fact two firsts, it was the first time we have ridden from home and the first time we had ridden on Canford Heath. The heath is only a mile and a half from our house so we rode over to the heath. The first half of the ride was very much a wide gravel type path, then it turned into narrow tracks. We even had to negotiate getting past 4 Shetland long horn cow type animals. They had very large horns and were stood on the track blocking our way. So we decided the best thing would be to get off the bikes and walk past them which meant walking through the prickly gorse. It was an interesting ride and one we will be doing again.

The afternoon was set aside for shopping, we went into one of my least favourite shops Primark, Chav central and boy what a messy disorganised shop that is. There were item of clothing and shoes all over the floor every where on all 3 floor, kids were running riot. Having said that the wife did pick up a pair of lycra jogging bottoms for cycling for a £5 which should prove useful.

While we were in the shopping centre we were accosted by a couple of Storm Troopers, Darth Vader and a few other characters from Star Wars, not sure why they were there, they just were.