Cambridge to London Bridge

I caught the 6:54 from Oxted to Victoria then pedalled across to Kings Cross and then caught the fast train to Cambridge. The fast train takes  45-50 minutes which is pretty good. Cambridge Station was heaving with people. I've never seen it so busy.

I used a route prepared by Hackney Audax. It's a very direct route but once you get to Ware its pretty urban I think next time I would go via the Lea Valley route.

Weather was great not too hot but a trifle windy over the Cambridgeshire 'flatlands'.

East Grinstead to Eridge NCN Route 21

Go to the Smugmug Gallery


Video best viewed in HD

Sustrans NCN21 East Grinstead - Eridge from Stuart Murden on Vimeo.

Go to the Smugmug Gallery

The Dartmoor Ghost Ride - My Next Micro Adventure

The Dartmoor Ghost Audax Link to Audax UK

145km cycling event starting from Bovey Tracey, Devon. Controls at Whiddon Down and Yelverton, plus 3 information controls.

Under the ethereal light of the full'ish moon, experience the wonder of the open Dartmoor roads, & visit numerous 'haunted' locations on your way. 

This has the makings of a fairly significant 'upping the ante' for me with much more climbing and a distance of 147km that's 50% further than my standard 'long ride' plus it's at night.

AAA 2.25 'grimpeur' (hill climbing) event

Although there is a lot more climbing than my previous rides the gradients don't seem to be a bad as some hills I've done recently. A lot will depend on the weather. I quite like riding at night. The ride is very close to a full moon so if cloud cover permits it won't be that dark. Watching the dawn has a unique quality but cloud cover can spoil that. 

Cycling means you're travelling very 'close' to the weather; what direction is the wind, how strong is it, what are the clouds doing, is it hot or cold maybe I need another layer? 

So far I have been very lucky and really I've had no rain to speak of except once on a Brompton ride from High Wycombe to Tower Bridge where I mis-read the rain. I thought it was going to be a 'localised minor shower' so I didn't put on any rain gear when really the rain had set in for the day.

Cycling and Audax in particular has a 'smiling at adversity' culture.

This distance and profile seem to indicate that I could be in the saddle for 10 hours. That's quite a long time. I'm planning to gradually get up to 12-14hrs by the end of the year.

Over The Hills And Far Away - Tewkesbury and Malvern 100km Audax

Over the Hills and Far Away 100km Audax from Stuart Murden on Vimeo.
I great 100km ride using my Surly LHT. The wind was very strong something like a 20-25kph from the south west.

The Bike Re assembled at the long stay car park in Station St.

Upton on Severn

Looking West from the 'Singing Kettle'  (3rd Checkpoint) view 1

Looking West from the 'Singing Kettle' view 2

Lower Lode Inn (Penultimate checkpoint)

Oddas Chapel (Last Checkpoint)

The Brevet Card (Shot 1)

The Brevet Card (Shot 2)

Tandridge Hill Lane and Beyond ...

Yesterday I got some practice in on local hills.

1. Under the Oxted viaduct to Limpsfield Chart Golf Club
2. Goodley Stock Rd
3. Tandridge Lane South to North
4. Tandridge Hill Lane which is a category 4 climb.

400m of climbing over 38Km


GOPR0131 1 from Stuart Murden on Vimeo.

I've added in a clip of me talking plus changed format to H.264. This format seems a lot better than AVI which I was using. It seems clearer and is much faster to process. I missed out a dissolve or two on re-editing - it's another thing to work on. I need a tripod too for the non moving shots. It's on my list as it would help with the Fujifilm X100T, but I have to watch the pennies.