...and the fourth day... Hereford to Eccleshall

Clearly we were enjoying ourselves a bit too much.

Tuesday's ride in the afternoon sun (I'm writing this on Thursday morning - was too tired last night) needed a bit of balancing, and balance came yesterday with haevy and persistent rain for the last couple of hours. The fact that it was only the last couple of hours, we can be thankful for, because the forecast wasn't good, and we'd escaped any rain until Ironbridge. (John and I had also done this route on our Easter Monday practice day - which was also a deluge - so I wonder what Telford is like in the dry?

The day started with a lovely long descent into Hereford and a trip to a cycle shop to get some new glasses for John - his others are somewhere on the side of the road near Bridgwater. Very helpful and brilliant shop, difficult to resist spending lots of money on unnecessary stuff ....so I only bought necessary stuff, honest M! J

The rain held off as we took the back lanes up to Leominster...

 ..through Ludlow (which having got into we couldn't find the way out of other than going though the very narrow pedestrian bit. Lovely little town, must go back, M would love it)..

..and then through Much Wenlock

...and then Ironbridge.

and then the rain started.

So I didn't take any more photos.

Back at chez Busby in Eccleshall, the bikes needed quite a clean and then it was off to meet friends at the Royal Oak - a lovely evening, which is why I'm doing this on Thursday morning.

Today's route is, to be frank, bloody complicated, but not so long (only 72 we think) as we wind our way up past Manchester, and trying to get Google maps to understand I do NOT want to go on a motorway thank you! is impossible, so I've given up. We'll do it with a proper map! The route takes us past Nantwich, Warrington and then up past Wigan, ending up just south of Preston at Eccleston. (see what we did there? Eccleshall to Eccleston... this isn't just thrown together you know!)