Ooooh. I'm ever so pleased with myself. Finally worked out how to embed a ride map. It's not obvious, on a mobile device! As you can see, we did the north easterly leg yesterday, and today was south-south-east, completing the second side of our triangular tour.
This ride was to end at the seaside. I'd packed my suntan lotion and knotted handkerchief just in case, although restricted luggage space had prevented me from adding the sandals and socks required for maximum sartorial credit.
The seaside town of Bournemouth, on the Dorset coast, is about twice the size of Bath in terms of population, and claims seven miles of sandy beaches to its name. It also seeks the credit for bringing the country's first beach huts into being; essentially, a small garden shed, situated directly on or adjacent to the sand, and of limited practical use other than to take shelter from the English summer. If this weren't already enough to qualify the town as a worthwhile cycle destination, another £45 centrally-located Travelodge was certainly enough to swing things.
The route south was due to take me through not much of note. This might be underselling the Cranborne Chase and West Wiltshire Downs Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty. But in my experience, we declare AONB's pretty much anywhere that there is a gap of over a few miles in the housing stock. I was expecting the ride to pass through fields, which are of course lovely, and even deeply important if you're an earthworm, but my view tends to be that if you've seen one then you've largely seen them all. And the local tourist board sites, in describing this AONB, majored on selling points like 'lovely views' (unspecified) and 'delightful walks' (generic). Six hours of green and brown views can be a little dull, not to say lacking in cake. So, I did some route tweaking. A couple of unnecessary and longer loops were added in to get us to larger settlements, and bingo. We could now badge ourselves as proper Dorset tourists.
All of which said, it's always the unexpected bits of the tour that I like most, and we started off with a humdinger. As I climbed the hill from Bath, the satnav directed me off the main road and into a rather improbable circuit of a small park. It looked as though we were going to do a loop and then re-emerge on the main road; one of those slightly unhelpful traffic avoidance things that Komoot sometimes suggests. But no. Exiting the park, the road dropped down and we found ourselves at the mouth of a tunnel. This was the two tunnels greenway, which I'd never even heard of. The route uses disused railway tunnels which are now reserved for cyclists and pedestrians, and they're so long that there weren't too many of the latter. I'd guess that the second tunnel was just over a mile long, and it unexpectedly spirited us staight from central Bath right into the middle of some beautiful countryside. This is, I've since learned, the longest cycle and pedestrian tunnel in the UK.
The entrance to our first tunnel. Well lit, well surfaced, and entirely unexpected. If you're ever around these parts, I recommend this route for an excursion. It even had a pub at the exit from tunnel two.
The weather was stunning, and the roads were smooth, sweeping and (mostly) flat. There are some gorgeous villages around Bath, primarily constructed with the picturesque Bath stone, but passing through the small village of Norton St Philip we spotted another unlikely treasure. Apparently, the George Inn is a was built in the fourteenth century: it's wonderfully preserved and still welcomimg guests. Had it not been about 0920, I think I'd have ventured inside for a pint.
Its website says it was awarded pub of the year 2024. I'm not on commission, but it definitely looks a cut above the ersatz irish bars that plague our tourist areas.
And having taken a photo, we were off again, on the road to Frome, the only settlement of note on our road for a while. It's remarkable in my book mostly for its pronunciation: froom, just like all those other -ome words that you're racking your brains for right now. It's frankly a miracle that our language achieved global domination, whilst Esperanto sank without trace. (The Domesday book is the only other -oom word I could conjure, despite the question occupying my brain for about eight miles. Do let me know if you have more ideas).
Frome. We'd been here before, for lunch whilst returning from Reading on a previous trip. Didn't pause this time, though, we simply zomed through.
Also, we came across this farm shop in Maiden Bradley (great name). We'd had ice cream here before, on a different leg of the same journey. I felt like we were becoming local experts.
The journey continued with the expected green fields and hedges, and few settlements. Zero bakeries, and even the road through the slightly larger town of Mere (which we'd diverted to specially) didn't throw up any obvious candidates.
Lots of this. Lots. Still, it's better than a day in the office, by a very long way 😎
It didn't matter though. We'd included Shaftesbury on our route, a larger place which I knew would come up trumps. Founded in the ninth century by King Alfred, its abbey had once made it one of the richest parts of England. This was good, because history means tourists, and tourists mean coffee shops. Also, it once had a primary function as a defensive settlement from invading Danes, which meant that - unusually - the town was constructed on top of a hill, rather than next to a river. This in turn meant that we'd have earned our cake when we got there.
Raven checking out the historic centre. Not the original buildings, but still pretty old. Some of you may also be excited by the presence of a gelateria, just behind her in the shot.
I stopped at King Alfred's coffee shop, although I'm not sure how much of a coffee fan he actually was. It being quarter past twelve now, I combined cake and lunch. A sausage and bacon bap, plus - on the waitress' recommendation - a piece of bergamot and honey cake. I like to try new things, and this sounded interesting. Sadly, my experience suggests that there's a reason you don't see bergamot and honey as much as you do chocolate cake. Still, a solid six out of ten, and I wouldn't have wanted to go to my grave wondering.
I just about remembered to photograph it before I demolished it. Blogging really does place so many demands on a person.
I wasted a pleasant half hour people watching and relaxing in the sun. Truth be told, and for some unaccountable reason, I've been suffering with achilles pain on this tour, and I was having to take things a bit easy. But I couldn't very well sleep in a Shaftesbury hedge, so there were still a couple of hours to go to get to my hotel. Our next stop - another diversion - was at Blandford Forum. This town had been largely destroyed in a huge fire in the early eighteenth century, and was comprehensively rebuilt by the fabulously-named Bastard brothers, local architects both. Various websites accordingly proclaim that the town centre is one of the finest examples of Georgian architecture to be found. All done at once, professionally and expensively, and to a coherent design. Possibly true. But it was very much choked with cars, parked up and down the centre of the wide streets, and crawling everywhere in search of further parking. It rather spoiled the place as a destination. I didn't pause too long, other than to take a couple of pictures so that you can make your own minds up.
Back on the trail, we headed through a few pretty little hamlets and on to our last waypoint at Wimborne Minster.
Dorset hamlet. There's money around these parts, and some pretty little places. Personally, I'd be replacing the thatch roof with something more substantial, but I guess planning permission gets in the way...
Wimborne is a bustling little place, with the church (minster) at its centre. As we went to pull away, a pedestrian stepped out and I gestured him on, which gave him the excuse for a chat. Apparently he was a cyclist too. "Just came off my bike about three weeks ago," he confided. "Wasn't paying attention and hit a speed bump." He showed me the huge scab on his leg, just below his shorts, and added, "Cracked my helmet almost in two. They're definitely worth wearing. Anyway... have a nice ride, I'm sure you'll be safe."
We proceeded with caution.
I reflected that perhaps I'd been insensitive in asking how his bicycle was doing. (Scraped handlebars, nothing structural, in case you were also feeling concerned).
The minster at Wimborne. Don't worry, the surrounding buildings don't really lean in, Pisa-style, threatening to crush passing shoppers. It's just the photographic effect.
And half an hour later, we were coming into the edges of the rather sprawling conurbation of Bournemouth. It took another fifteen minutes to reach the hotel but we did so at just after three o'clock, which left a little time for sightseeing. So we did. But the achilles tendons are tightening up now, and I'm back at the hotel, and hoping fervently that I can make the 90 mile return tomorrow. I don't want to be calling for rescue if I can help it!
A short day, and we took it easy. You'll note that our max speed has dropped significantly compared to yesterday. 😁
The view about twenty yards down the road from my hotel. I wasn't planning to verify the tourist board's claim of seven miles of beach... it's certainly a very impressive length of sand.
Just back from the seafront I found a finishing line. It looked like there'd been a run today, starting at around the same time that we'd left Bath. Had I known, I might have ridden through on my way to the hotel...
