2009-Jul-10 by Gregory Williams.

I had quite a bit of cycling planned for today, so knew that it would take a fair amount of time. After a while I reached National Cycle Route 72 (The Hadrian’s Cycleway), and Regional Cycle 30 which was also following the same route. I noticed from glancing down at my GPS that it appears OSM doesn’t have coverage of all of this yet, so took a diversion for a mile or so following the route away from my intended direction before returning to follow the portion of NCR72 that I’d planned to cover.

I left NCR72 near Carlisle with the intention of making my way towards NCR7. Unfortunately this involved using short stretches of the A689 and A7, both of which weren’t particularly cycle friendly. I diverted off of NCR7 for a short while past an MOD base which appears to be a weapons storage depot. Shortly thereafter I crossed the border into Scotland and shortly after that rejoined NCR7. I followed NCR7 for a little while and gathered what looks like it’ll be new mapping, then started on following NCR74. It starts out of a quiet country road, gradually working its way towards the A74(M). It eventually reaches the B7074 (the former A74), and uses that for miles upon miles with a mandatory cycle lane. Unfortunately the route runs almost parallel to the A74(M), so despite it being a relatively quiet road there’s plenty of road noise from the motorway. Also, quite a few logging lorries use the route, so it’s not quite as pleasant as I’d hoped. It goes on for so many miles that it gets a little monotonous after a while. The hills beside the route gradually got steeper, and they should get steeper still when I continue to follow the route further.

Tomorrow I’ve got as a rest day, which should allow me to catch up on things and relax a little before the next leg of my journey. John O’Groats is still some way off yet.

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2009-Jul-10 by Gregory Williams.

I substantially changed my route today from that which I’d planned. I was going to use a fair amount of A- and B-roads because they’re slightly more direct and less hilly, but I instead elected to follow a portion of National Cycle Route 68 on some extremely quiet roads, and then a small section of National Cycle Route 7 near the end of the day. It turned out that these were a great choice because they enabled me to enjoy the scenery of the Yorkshire Dales National Park uninhibited by traffic.

Right at the end of the day I turned onto an alternative route into Kirkoswald. After a bit I noticed that all of the drains had been covered over. I noticed that the edges of the road looked cleanly swept, so concluded that this was to prevent sweeping the debris down the drains. A little further on the true reason became clear: The road was being topdressed with a layer of tar and small stones on top of that. I hadn’t seen any road closure signs, so it looks like they missed an approach. Luckily it was possible to walk my bike down the narrow gap that they still had to complete, so a diversion wasn’t necessary.

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2009-Jul-10 by Gregory Williams.

My journey today took me through the Forest of Bowland Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty and into the very edge of the Yorkshire Dales National Park. I started out in Lancashire and now I’m in Cumbria.

I tried to take a few photos this morning but they were extremely blurry. It turns out that a little water had managed to work itself into my camera, presumably in the downpour at the the end of yesterday. This manifested itself as some condensation within the lens and the screen. Luckily it dried out within about and hour and a half.

In terms of cycle routes today I followed a bit more of the Lancashire Cycleway (Regional Cycle Route 90), several miles of National Cycle Route 6, and a little of the Cumbria Cycleway (Regional Cycle Route 30). I wasn’t expecting the latter of those, so that’s a bonus.

Sedbergh, it turns out, is England’s Book Town. It’s a small town, but has eight book shops and a book centre.

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