MoFo Welsh Recce 7th & 8th July

What an eventful day. I'm knackered, but I guess I'm first back so a brief report is due.
Today, well yesterday technically, we did a recce of the planned route for the rideout planned for the 4th & 5th August.
We (me, Xan, Vickster, Beenz and stretchie) Started at Stretchie's in Bristol at about 11ish, and from there to :
Abergavenny ( where we picked up valleyboy),
Builth,
Rhayader,
Up the Elan Valley (which is very very cool),
Aberystwyth,
Aberaeron,

Somewhere around here, stretchie's bike broke. Again. The front sprocket had worked it's way off. Looks like it wasn't fastened up properly after the gearbox rebuild. Waited for the recovery truck for a while, but as it was getting on a bit, and we were at the edge of the known world, we decided to head back and leave him at the mercy of the locals. Back via Aberystwyth, A44, Rhayader, Builth & Abergavenny. To round it all off, the old bridge was shut, so we had to detour to the M4 and over the new bridge.

Oh, Xan and Vicky only had dark visors as we weren't meant to be out that long.

Photo's may follow.

[_Stretchie_]

Right.. JUST got in...

Yeah, got to ring the garage on Monday, they hadn't fastened the front sproket on properly I guess and no lug washer to hold it securely...

I'm well lucky it didn't lock the wheel up...

Back safe n sound, starting to thaw now. a grand day out, the Elan Valley is like another world, wonderful!

Hope you got back OK Stretchie, the pickup ETA was ten mins when we left. Thanks everyone for the great company on the run. Xan, Vickster hope you got back OK.

Glad you got back OK.

Could have been very nasty .

Weren't there more photos than that ? lol

1000 sheep road at 10pm is cold.. plus when you have a dark visor, the sheep seem to apear about 10feet away from you... did most of it with my visor open....

Wow, bad work there by the looks!
Elan is wonderful, isnt it? Glad you had fun there.
Its times like that why I gave up dark visors and went for a light tint with sunglasses. Got caught out a couple times and that was enough, I dont like riding in dark as it is.
Alls well that ends well!

Im glad everyone enjoyed the Elan valley... on the ride itself, I think we will make a stop at the visitors centre... the resevoir was full yesterday and had water spilling over the top... its a photo oppertunity.. lol.. then a stop at the last resevoir, just to make sure people survived that part... also the mountain road to Aberystwyth is way cool.. but too many places for furry critters to hide and jump out! so will warn everyone to take their time on those stretches!

Gutted for you stretch, but its a case of phone up the garage and ask if they had any bits left over, as the general consensus was, they couldnt have put the nut back on, as thers not enough room for it to come off the shaft when the sprocket cover is on...

Did those man eating sheep make an appearance ?

plus, we had a comedy moment of stoping near the roundabout for teh A44/A470... and a small hurd of cows took interest in us...

[squirrel_hunter]

Sorry I missed this one guys but I didn't get in until 4 in the morning and needed a bit of sleep

Thats not good about your chain mate, very dangerous. Would be interested to hear what they say about it on Monday.

Not many good pics I'm afraid. And none at all of the Elan Valley.

Got to Aber bus station only to find the Xan's left indicator had committed suicide. Duct tape to the rescue.



First stop, Erwood. Save our Toilets.


Stetchie adjusts his clutch. And pours my tools all over the road.


Lots of missing time here, until Aberystwyth. Nice day for it.

10 minutes down the road from here to Llanrhystud where stretchie's sprocket came off.