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Wednesday 12th May 2010 Okehampton to Wellington After a reasonable breakfast at the Fountain Inn I set off from Okehampton at 9.30. It was a lovely, cool spring morning and the roads were quiet and rolling, with nowhere near the number of hills as had been encountered in Cornwall. All very pleasant.
I hadn’t slept very well the previous night though and couldn’t eat much at lunchtime for some reason. I stopped in Crediton for a bowl of asparagus soup, bread, cake and coffee. The soup went down easily enough but I left the crusts of the bread – quite unusual for me – and could only eat half the carrot cake. I took the other half with me and had it later.
The nice day continued and I got to within six miles of my destination for the day, Wellington. It wasn’t yet 3.00 so I decided to stop at a garden centre café for a cup of coffee and when I came out it was raining – a cold, sleety kind of rain. Having learnt my lesson the previous day, when my wet feet had quickly become numb with cold, this time I immediately put my waterproofs on, including my waterproof overshoes, before setting off. Naturally this resulted in the rain stopping shortly afterwards – for the time being. I was now on the A38 where the traffic was uncomfortably fast and abundant and I wanted to get past this stretch as quickly as possible and reach Wellington. Of course the rain restarted as I was pedaling along and teemed down in buckets. On the uphill stretches it was like cycling up a stream against the current. That together with the rain sploshing into your face and a generous hosing of spray from the juggernauts as they thundered past meant it wasn’t a very nice experience. Still, I got there ok. Wellington was a disappointment. I spent some time cycling around looking for B&Bs but there didn’t seem to be many around so I eventually tried a pub in the High Street. It smelt of cats and dogs, and air-freshener which failed miserably to mask the resultant pong so I was not too disappointed to be told they were full up. Surprised though. Anyway I asked the barman if he knew anywhere I could stay and he suggested the Blue Mantle guest house just a few doors away and happily they did have a room available there for £30.
It was an absolutely tiny room in which a well-swung cat would soon have acquired a severe headache but of course it was still considerably better than taking the bivvy bag to the nearest hedge. I was getting into a routine at the overnight stops by now. As soon as I had somewhere to stay the first thing would be to unload the panniers and get the bike safely locked away somewhere, usually in a hallway, a shed or a garage. After that I’d take the gear to my room and put all three electrical gadgets on charge, ie the camera, phone and GPS. Then it would be time to wash a few things, usually socks, underpants and cycle vest but occasionally other bits too. When they had been washed, using whatever soapy liquid I could find – shampoo, hand lotion or anything that made bubbles – I’d rinse them out, squeeze them dry then put them between a couple of towels and twist as much as I could. That would get a lot of the water out of them and radiators or occasionally hair-driers generally finished things off and got them dry again. With the chores out of the way I could go out and look for something to eat and drink. On this occasion my body was crying out for some tomatoey pasta which I thought I’d be able to get down without too much trouble but I was destined for further disappointment from Wellington – it had very poor eating out amenities. There wasn’t one Italian restaurant and not much on offer in the pubs either. In the end I settled for a veggy-burger and chips from the local chip shop – as veggy-burgers go it was ok but not overly stimulating. Wellington was adding itself to the mental list of places not to come back to. On the plus side, however, today’s ride had been a lot smoother and easier, rain aside. Distance: 48.2 miles but then I added nearly another 3 miles looking for a B&B Average speed: 10 mph Max speed: not displayed for some reason but I know I reached 29 mph at one point | |||
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