May got off to a poor start with the first ride of the month (following parts of the ‘Tour de Yorkshire’ route) being postponed because of bad weather.

May 10th saw the return of an old favourite, the ‘Whalley Wobble’. We brought it forward this year in the hope of better weather and we weren’t disappointed. The ‘Wobble’ starts and finishes at Springwood Picnic Site, Whalley and goes through the Ribble Valley, taking in some of the finest scenery Lancashire has to offer. With a café stop at the picturesque village of Waddington the ride is about 30 miles long but here is always the option to  ride to and from Springwood and this is what we all did, making a round trip of about 80 miles. Tough ride!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

May 17th – ‘Over the Edge’ celebration ride. We had planned to do the Gold Route but again we were met with poor weather conditions and so decided to do the Silver instead. This was only 35 miles but with a fierce head wind most of the day it felt like a lot longer. We had a cafe stop at Todmorden and, having heard that riders were being blown over on the ‘Cragg’, we came home down the valley.

 

May 24th – We had planned a ride through Denshaw and over the moors towards Brighouse but, as has become the norm recently, we woke up to steady rain and fog which made crossing the moors unattractive to all! With this in mind we decided to stay as low as possible and went through Rawtenstall, Helmshore and Hawkshaw to the café at Jumbles country Park, coming home via Tottington and Bury. Total distance 40 miles.

 

 

 

 

 
May 31st – Being the last day of one of the wettest Mays on record, we couldn’t really have expected anything else but rain and that’s what we got! We rode through Whitworth to Waterfoot and then climbed the hill up to the top of Deerplay before descending to the Bridge café in Todmorden for the usual lunch stop. After lunch we returned to Rochdale via the ‘Valley’ and Littleborough.  37 miles in total.