The CTC Birthday Rides 2019, as told by Mike Morley

CTC Birthday Rides 5th – 11th August 2019

Mike Morley

The Birthday Rides took place this year on the borders of Cambridgeshire and the Great North Road at Wyboston Lakes near St Neots. Access to the site was tricky but an effort had been made to create a gate on the side of the site to enable easy access to the footbridge over the A1.  The venue offered extensive accommodation and the hearty catering required by cyclists. The organisers of last year’s event at Stone had taken over the venue and so there was good continuity with CTC Holidays and Tours selecting this first class venue. The voice of this year’s www.birthdayrides.org when phoning for information was recognisably Shirley Quemby ably assisted by Colin who were very much in evidence throughout the week. It was great to be signed in by Lynda Barrow and Liz on arrival. They had arrived on the Sunday and were allowed to take their accommodation the night before the official opening in exchange for helping out. There were more than a dozen wayfarers, Ann and Steve Bath cycled there and back, Liz, Lynda, Maureen and Cliff, Stephanie, Carolyn and John Beer, Tony Hooker, Tim Court and Pat, and Mike Morley, Dawn in her tent, Irene North and Graham, Ed Sharp who came with his chauffeur Lillian and of course Colin and Shirley.  Christina called in one evening to join us for drinks.  There were approximately 400 attendees in total . Sadly though few children/youngsters if at all but a good show of hands on the first evening revealed many experiencing the Birthday Rides for the first time. The CTC was formed on 5th August 1881 so we were also treated to Birthday Cake on arrival.

Irene North & Graham led a ride to Grafam Water, one of the largest reservoirs in the UK. It had an earthen work dam similar to that of Whaley Bridge but was grass covered and not capped with concrete slabs. Each day there were a selection of “A”, “B” & “C” rides of various distances in the main set out by the local Cambridge CTC. An option on the Wednesday was to take a coach trip to Bletchley Park for a conducted tour which was excellent. The coach however was fully booked so I could not go. Christina who like me had ridden the Prudential 100 on 4th August came by car to Bletchley but mistakenly on the Thursday. She did however end up at Wyboston Lakes that evening.
I had a particular interest in visiting Little Barford 500MW gas fired combined cycle plant in the village next door. My old company Hawker Siddeley Power Engineering (HSPE) designed and built the plant using GE of America turbines. I visited it on Thursday the 8th August and on Friday 9th August it shut down simultaneously with a wind farm off the east coast causing the loss of approx. 1000MW of power on National Grid.  Indiscriminate automatic load shedding then took place the main casualty being trains into and out of London.

Evening entertainment was varied, with films, quizzes and a very interesting slide show on cycling light in Cuba and another on the battle by activists in polluted cities across the world for safe space for cyclists.   Live music one evening by St Neots local choir was well received and the quizzes were fun.  On Thursday 8^th August was the traditional Service of Thanksgiving organised by Shirley and led by the local vicar.

The headwinds later in the week provided extra challenges but overall the weather was very favourable.   Some opted for a coach into Cambridge on the Saturday for a sightseeing day off the bike.

Altogether a very enjoyable week which all present hope will continue next year. 

Author: Paul James