Day 9 - 25th July 2002

Making it to Lancaster kept us on track and gave us 3 reasonably easy days to Glasgow so today we had the choice of Penrith or preferably Carlisle. The main news of the morning was the terrible weather forcast and sure enough about the time we were packing the bikes the drizzle started. I guess it would be somehow wrong to visit Lancashire and not get soaked!

The forecast suggested rain all day and the extremely dull conditions gave us little room for enthusiasm. So much for the expected fine views of the hills. Basically we'd head for Kendal, then pick up the A6 for the famous climb to Shap: I'm too young to remember the road as the main western route to Scotland but it was a famously tough climb for trucks. Then we'd coast down towards Penrith and make a decision on carrying on the last 20 miles to Carlisle.

A village. I forget which

The early part of the day featured some climbing out of Lancaster, but was otherwise pretty easy if wet and unpleasant, though we should have considered ourselves lucky to have had 8 dry days. And north of Glasgow we'd have given a lot for only drizzle! We'd had a fair breakfast in the hotel and didn't feel much like stopping so we kept going with a reserve of chocolate and biscuits. Much of the day was spent paralleling and periodically crossing the M6 and west coast railway while passing a lot of farmland, stone walls and stone built villages; and not seeing much of a view.

Soon after leaving Kendal we began the climb to Shap summit and were soon strung out over a long stretch as the road climbed and climbed. Mike and Tim were if not flying at least in the lead, with Mickie away behind but ahead of Tracy. Manda kept going at her own pace while Mark had the job of sweeping. Tim and Mike were kept going by spotting another cyclist ahead and there's nothing like a bit of competition on a long climb. He was passed near the summit where we stopped briefly for a picture (very briefly, it was suddenly cold although the climb had been sheltered from the headwind) and passed again as we used the top gear of the Cannondales to speed down the long drop to Shap village. Here we found the most promising pub and waited while the rest caught up, and we all relaxed over a drink while filling our stomachs with pies from the next door shop.

The M6

Surprisingly there was little complaint about the ride so far, everyone had been duly warned even though I'd read someone's comment on a website that the climb was overated and not that tough. Don't believe it! From here the ride to Penrith was down or flat and we were soon decided to head towards Carlisle. Tracy and Tim walked through the center of town (against the one way system) to the Tourist Information center to find out if there were any places to stay between here and Carlisle (no) and to pick up the phone number of the Carlisle Youth Hostel. We then walked back and everyone followed the one way system in a loop around the center of town. Ending up near the Tourist Information!

Progress to Carlisle wasn't swift but was steady and we continued into the center of town keeping an eye out for a promising B&B but heading generally for the Youth Hostel. At the station we phoned for directions, got somewhat lost and were put back on track by 3 guys we met who were already booked into the YH. It turned out to be a college apartment block so we got to share a 6 bedroom student house with kitchen. Very convenient as we'd accumulated a fair amount of food and especially useful for reheating leftover curry (yet, I'd hauled it up the Shap climb!).

The day had become drier as time went on and the evening was pretty pleasant for looking at the town. After leftovers we snacked at McDonalds and wandered around until dusk, returning for an early night.