A Simple Life of Luxury

Hopefully Anna will add here perspective on our holiday to the isle of Man, and over the coming days I shall be adding some details of each day, but for now here is the overview.

We are all back safe and sound, although I wouldn’t say rested… As usual when on holiday with a 2 year old, we feel as though we need a holiday to recover, especially as the ferry crossing home was so rough! Mind you, if we had sat around resting all holiday then we wouldn’t have done much and there’s little point in that.

I did lots of driving, but we managed the whole trip on one tank of fuel (just). I did lots of windsurfing. There was wind every day and I got out every day but one. Sunday was really windy with gusts to 48 knots and I even attempted a forward loop (first one outside of Borth for me!). I didn’t go windsurfing on Monday but that was probably the day with the best conditions, sunny and a decent 30 knot wind all day. I got out on the water every other day though.

We did some geocaching, but not loads. I guess we need to plan a little more carefully next time and hopefully once Morgan decide he can use his legs rather than be carried all over the place this will get easier. morgan did enjoy the caches when we found them though, but we stuck with relatively easy ones.

We also did some touristy things too. Morgan loved the Laxey Wheel and had been looking forward to seeing it ever since he saw it on the TV before we went on holiday. We also visited the House of Mannanan, Cregneash, the Arboreum, various playgrounds and Morgan went on the steam train.

Relatives were visited and the weather was on the whole kind to us (except on the journey home). More on each day soon.

Continuing my exploration of the local trails I decided to have a go at the Climachx Trail to the north of Machynlleth yesterday. I’m not feeling much fitter yet, so I have to keep plugging away and get out doing some exercise as often as possible and the write up about this trail sounded interesting:

The cli-machx is is sited in the Dyfi forest; home of the Raw Dyfi Enduro. It’s a 15km round trip, with 9km of built single track with compressions and whoops, rock slab drop offs and some beautiful flowing turns. The last descent is the longest in Wales and features rocky jumps; watch out for the ‘eye of the needle’; a huge jump with a narrow landing between two trees on the other side. The finale is a sequence of eight huge berms following quickly after each other. Hit them high enough and fast enough and they ride really well, but don’t look down!

It also sounded as though it may have been a little out of my league so I planned to take it easy and enjoy the ride. It starts off with a long climb and then there are a few bits of relatively easy single track and then more climbing. In fact the first half seemed to be uphill almost all the way. Most of the single track was pretty easy, but it felt hard going all the way around. the final, long descent is good, with a few pretty technical sections, but even this descent felt like hard work as there are still a few little rises within it that need a bit of effort. My first circuit took 1hr 14 mins and felt pretty hard.

I was then contemplating whether or not to have another go when a couple of other guys turned up in the car park. I was going to watch them set off and see if it looked as though I had a chance of keeping up with them before deciding to do a 2nd circuit or not. then a third guy, who certainly looked the part turned up and headed off up the hill so I decided as it was liekly I might see other people out there this time to give it another go.

I had a quick chat with the third guy who was visiting Wales from Belguim specifically for the mountain biking and to participate in a few marathon events. He certainly looked pretty fit so I told him not to wait for me and watched as he headed off up the hill leaving me behind him. I went at my own pace as the other two guys set off behind me, and to my surprise didn’t get dropped too easily. In fact, around half way round, as I cam out of the forest at the top of the hill I could see the guy from Belguim about a minute or so ahead of me and then on the long descent I caught him up and overtook him. I waited for him by the car and we had a little chat. He seemed like a really nice guy and was enjoying his mountain-biking here in Wales. He then set off back to Machynlleth. My second circuit was a little quicker than my first at 1hr 4mins, but once again it felt pretty difficult.

I hen packed up in a leisurely fashion waiting for the other two guys but by the time I set off they had yet to appear. I’ll definitely be back for more, but will try the other Mach trails first. The Climachx was good, but I never really got into any sort of rhythm with the trail and think I prefer the trails at Nant-yr-Arian so far. Although once I’m a little fitter this may change as the Nant-y-r-Arian trails may become a little too easy.

We’ve just had a good weekend visiting family in Gloucestershire. Saturday was spent at Prinknash Abbey Park, feeding ducks and various other birds, fish, goats and deer. Morgan seemed to love it there, but unfortunately the battery in my camera ran out half way round so we don’t have that many photos of him feeding the animals.

He also enjoyed playing with Kia and Shaun which is nice. We stopped off briefly to find a couple of gecoaches, but were unsuccessful with both of them. The second one ‘A Gnarled Giant’ was near to a huge Chestnut tree known as the Tortworth chestnut which was apparently mentioned as being ‘notable’ in the 12th century, which probably makes it over 1000 years old. The plaque near to the tree suggested that it is only around 900-1000 tears old though so it age is difficult to tell. Legend has it that it sprang from a nut planted in 800 AD. Written records go back to the 12th century. In 1776 Peter Collinson, then Britain’s leading dendrologist, described the Tortworth chestnut as “the largest tree in England, being 52 feet (15.8 metres) around.”

It was certainly pretty impressive.

Saturday night was a family gathering with various bits of news and some eating and drinking. Then in Sunday we had a leisurely start to the day, followed by lunch in the garden centre near to Gloucester and a long drive back to West Wales. All in all a good weekend away and not too much in the way of chores waiting for us when we got back.

I had a busy day on Friday. After a 5am start in order to do a couple of hours work, I took Anna to work and Morgan to nursery and then drove up to Llyn Pendam to meet Steve. We then had an enjoyable Mountain Bike ride around a combination of the Summit Trail and the Pendam Trail. We started from Pendam rather than Nant-yr-Arian.

When we finished we couldn’t quite resist a swim in the lake so after dropping off a travel bug in my nearby geocache we jumped in and had a short but very invigorating swim in the Llyn Pendam. It actually wasn;t that bad, it certainly wasn’t warm, but it wasn’t too cold either and felt quite nice.

The I had to rush home, drop off my bike, go to work for a few hours, fill up with diesel, collect Morgan from nursery, collect Anna from work and then drive all the way to my parents house in Gloucestershire. We haven’t made the drive for a while and there were a few new bits of road which livened the journey up a bit. Morgan was good all the way, and was pleased to see ‘Ninny’, Grandad, Auntie Trudi, Kia and Shaun.

Steve had the week off this week and wanted to go out for a cycle in the hills. I should really have done some work, but couldn’t resist a day playing on our bikes so we headed off to the hills around 9am. I know, ‘It’s a Hard Life!’, but you only get one life so too much work and not enough play isn’t the way to live it.

We started off on the Pendam Trail but as soon as we got going Steve realised he couldn’t change gears properly. Not surprising really as his front derailleur was clogged up with dirt and grime. there wasn’t a lot we could do about it there so I put it into the middle cog for him and off we went. Steve was a little uneasy on the technical downhill bits, but was better than me on the uphills. Cycling to work everyday for the last however many years must have paid off, and the fact that he had to stay in a relatively high gear meant he had no choice to slow down too much anyway. As we approached Llyn Syfydrin we headed off onto the northern loop of the Syfydrin Trial and did that too.

By now the sun was shining and it got really hot on the long climb back to the top. I think Steve has the bug though. Once back at home I cleaned up and adjusted his deraileur for him and got it working , so there should be no stopping him now.

Summer had by now well and truly arrived to Borth. About time, but it had turned into a beautiful day, so after collecting Morgan from nursery we went over to the beach and had a play in the sea and then sat on the hot sand in the dunes. Certainly better than working all day… Although for those of you who think I do nothing, I did get up at 5.30am and do a couple of hours work before going out.

I knew it… The new iPod is an iPhone without the phone.. Perfect.

I said, way back in January when the iPhone was released that the new iPods would be iPhones without the phone, and now it has come to pass. For me it has all of the best bits of the iPhone, touch screen, full screen video, wi-fi, but not the annoyance of having a phone attached to it… OK, mobile phones are clever and the iPhone appeared to be the cleverest of them, but for me I just want a cheap and cheerful mobile phone that I can throw around without worrying about breaking it. A phone is a tool not a toy. An iPod however is different, it is made for entertainment and it has just got better.

I won’t be getting one however, as for me one of the nice things about my current 5th Generation iPod Video is the storage capacity. As well as storing all my music on it I can store quite a few videos and all my photos, so I use it as (yet another) back-up of my personal media…. All the iPod touch needs to make it even more desirable is larger stirage capacities.

Saturday looked a little grey and as it was Anna’s birthday weekend a nice family day out (rather than one where I go off and do something and leave Anna with Morgan) was on the cards. A nice drive around some of the lakes of North Wales whilst stopping off to do some of the ‘Famous Five’ series of caches was the plan.

We left the house relatively early and were soon on our way up to Trawsfynydd. After a while Morgan fell asleep which gave us a break from tractor and digger spotting for a while and before we knew it we were on the shores of Lake Trawsfynydd.

All of thr Famous Five caches are multi-caches where the co-ordinates given on the website are those for a micro-cache. the micro-cache then contains the co-ordinates and a small clue for a larger cache. There are five larger caches in total and each one contains some of the co-ordinates for a 6th and final cache.

Once near to the first micro Morgan and I headed off to find it while Anna sat in the car. We found the micro nice and easily and then had a walk across the footbridge which spans this part of the lake. Then headed back to the car and drove a little closer to the main cache where all three of us went off to find it. Again we found it easily, filled in the log book, took in the views and then headed back to the car and off towards Llyn Celyn and the next multi-cache.

The drive along the Prysor Valley was nice and as usual the description of the geocache provided us a little history of the lake and its surroundings. The micro for this was a relatively easy find and then we had to retrace our steps slightly to find the main cache near to a memorial chapel for the village that was flooded to create the reservoir. Again this cache was easy to find and in a location that we wouldn’t have known existed and certainly wouldn’t have visited if it weren’t for the cache.

By now we were all hungry so headed into Bala and had lunch in a hotel there. After this we headed around to the other side of Lake Bala and the search was on for cache number three. The micro was close to a spot where Anna and I had been before for a little swim in the lake. Unfortunately Anna had been left to enter the co-ordinates for the cache into the GPSr and she had done it incorrectly so we were looking in the wrong place for ages! It wasn’t until we checked that we realised our error, corrected it and started looking on the correct side of the railway line. After this we soon found the micro and were off to find the final cache of the day.

This one took a bit of searching for and the area was a little smelly as I think people had been using it as a toilet but we found the box in the end, filled in the logbook, collected a travel bug and exchanged a few items before jumping back int he car and heading home after a long and exhausting day geocaching.

Of course Morgan slept for most of the journey home so by the time we got back he was fully revived meaning we had no rest until later on in the evening.

A good family day out and other than lunch and diesel an inexpensive way to keep us all entertained too.

Could this be the beginning of me getting fit once again? I’ve been out on my bike a couple of times again this week and once again on Friday afternoon I did a couple of circuits of the Pendam Trail at Nant-yr-Arian. It was a little wetter and therefore slightly more slippery than before this time, so I took it easy the first time around and yet again did it in 48 minutes.

I pushed a little harder the 2nd time around and completed it is 42 minutes which is a record for me. I still have quite a way to go as far as strength and fitness for the climbs go, but a 45 minute work-out is more than I’ve done for a while so hopefully if I keep it up I’ll improve and will soon be able to beat5 40 minutes. Who knows I may even loose some weight in the process.

Of course, it isn’t all about training and fitness and I’ll make sure I do quite a few easier, less frantically paced rides exploring other trails and other areas. It is after all supposed to be fun, but pushing hard around a known course every now and then is good, especially if it shows some sort of improvement.