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Again there were only two MidAirMen available today, which saw John and Terry drive out west to the sleepy little South Northumberland village of Blanchland to hook up with the Old Enemy again, er, I mean the Reivers. We even got there early for once. Eight of the Strange Ones were there to make a nice round ten for the ride, this one being led by Willie, which is why we decided it would be safe and not silly. We were right, thank goodness.

Surprised to see Fatboyreiver in attendance, though we might have to find a new monika for him now as he is, er, substantially lighter than he was before his dreadful accident last year, looking good and pedalling very well. Nice to see a few new bits on his bike, like round wheels, working brakes and tyres with tread on. Dave's misfortune hasn't curbed his lip, either, and even I got a good chewing for leaving the Reivers Downhill a few months ago before his return State of the Reiver Nation address! Oh, and I also got it in the neck for finishing the downhill before he arrived to see us descend! Honestly Dave, not my fault, blame your stupid useless walkie talkies (oooohhh!!!, more controversy) as "your men" did indeed try in vain to contact you and Tom before we commenced the contest that day.

From the car park in the middle of the village Willie herded us out to the nearest uphill drag - no change there, then! We were treat to a mixture of skinny tarmac roads, dual and single bridleways, with a measured mixture of ups and downs over Blanchland Moor and Hexhamshire Common. It started cool, around 8 degrees, and stayed that way til about ten miles had passed. Then there was a flurry of stripping. Weirdly, the Reivers seemed to be following their own rules for the first time in forever, waiting at the multitude of gates we had to open and close after us and letting the group regroup after a hard climb. Last time they did this was the first time I ever rode with them a year ago. Maybe they've had a meeting? Anyway, this all made for a very "together" group outing and apart from a couple of small breakaways from the downhill preferers (Jeff and the Gollum in particular) it largely stayed that way. Oh, and Jeff managed to get his splitting GT iDrive frame replaced by ChainReaction Cycles, and the new white XC-1 looks even nicer than the original.

For what was touted modestly by Willie as an "ordinary, short ride" it delivered a couple of small but excellent opportunities for scaring yourself and those who wanted to took full advantage. We'd been out about an hour (remember, I can't remember) when, while stopped at a farm atop another climb, just here Tom's back wheel exploded, literally, seconds after this picture was taken. We all dived for cover fearing a sniper attack, but it turned out that Tom's Old Faithful, forty year old rear tyre had finally given up the ghost, big time, and split it's sidewall. The bang and accompanying belch of dust and mist from the tyre looked and sounded very surreal. I was fortunate enough to be looking in that direction when it happened and it certainly looked like bullet damage from a few feet away. Glad I didn't have my heart monitor on this day. Unfortunately, the shop Tom got his tyres from, the CWS Gentleman's Bi Cycle Emporium, was bulldozed just after the Boer War, so we had to scrat around for a substitute. He got underway again thanks to a wide and varied collection of "stuff" collected from the surrounding landscape topped off with the skin of a motorway cone found by Oor Wullie to seal the blasted tyre carcass. It lasted the ride no problem.

We had lunch on a sunny grass bank and plenty of time to recover, and there were a few more recovery halts along the way. Unusual.

Towards the end of this excursion on the return loop to Blanchland, Willie had us out on the moors again and a section of very narrow, rim-grabbing but very fast singletrack that put a huge smile on two MidAirCrisis faces, and the others I think.  John was in much better condition than he was at Glentress last Sunday and it showed in his pace up the inclines. Apart from Tom's blowout, the only other problems were a loose chainset on Ian's Specialized (see this 6MB .mpg vid if you can) which is totally stuffed (it's a Toys r Us part according to Jeff), and Gavin's rear gear cable snapping, luckily just as we got to the final few kilometres which were all nicely downhill - the ideal way to finish a ride (no, going downhill, not snapping a cable). Here's Jeff tackling one of the trickier bits - vid doesn't do it justice, as usual! 3MB.wmv vid.

Bike PC said 16.18 miles, John's said 16.7. Top whack 39mph, 2hrs 10 mins rolling time, 7.4mph average. Started at 10.15, returned at 2.00 pm. Unfortunately my GPS wasn't picking up satellites until we hit the last seven miles so I only have an incomplete map for you - I'll need to see a Reiver to complete the track, sorry.

Why aren't ALL Reivers rides like this one? - size isn't everything.