At last it’s that time of year again! The sun is out, the sky is blue, conditions are absolutely perfect for cycling, and up and down the country the same conversations are taking place in cyclists’ households. When is the best time for me to go out for a ride this weekend?

It isn’t always easy to balance the competing demands of family life and cycling. Weekends are busy and heading out on your own on a bike for five or six hours can seem like a heinously selfish act. I’m sure I’m not the only one who finds themselves getting up at 6am of a weekend to try to get a decent ride before anyone else in the family is fully awake. That in itself can be hard when you enjoy a pint or two on a Saturday night!

Five years ago, I started a social enterprise, and a nice thing about being the director of such an operation is that you get to rewrite your own rules. One of these was the idea that Fridays would always be a half day of work. We’d have a team meeting for an hour or so, catch up on any other business and then ideally be out the door for the weekend by midday. Conversely, one of the bad things about being the director of such an operation is that you also don’t always get to choose when you finish work and often I find myself wishing everyone else a nice weekend while I’ve still got a few hours of work to go. However, this week I was the first one out the door. The bike was in the car with a change of clothes, my route was planned and downloaded to my Garmin, and for the price of a quick coffee and cake my permission slip to go out for the afternoon was signed. I was going out for a ride with the family time at the weekend still intact.

The first few kilometres took me around the coastline from Torquay to Dawlish. The first part resembles a badly-assembled marble run, with little ramps improbable corners, fast bits and blind bends. It is an absolutely wonderful ride that I think everybody should experience. The only downside is the traffic; people will either pass you very carefully and correctly, or they will speed past at 60 miles an hour on the approach to blind bends. It all adds to the excitement I suppose. At Teignmouth, our analogy switches so that of a rollercoaster with the big hill out of town taking us as high as we can possibly go before dropping up and down through a series of hanging valleys. The big hill at Taymouth, by the way, is a fairly solid 7% gradient for the whole climb. This was hard enough, but I cheered myself up by reflecting that when we go to the Alps, we’ll have to do this kind of gradient for three or four hours at a time. It’s going to hurt.

After Dawlish, the road flattens out as it weaves through Dawlish Warren and Cockwood before leaving the main road at Starcross and following the canal into Exeter. This is a really nice trail but I don’t often ride it because although it’s quite pretty, it’s fairly flat and unchallenging. I like a good climb and just plodding on for 20 or so kilometres doesn’t excite me all that much. Still, I cruised along at a good pace and later discovered that I’d beaten most of my PBs all along the trail.  The training must be working.

Still feeling good, I abandoned my plan to stop at Exeter Quay and continued on my route straight back out of the city again. I don’t normally go further than Exeter Quay because I don’t really know any good routes on from there – if anyone has any suggestions please let me know. Today I was heading for Dunsford and chose a route up through a new estate and onto Exwick Lane. From the start, this was a quiet country lane and despite being very close to the centre of Exeter I saw almost no traffic whatsoever. I was high above the city and soon into some gorgeous countryside. I passed through Nadderwater and the Royal Oak, now sadly a pub no more after being converted into a guest house, and then Whitestone. With good legs I was getting close to tge top of the climb and hazy views opened up to the south and west, a succession of low ridges overlooked by the distant heights of Dartmoor. It must be spectacular on a clear day.

From Heath Cross I dropped down to cross the A30 and pick up a lane that followed the next stretch of high ground towards Dunsford. The road was horrendous, the surface broken up by a succession of lorries that have left it as nothing but potholes and gravel. It was impossible to get any speed and I had to pull over half a dozen times to let the lorries pass. I passed – and was sorely tempted by – Grays Cider Farm and things gradually improved. I had thought the climbing was more or less over but Devon always has a sting in the tail; climbs not so big that you’re expecting them but steep enough to be hard work. The houses had twee names like Hillcrest and Moor View that gave away their elevation. Gradually the efforts lessened as I approached the Teign Valley and before I knew it I was back on the main road. 

Teign Valley is a well known and much used route that sweeps south from Dunsford. Weirdly, I only ever seem to ride up it, so heading down for a change was quite nice. There are small villages, roadside cricket clubs, patches of woodland, occasional glimpses of the river and generally a decent surface. There are also several pubs and, having ignored a few en route already, I finally relented and allowed myself a quick pint at the Teign House Inn. It’s a superb pub that has a small campsite, good food and well-kept beer. I love it there. Today was a pint of Hanlon’s Simcoe which fitted the conditions perfectly.

Suitably refreshed, I powered on, pausing at Bovey to pick up a lump of cheese (‘something hard so it doesn’t squish in my pocket!’) and followed the Templer Way back to Newton Abbot. I had set myself one last challenge and on getting back to Torquay I followed the climb up Cadewell Lane and Exe Hill. My legs still felt good, and I was grinning broadly as I rolled back down the hill and home, my first 100km of the year safely chalked up.

Now for that all important family time.