Bob’s LEJOG 2022: LEJOG Day 2 - St Columb Major to Bridestowe

Blimey, that was tough! It mainly rained, every hill was hard work and I was late starting off.
I’d actually managed to get my Garmin working again - which was a good job because my Apple Watch threw a wobbly as I was going down a bumpy hill in the rain - it ended the ride and sent those 3 miles to Strava before then recording the rest of the ride as a walk and halving the number of miles and the amount of time it took!!!!

Anyhoo, the rain started as we were getting my bike out of the car and before I’d gone five miles my waterproof socks had failed to live up to their billing and I had an extremely cold, wet, numb left foot. I soldiered on and eventually reached The Camel Trail - this gave me about seven miles without hills as I travelled up the Camel valley. Unfortunately this was followed by a three mile climb up out of the valley and on to Camelford itself. We’d originally intended to have lunch there but had been dissuaded by last nights B&B proprietor and so Jan was waiting for me at the Cornwall at War museum at Davidstow, a few miles further on. Due to our late start (11:00 ish) and the slow pace brought about by the half dozen climbs of the morning, I didn’t get to the museum until just before 14:00 hrs. We dined on cheese, crisps and apple washed down with plenty of tea and I managed a quick look around the Museum which I would describe as “eclectic”.

I really enjoyed it and it had everything - from old military vehicles, to mock ups of WWI trenches, from aircraft parts to several early flight simulators, from a detailed video description of the in-flight refuelling program and aircraft involved in getting one Vulcan bomber all the way to Port Stanley and drop half a dozen bombs on the Port Stanley airfield during the Falklands Campaign to a mock up of a WWII RAF mess room - the latter reminded me of the cover of a Roxy Music album - have a look at my photo and tell me which album.

After lunch I was getting a good pace going as I had several downhill stretches on the way to Launceston but after that, having crossed the Tamar and entered Devon (bye bye Cornwall), the hills started in earnest again with each one seemingly steeper and longer than it’s predecessor.

I was getting tired by now and the toughness of the road surface was getting me down but I persevered and eventually I rolled into our original destination (and end point of my maps and satnav routing), Bridestowe. Tonight’s B&B is a mile or so to the northeast BUT I took a wrong turn and didn’t realise until I’d done another really steep climb. Looking at my map I’d added another two miles to my ride and the quickest way to the finish used a By-Way. It started off nice and smooth and easy but after 3/4 of a mile became really rough then went downhill before going through two stony fords and climbing a wet and stony final half mile.
Still, the B&B is a very nice country house and we’ve just been out for an evening meal with our old friends Mick and Marilyn who live in these parts.