Coast to Coast, Day Two, 16th May (55 Miles)

One-Sided Sunburn.
In complete contrast to the previous day, the morning of day two began with bright sunshine, quickly followed by a full English breakfast and lashings of tea. By 10 o'clock the bikes were loaded and were cycling up the steep road out of Penrith (a pattern emerging here) and up onto the escarpment overlooking the town. From there, a couple of miles lazy pedalling in the spring sun bought us to the A686, which we would be following for some seventeen or eighteen miles through Langwathby, up Hartside and down the other side toward Alston. In no uncertain way, this climb really took its toll on me, and left me in a dumbfounded stupor for the rest of the day. And unfortunately it was largely my fault. The climb up Hartside (1903 feet or 577 metres) is about ten or eleven miles long, and although the gradient is consistent for it's duration, it is pretty steep. As we reached the bottom, passing signs warning of impending death by speeding lorry, I shifted into my lowest gear, lent into the pedals and sped off at a ridiculous twelve miles an hour. This pace soon proved to tough for Gary and he fell back, finding his own more sensible speed and rhythm, whilst I pressed on, head down and legs thrashing.
After about six miles, and having joyfully passed a fellow cyclist in true King of the Mountains style, my legs finally realised what my head had worked out a couple of miles earlier, that I was going far to fast with the summit still nowhere in sight. Another mile or so on and I ground to a complete halt, gasping for air and trying to stop my legs from crumpling under me. To my chagrin, the cyclist I had passed then overtook me uttering words of sympathy, followed by Gary hot on her heals. He quickly passed her and in the distance I saw him catch up with her wizened cycling colleague, a man with the head of a 60 year old firmly adhered to the body of a twentysomething (such wizened youths were to become a recurring feature of the entire ride). After five minutes I felt somewhat better, remounted my bike and carried on, trying to catch Gary up, but again at too fast a speed. Thankfully, after another mile, perhaps now eight of the ten mile total, I got a puncture in my back wheel, and with gasping breath managed to yell "Puncture!" so that Gary could stop. We had agreed that only he need bring his tyre pump so as I stopped and started to get the wheel off he returned back down the hill. To be honest I think that timely puncture was a welcome respite for the both of us, and having changed the inner tube for a new one, we remounted, and the gradient didn't seem nearly as bad as it had done ten minutes previously. The last two or three miles to the summit were the easiest of the whole climb, probably fuelled by the observation of Hartside café at the top and dreams of sugary tea. Having finally reached the summit, we disembarked and Gary quickly demolished a bowl of porridge whilst I devoured everything with sugar in that I could find, including kitkats, the aforementioned sugary tea and most of a bar of Kendal mintcake. Somewhat refreshed, we stopped for another photo opportunity and then prepared for the descent.
As interminably long as the ascent had seemed, the descent down the far side of Hartside seemed to be over in an ear-flapping, jaw-clenching flash. Top speed easily reached in excess of 40 mph. Before we knew it we were leaving the A road behind and were back on the minor roads again, passing through the pleasant villages of Leadgate and Garrigill. On leaving Garrigill, things took a turn for the worst once more as we decided we would risk the steep roads of the Dowgang Hush to reach our lunch at Nenthead rather than the offroad option. Our route out of Garrigill commenced with a sharp one in five which Gary, veins standing out from his forehead and legs moving in a strange Six Million Dollar Man slow-motion, managed to cycle up, whilst I deferred and soon dismounted. From there the ride didn't get any easier. The Dowgang Hush is extremely steep with at least one more one in seven (and I suspect several more that aren't far off) so that I had to stop several times to ease my aching legs, and when I was actually cycling I had a most peculiar desire to grit my teeth and stare at my front wheel, rather than view the glorious scenery around us. Eventually we reached the summit and plunged headlong toward Nenthead, apparently England's highest village, this time down a one in five which made a refreshing change, past the old the lead mines, before finally stopping at the Miners Arms for some nourishing soup and bread, and a discussion on the use of Nenthead as a term of abuse. "Take that, you Nenthead".
Immediately after lunch came one of the highlights of the day. Climbing (surprise, surprise) out of Nenthead we soon passed the highest point of the C2C, Black Hill at an impressive 1998 feet, or 609 metres. Here we could finally appreciate the windswept scenery, and at this point I must take my hat off to those clever people at Sustrans on their choice of route. Apart from the various A roads which were our decision to take, we hardly saw a car or vehicle all day. The quiet and solitude we encountered was incredibly relaxing and refreshing, and whilst I'm sure the situation is a little different in winter, in the hot springtime sun the awesome splendour of the Pennines was worth all the aching legs and teeth-gritting. After the climb to the highest point, we rapidly descended across Coalcleugh Moor and Allendale Common toward Allenheads. Another puncture occurred on the descent, but this time Gary was the beneficiary, and although far less timely than mine on Hartside he obtained it in a far more comedic fashion. Whilst descending at close to 30 mph he didn't notice a looming cattle grid until it was to late, reflex braking only slowing him to 20 mph before he rattled across it, blowing out all the air in his back tyre and ruining the valve on the inner tube to boot. A quick change and we were on our way through Allenheads itself, quickly followed by Rookhope, before a most welcome though tardily served cup of tea and a bun in Stanhope.
The route out of Stanhope began with (yes, you've guessed it) a steep climb, this time a couple of one in sevens in quick succession, where Gary received a nasty surprise. For whatever reason he couldn't get into the lowest gear of his chainset and was left to make do with whatever gear his chain decided it preferred thereafter. Thankfully, most of the climbing had now been done, the sharp ascent out of Stanhope was essentially the last one, so it didn't affect him that much, but it would have been much more worrying had happened earlier in the day. Following the initial sharp ascent there was a gentle climb for a couple of miles before a smooth descent across Waskerly Park and Muggleswick Common and on to Consett and our stop for the night. At Castleside we were mildly accosted by a small group of oiks, but vehemently ignoring them we made the last few miles to Shotley Bridge in Consett in good time given Gary's gear problems and my fitness (or-lack-thereof).
We had a small problem finding the Crown and Crossed Swords Hotel, not that it was well hidden but rather that we blindly cycled past it once or twice at least, and once we'd checked in it was all I could do to put the kettle on. At this point we noticed a rather unexpected effect of the days cycling. Since we had cycled all day essentially heading east without the benefits of cloud cover, we both had one-sided sunburn on the right hand side of our bodies, mine largely confined to my face since I had covered myself up for the whole day, but Gary was prominently red on his right arm and leg. Galloping lethargy reigned, and it was some time before we ventured down for some food and a beer in the bar, once again primarily carbohydrate in the form of pasta and chips. Having eaten we wandered out to see what other watering holes and delights Shotley Bridge had to offer, which turned out to be none. A quick look at the River Derwent in the dark and we were back in the Crown and Crossed Swords for another couple of jars before a deserved, uninterrupted sleep.