Solo ride to Soberton

Only one ride last week and it's not looking good for many this week. 

On Sunday 2nd February I took advantage of the lovely sunny morning and set off for an amble on my own. I headed out of town towards Bishops Sutton as I wanted to see why that road was closed to cars, hoping it was possible to get through on bike. It was. Here is a picture of the reason why it was impassable to motor vehicles.

Road works between Alresford and Bishops Sutton

The underlying reason for the work being to lay electric cables from the electric sub station on the Alresford side of the bridge to connect with the new solar panel arrays on White Hill.

Once I'd satisfied my curiosity I headed for West Meon via Bramdean Common. Taking advantage of the greatly improved weather were many other cyclists. During my ride I must have passed around 70: one large group of around a dozen passed me going in the opposite direction. 

The roads had been clear so far with much evidence of recently cleared fallen trees in many places. On the floor of the Meon valley there was a lot of surface water in the fields, spilling out onto the roads. I took the back roads through the villages of Exton, Carhampton & Meonstoke fording a number of deep puddles before continuing past the old station at Droxford to Soberton. Here I paused for refreshment in a sheltered spot and to bask in the warm sunshine out of the cool breeze. 

My way home was via Swanmore and Bishops Waltham and I was glad of the tail wind as I was beginning to flag a little. I rode a short way behind another cyclist but couldn't hold the wheel for long. The swoop down to Beauworth is great fun and I achieved my top speed of the day here.

Cheriton was free of any surface water but Tichborne made up for that with two flooded areas. One near the entrance to Tichborne House the other just before reaching the A31 bridge over the lane. Here for about 100 metres the road was up to my bottom bracket. (I.E. about a foot deep). It was necessary to keep pedalling so of course my feet and legs were soaked, but, Hey! I was nearly home so what the heck!

Here is a car coming through that flood:

Yep! It's a road not a river.

I was home and in a warm shower within another ten minutes so did not get cold from my wetting.

For the record here is my map for the day:

Gridironman