Cycling staycation in Yorkshire part 2

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Today I headed out in the chilly sunshine, meandering towards the North Yorkshire moors again, this time via the caravan route, which promised to be a bit more sedate than the 25% Sutton Bank. I had learned my lesson on day 1 that sausages for brekkie and crazy steep climbs have disastrous consequences for my digestive system. I looped around the foothills to Kirkbymoorside, where I took a nice quiet climb up through Hotton-Le-Hole, clearly named as such to give an air of French sophistication. It was actually quite a quaint picturesque village so to label it “the hole” would seem a little harsh.

After a cattle grid the route reached the open moorland. There was a bit more gentle climbing before the road plateaued as it then followed the ridge line pretty much all the way to the north side of the moor from where I descended all the way down to the villages in the valley below, passing through Castletown before following a railway towards Glaisdale. Rather bizarrely the narrow lane swooped over and then under, backwards and forwards from one side of the railroad to the other. Clearly the Romans had not spent much time in these parts back in their conquering days. Sooner or later I had to climb back up onto the moor again so I took another narrow lane up towards Rosedale Abbey. The climb was not too bad, up to the top of the wide open moor land, before descending into the pretty village of Rosedale Abbey. I didn’t spot any abbeys though.

There was a well known climb, the Rosedale Chimney, out of the village that I thought I should have a go at. The sign at the bottom was a little discouraging: 1 in 3. Hmmm. Hopefully that would just be for the inside corner of a hairpin, so undaunted off I set. The beginning bit was steep but manageable, over a cattle grid and then it started ramping up through some hairpins. Thankfully no vehicles were coming so I could make full use of the narrow road to wiggle from side to side. I had been expecting to get round the bends and for the road to ease up, but a near vertical straight section looked ahead. I struggled on a bit further but then effectively lost all residual momentum so I had to bail before going splat. Utterly defeated, but thankfully only about 30 meters from the point where the gradient subsided again so that I could remount. On returning to base I checked the details about it in the top 100 UK rides - it is graded 10/10, so failing to conquer it maybe isn’t so shameful.


The hard bit done, the rest of the ride was a sheer joy. I descended back through Hutton-Le-Hole, but then wiggled through the lanes instead of taking the main road to get back to base, in the baking sunshine. Luckily the guesthouse I was staying in let me use the shower before jumping on the train for a easy trip back to London. All in all a great trip, with some fab cycling, and so easy to do from London. So now I’ve done the reccy who’s up for it?!

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