3* December 10th
Posted on Thursday 21 December 2006 by Camille Savory
A Brrrrrrill ride
Shamed the previous week, a respectable crowd showed up shivering at Marylebone, to get as far as we could before the next tornado. The view from the train windows of heavily frosted fields was not promising, and High Wycombe was an obvious exception to the threatened global warming. Cold enough to make breathing painful, the first hill was a cruel but effective way to warm up stiff legs. While some applied the rule ‘keep moving = keep warm’, my kangaroo hopping tactic at the halts failed to save the feeling in my feet. We took the 2nd easiest way up the hill at Brill (thanks Mr S) and did not stop to admire the murky view from the windmill. The Pheasant was not just warm but welcoming, efficient, and fed us extra chips.
Excellent coffee delayed the inevitable, our emergence to be greeted with spattering rain. We braved ‘plan b’ and on the second try picked up the elusive Phoenix trail to Princes Risborough, with one choosing tarmac over possible (actually not much) mud. Met-check advised us not to push our luck and most opted for the train there, two hardy souls climbing back to High Wycombe. Coffee at Marylebone provided fortification for those having to skirt perilously close to the West End, en route to a bath. A round of applause to Man Kwun who on her first 3* risked getting her shiny new candy-apple red Condor dirty (but got plenty of admiring comments for her trouble).