Llamas and horse drawn traps
Posted on Monday 18 May 2009 by Charles Harvey
RSF/CTC joint ride 17 May 2009
This was a joint ride of the Rough Stuff Fellowship [RSF] and the Cyclists Touring Club [CTC]. Most RSF members tend to be in the CTC as well so there was quite an overlap of memberships. The weather forecast was changeable and so it proved. It was raining when we assembled at the Brown Box Café in Harpenden, sunny shortly after we set off , raining again soon afterwards and so it continued all day. Most of us ended up keeping our waterproofs on as it seemed to start raining again whenever we took them off.
The ride began by going though the grounds of Rothamstead agricultural research station, passing the oldest agricultural field trial in the country which has been going since 1843. We emerged onto the roads and soon passed a house which had llamas in its grounds. We looked at the llamas, they looked at us. I don’t know who were more surprised. After crossing an unpleasant roundabout on the A5, we arrived at Flamstead. We’d had to change our lunch arrangements as our original pub gave us a choice only of roasts so instead some ate their sandwiches admiring the view of the church while others ate in “The Spotted Dog”.
After lunch we followed a road along a valley bottom and then a bridle path that took us up to Gaddesden Row. On one of the bridle paths between there and Redbourn we had to pull in to let no fewer than eight horse drawn traps pass. After tea at ”The Cricketers”, some of us visited the Redbourn Museum, housed in a former silk mill, and then we followed the “Nicky Way”, a former railway line, back to Harpenden.