Ilkley

The rain was heavy and continued all morning.  We had a short ride from Leeds today to take us through to Ilkley in the West Riding of Yorkshire,  just seventeen miles.   We had agreed to meet up with Ewan McKay from the Ilkley Cycling Club who was going to ride with us and lead the way.  We hoped that he liked going slowly. We reckoned 8-10 miles per hour.  Maybe a little more going downhill with the wind behind us. The Ilkley Cycling Club is the largest in England with nearly 1,300 members and is heavily involved this year in the Tour de France which brings it's Grand Depart to the town in July. We were honoured to have Ewan as our escort and he and his wife Louise were helping to organise the concert in St. Margaret's parish hall.  If that was not enough they were also hosting us for the night.  The rain had eased by 13.00 and just a little after we hit the road again after two great days with Joseph, Louise and Thomas.   It was good to be back in the saddle after the Marek treatment on the bikes.  Just to remind us of what is involved we had a steady hill out of Leeds for the first couple of miles.  Our route took us by way of Cookridge, close to Leeds and Bradford Airport and through the back doubles to the iconic views around the Cow and Calf tor where we stopped to do some filming for the video blogs.   In the circumstances the progress was more than acceptable.     With Ewan in the navigators seat I was able to relax from that duty. No chance of getting lost. No blame today.    Long steep downhill into Ilkley and a visit to the book and bike shops.  Ewan treated us to a coffee and a caramel slice.  Very welcome. It slipped down without a problem.   The artiste's fingers were twitching a little and so he offered to play in the bookshop.   Very much appreciated by the customers.  Perhaps it would increase the interest for the evening show.   Ticket sales had been slow.   In order to get to the venue we peddled the bikes up the steepest hill on the trip to date.   Slow and steep,it may have been but we did not get off to push even with the back wheels struggling to grip.   Once again Richard did a heroic  job of dragging the trailer behind him.   Great hall and plenty of space with excellent facilities.   We got the show set up and in good time too. Another light has gone on the blink. This definitely means a trip to Maplins in York to secure another one tomorrow. A nervous wait to see how many would turn out. Slowly but surely an audience grew and this did much to encourage the maestro.  Joseph and Thomas came too which was a real treat for me. Marek, our bike engineer, arrived just in time to enjoy the show.  Our way of thanking him.  New territory for RD and the audience were rather reticent to start with, not knowing what to expect  but the silver tongued guitarist soon won them over with his chat lines and background stories which equally match up to his beautiful playing.  Two encores! Satisfying cd sales.  Some good foundations were put down for a return to the area.   Pack up and pay up.  We were out in good time.  Sad goodbyes to my gang and off to Ewan and Louise's house in the town for a drink,  a chat and a welcome bed.  So so the adventure continues........  756 on the clock.