Trip to Shaftesbury's 'Hovis Hill'

[D O G]

A couple of months ago I was grubbing about the net looking at steep hills, and came across the old Hovis advert with the kid pushing his bike up the cobbled hill.

I knew that was in Shaftesbury, which is sort of near where I live, so I thought it may be do-able in a day to ride there, go up the hill, have some lunch, then come back. I plotted the route, which worked out as 50 miles each way, which for me is probably about as far as I'd go at the moment in a day, unsupported. It was flat though, apart from a reasonable ish climb at the end, then the short blast up Gold Hill from the advert.

I tried to tempt some others into the ride, but after getting interest from 4, the forecast of freezing temperatures put most of them off, the excuses came in and then there was only two of us left.

We met at 9 am at Hursley, then set off. It was absolutely freezing first thing, but after an hour the sun was warming us and it was a pleasant ride. The route took us right into the middle of Salisbury, past the cathedral, which even though I've lived down here for 8 years I've never been to. An amazing place - the area around the cathedral is like a enclave to a bygone and very privileged age. It was serene on the crisp morning, so we stopped for a bite.

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Continued along a bit more then we had to stop for a natural break in one of the deserted lanes:

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Then after a leisurely 3h20 or so we made it to the bottom of Gold Hill and prepared for the sharp climb. It wasn't that bad actually, although the wheel did slip on the cobbles at one point, but nothing to write home about. Clearly I tried to maintain a unflustered expression for the sightseers taking photos. View from the top:

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Happily there was a good cafe right at the top, we went in and managed to get a table right at the window, looking out over the hill and the bikes:

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Two steak and kidney pies and jacket potatoes later we set back off home. Stopped to take a pic of this random house and fairly sizeable church in the middle of nowhere:

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Apparently this is Howards House near Teffont Evias, not a bad little pile!

Nice deserted lanes:

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Stopped off again at Salisbury, bit more overcast this time:

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Happily it was more downhill on the way back than it was going, as neither of us had much left in the tank for the last 10 miles, I literally crawled up the last hill on the way back to mine, then tucked the bike up for the night.

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Then went inside and ate one massive bowl of curry, half a loaf of Soreen, some crisps, a Double Decker a Penguin and about 3 milk chocolate digestives, washed down with about 2 pints of milk. Nom.

[UnknownStuntm...]

Nice work. I see you parked a bike in a disabled spot there. I'm pretty sure after that beasting I'd have been disabled too!