North Devon/Cornwall Trip II

[Steve H]

16 July 2006

The downside to having the single bed and a room on my own was that the mattress was a camp bed and unfortunately it concertinaed both ways to the extent that after a good nights sleep it looked like one of those ‘pick a number, pick a colour’ paper games…

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…consequently I woke up with more creases on my body than an overused Stretch Armstrong toy.

The upside was that I felt no ill affects from the previous evenings exertions and nor did Paul or Steve although there was a heated dispute on who snored the loudest. After much debating on the subject it was agreed that we’d enter the Olympics in the team event and our trio is now tipped as hot favourites after Cornish seismologists measured our evenings efforts as registering as an unofficial World Record on the Richter scale. Steve then went on to prove that he could go for individual honours in the biathlon event combining the Richter and Sphincter scale as he absolutely obliterated his Personal Best (and underpants I predict) by making the downstairs a no go zone for anyone with a sense of smell.

9am saw us back on the bikes and searching for each other after about 2 minutes of riding and then a petrol station when we all got back together – once this was found we rode across Cornwall to St. Austell and searched for a place for breakfast. The riding was more even paced and relaxed this time as we got back into the swing of things gradually.

After an unfulfilled search for an agreeable place to eat we resigned ourselves to breakfasting at the local ASDA and were accompanied by herds of people who obviously had nothing better to do on a glorious Sunday morning than buy the weekly groceries and batter their kids up ‘n down the aisles for moaning (quite justifiably) about being stuck in a bloody great supermarket when there’s a beach just up the road. We jumped back on the bikes and then travelled no more than 200 yards and saw a quaint unpopulated café serving all day breakfasts and begging to be visited by ravenous bikers - at the time (to quote a doctor assisting a single Mother in giving birth) ‘It was a right Bastard’!

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Travelling out on the A390 out of St. Austell was quite a chore in view of the amount of traffic however once we were out of the town we managed to find plenty of open stretches of road to maintain the pace set the day before – once again the roads were outstanding and the riding invigorating. Off the A390 there was a right turn to Looe at a place called Mid Taphouse, we took this turn and began 10 minutes of sweeping roads that ended abruptly with a car boot sale and the obligatory Hot Dog wagon serving crap to bare chested low life since daybreak. We turned left and rode into Looe through roads overhung with trees, the sun casting mottled light through them as the shadows danced on the tarmac.

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Despite Looe looking so inviting it was, to be frank too hot to walk around in leathers so after a brief stop for a couple of photographs we left the quaint seaside village and began our journey once again.

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Joining the A374 to Torpoint we crossed the estuary to Plymouth via the Torpoint Ferry which was, Paul said ‘…free to bikers.’ after I’d spent 10 minutes wrestling a couple of quid from the pocket of my Alpinestars.

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The ferry unfortunately began the end of our journey, the quiet unpopulated villages we were used to travelling through were replaced by the the hussle and bussle of Plymouth and the beautiful scenery and roads replaced by the dual carriageway of the A38.

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We rode back to Paul and Sue’s shop - Finesse in Topsham (50% off any purchase when you mention this website*) with our hearts heavy and our stamina waning.

We stopped at the Shop, had a quick drink and then Steve and I rode back to Gloucester exhilarated by the weekend and vowing to do it again when Steve had the bottle to pull another ‘complete shift sicky’.

Total Miles - 438
Total Petrol Stops - 4
Total Stops to remove flies from Visors – 11

*Offer subject to revocation at any time
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[JonB]

I remember really needing a piss on that ferry, but they had no toilets and I very nearly did wee myself.

Looked like you had a lovely day!
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[Annabella]

I remember someone else telling me the Torpoint Ferry was free for bikes with a voucher out of a local paper... that was embarrassing!
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[markandmindy]

If you'd gone further West you could have done the Ladock twisties between Fraddon and Truro. it's the route of the old main road and gets hardly any traffic at all. also there's the road between St. Ives and St just. bit busy with emmets, sorry, tourists, this time of year but in early spring and autumn it is biker heaven. Glad to see you enjoyed your trip down here. tend to take the roads for granted a bit when you live here.