October Ride to Sunderland Point and Morecambe

We had recced this particular ride a few weeks ago and the one thing we learnt from the recce was that we would have to cycle the planned route in reverse if we wanted to avoid getting trapped by the rising tide at Sunderland Point.  And that’s just what we did.  The only disadvantage to that is the hills were saved until the end of the ride!

The weather was perfect for cycling as the 3 tandems, one solo and a recumbent set off from the car park adjacent to Junction 34 of the M6 and headed along traffic free cycle paths through Lancaster and across the Lune via the Millennium Bridge towards Heysham.  Numbers were down from usual as many members were away on holiday.  Well, they certainly missed a treat this month.  The cycling was gentle as we headed across the causeway to Sunderland Point which provided us with extensive views across the estuary to the Bowland Fells.  We could even see the Yorkshire peak of Ingleborough popping its summit above the skyline.

We retraced our route back to Overton and took the lane into Heysham, stopping for a well-deserved coffee at Tracy’s.  Then it was onto the prom towards Morecambe.  We passed the start of The Way of The Roses, and even Eric and Ernie on our way to Hest Bank, where we started the first bit of climbing of the day up to Nether Kellet.  The climb was well worth it with superb views over to Warton Crag and across ‘The Bay’.  We stopped at the top of the climb to discuss our plans for lunch as we were running a bit later than planned, partly due to the many stops for photo opportunities and partly, a big part in fact, due to going quite slowly along the prom.  It is a shared cycleway, so no traffic thankfully, but you need to take care with pedestrians and dogs! 

We opted for a picnic lunch in Carnforth, sitting outside enjoying the warm autumn sunshine.  Was it really October?  After lunch we headed through Warton to Yealand Redmayne before circling back south through Priest Hutton and Borwick.  We only had one more climb up to Over Kellet before a long descent to Halton where we picked up the Lune Cycleway back to the start.  40 glorious miles in a lovely part of the country with wall to wall sunshine.  A big thanks to Matt for the action photos from his on-board video cameras.