The weather is reasonable (ie not snowing), my cold has more or less cleared up, and it is Thursday, all this can only mean a cycling outing with the cycling group.
On Thusdays we start from Temple Park Liesure Centre at 10:00. Mark (the leader) as always is cheerful and raring to go, there are a couple of new faces, which is always promising.
Our little group of five make our way across Temple Park and on the track behind Holderhouse Estate and Whiteleas (just wet enough here to get a small smattering of mud) until we come to the cycle track /footpath which was once the Sunderland / South Shields Railway line.
Turning left we head for Tile Sheds, then straight ahead on a track running alongside the Sunderland / Newcastle railway line to emerge at Sleepers Pub. Along Moor Lane, past Boldon Flats Nature Reserve, and turn right into Blue House Lane. Carefully across the railway line at the unmanned crossing, we emerge at the A184, alongside Sunderland Dog Racing Stadium.
Straight on here, experiencing one of Mark's little jokes, it is slightly up hill, and, given the run off from the recently melted snow, the track has a small stream running down it. We slither up the hill, wheels spinning in the mud as we peddle. Fortunately no-one falls off into the mire. At the top we emerge onto a good gravel track and turn left, to emerge back onto the A184 on the edge of Sunderland. Down the hill towards Cleadon Village and then onto a gravel track which skirts Sunderland AFC Training Academy Grounds, rejoining the road on the edge of Whitburn.
We turn right now, into Whitburn, then through Cornthwaite Park, to The Bents, next along the cliff top track towards Souter lighthouse, with an impressive swell rolling in whipped up by the brisk northerly breeze. Then on to Marsden Grotto.
Across the Coast Road now and through the houses, to join another (very muddy) track to arrive at the White House Pub. Straight on, then turn left into "The Lonnen", up a track which takes us in front of the Cleadon Hills Water Tower (openned in 1863, but not now in use), and, turning right to take a track which crosses Sunderland Road and then King George Road, to return to our starting point at Temple Park Liesure Centre.
Mark tells us we have done 14 miles (in 2 hours).
Sorry no photographs today, we are all shy in our Lycra gear!
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