Windy Dales Blast

The weather this week has been rather shocking, with some rather heavy and prolonged rain showers. Saturday although windy appeared to be looking the best day of the weekend. 

We left home at around 11:00am and headed over to Clitheroe by our usual roads, were we stopped to fill up. From Clitheroe we followed our usual route to Settle via the minor backs roads of Sawley and Wigglesworth. We passed by Settle and joined the B6479 and passed through Horton in Ribblesdale before turning right at Ribblehead Viaduct. We then followed the stunning B6255 to Hawes. We stopped for lunch at the Penny Garth Cafe. It wasn’t too busy this week at Hawes and the majority of bikes about were cruisers.

After lunch we left Hawes and decided to head over to Devil’s Bridge via Sedbergh. We joined the A684 and headed for Sedbergh, thankfully the surface was still in good shape. A few years ago this road was horrendously potholed for much of its length. We arrived in Sedbergh and then joined the A683 and headed down to Devil’s Bridge. It wasn’t mega busy for this time of year, although it was busier than we expected. We stopped here for an ice cream as we felt it was just about warm enough to warrant one. The only issue we noticed was that the toilets are currently closed and have been replaced by one Portaloo.

We left on the A65 heading towards Skipton and soon arrived in Ingleton. Just after Ingleton we turned right onto minor roads and headed through Gisburn Forest and past Stocks Reservoir. We then joined the B6478 and headed for Slaidburn. We continued on this road and headed over Waddington Fell and down into Clitheroe. We passed through Clitheroe and then went over Pendle Hill and through Sabden. We then followed the A56/M66 back home as usual.

The wind especially up high yesterday was very strong, thankfully I was on the VFR but the bike and I still took a battering. I am aching on my chest and between my shoulder blades today, probably as a result from having to fight the wind. Helen has also managed to bruise some of her tendons in her left wrist, also probably due to fighting the wind.

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New Helmet

After almost fives years it’s time to replace my ageing Arai Viper GT Leon Haslam Replica Helmet. I am sad to see it go up in the loft as it has been a pleasure to wear it, although of late it is letting in too much wind through the visor which is making my eyes water at times.

After trying on a few different helmets at Hein Gericke it appeared that although I liked the Shoei helmets, they didn’t like my head. After being advised that Arai hadn’t updated the technology within their helmets for ages I decided that a HJC helmet was the best bet.

So I then spent the next week scouring the internet to see what designs were available. In the end I decided to purchase the HJC R-PHA10 Ben Spies Limited Edition helmet. It arrived the other day and came with a free smoke visor as well. But alas although it was pinlock ready it didn’t come with one, so I went on the internet again to purchase one. The helmet is very light and feels like a quality item. The only problem I have with it, is the fitting of the speakers for the Autocomm kit. When I put the helmet on with the speakers in but without a balaclava on my ears bend over and don’t have the room to bend back, unless I stick my fingers in. Hopefully when I am able to test the helmet out the speakers won’t start to hurt my ears over a long days riding. Other than that minor issue and I am very happy with the helmet.

Update: The helmet was supposed to come with a pinlock insert, so they sent me one in the post. So now both visors have pinlock inserts, which makes it very easy to change them over now. The initial position of the speakers was no good, but I have managed to find an acceptable location for them now. After having a few rides in it, I found it to be very comfortable but quite warm to wear (opening the upper vents solves this). No fogging issues at all, lifting the visor up and down takes a bit to get used to (if you haven’t had a centre visor lock before). Overall very nice helmet and very pleased with the purchase.

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