Cafe of the Year 2010

I had done no exercise since the Cheshire cat. I had barely left the house since Thursday, and I had not spoken to a person since Friday morning. The plan had been that when my family left to go and visit the in-laws for Easter, I would spend my time cycling. But a combination of the remnants of my cold, atrocious weather and extreme lethargy all worked their magic to keep me pinned down on the sofa for the best part of two days.

I would probably have defaulted there again if I had not made plans to meet Skip down in the Square in Axbridge, for a Sunday-morning ride in a vague northerly direction.

As readers of previous posts will know, Sunday is the most dangerous day to ride a bike, and people on their holidays on unfamiliar roads are also not my favourite people. Note to self: "Avoid Berrow, Brean and Weston super Mare until September". I didn't actually get rude or angry until I was nearly home (when despite my clear signal to turn right , and plenty of time for my manoeuvre too,the car driver behind me decided I would like to hear his car horn. I gave him some Anglo Saxon-that will learn him!), but I do feel a certain amount of indignation that people don't look, or don't judge that a road cyclist moving at 15-18mph will be upon you before you have crossed that road. Skip thinks I'm a tad aggressive I think, but my view is that you just have to teach these idiots a lesson. I know what you are thinking, I'm thinking it myself. "Grow up Modern middle-aged man, accept it with good grace and don't provoke the grockles. Chances are they have a knife anyway".

I coughed my way around the route for the second successive Sunday, although at just over 40 miles it doesn't feel as bad as it did last week. I did actually enjoy it. Especially as we got to go to a new cafe in Kewstoke. Technically I think it's a wine bar, but it had freshly baked scones and a filter coffee for 2.95, which makes it a cafe in my book. The New Castle, very friendly, good views out over the Bristol channel towards Wales, and importantly for the ladies-very clean toilets. An early contender for Cafe of the Year 2010, a competition of which I will be the sole arbiter. Criteria: 1. Value for money, 2. Range and quality of food (no bacon sandwiches for Knight of the Realm, but you can get a pint there I think), 3.Cleanliness of Toilets 4.Friendliness and effectiveness of staff, 5. External environment (is the view good? can I see my bike while I am inside? Am I likely to get beaten up if I look at anyone in a funny way [we are talking location I think]).

My big mistake of the day was to leave Charlie switched on whilst in the cafe. So I thought that would mean a low average speed, which it does, and you can see from the map that there are loads of red squiggles in Kewstoke, denoting some strange computations in my cafe stop. But, it's a clever old thing is Charlie. It actually calculates average speed and average moving speed, so 15.4 on a very windy day like today is actually very respectable.

The cough is coming under control too, so perhaps it did me some good. I can't wait to find some more cafes to enter the competition.

http://connect.garmin.com/activity/28900568