Half-day ride this coming Saturday

As you might know, our rides take place right through the year, including during these winter months. However, for this month and next, we will be departing from our usual format. In December and January, our runs will be shorter than usual: just half-day rides, finishing around lunch time. This is partly in deference to the winter weather and the short daylight hours; and partly (in the case of December) because of the difficulty of finding lunch venues during the festive season.

With that in mind, here are the details of our next ride, which takes place this coming Saturday (9 December).

For this ride, Glenn has devised an interesting and unusual route, involving the back doubles of Portobello, the Musselburgh waterfront and a delightful stretch of the River Esk walkway. Even if you are one of our habitual riders, you might find that there are parts of this route that you have never cycled before.

The total distance will be about 16 miles. It should be a straightforward run, with no difficult hills and with generally good surfaces - apart from a couple of short cobbled stretches.

Time and place

The ride will start as usual at 10:30 form the north end of Middle Meadow Walk.

We will aim to get back to the Meadows by 13:00 at the latest. There will be no official lunch stop, but given the large number of pubs, sandwich shops and cafés near the finish, some of you may wish to get together for a meal or snack after the ride. But if you do, it won't be part of the official event.

Looking ahead

For various reasons, we have decided not to run our customary Christmas morning ride this year. It's possible that someone else will organise a ride for that day. If so, I will let you know.

Our January ride will follow the same half-day format as in December. From February, we will return to our usual full-day runs.

One more thing ...

As some of you will know, 2024 will be a momentous year in the history of the 20-Milers: our 20th anniversary. Our first ever ride took place on 11 September 2004. I would very much welcome any suggestions you might have for how we might mark this important milestone. Please get in touch if you have any ideas.