Here's a GPS trace of most of "Y Wal" at Afan.  There's a bit missing because at that point I took my coat off (with gps logger in the pocket) and shoved it into the depths of my backpack where it couldn't lock on to the satellites. oops.  I realised this mistake, and moved it to somewhere more sensible at the next stopping point!

Anyway, yes. Red mountain biking - probably not my normal choice for a weekend's activity, but this was a bit of a uni reunion type thing, involving many keen bikers.  Plus a few of us with somewhat less experience to slow them down (the 24ish km route took about 4 hours, oops)

I do enjoy mountain biking - but it's never going to be one of my main sports.  Far too much risk of hurting myself!  And I'll freely admit that my bike is perhaps not cut out for too much abuse.. but at least it's pretty

Obviously I'd fixed the frayed gear cable after my last excursion, but while doing that I also took the opportunity to replace the brake cables - with pink ones!  Pimp my bike, haha.  The boys looked at me like I'm some sort of lunatic, but then again they probably realise that already...

mud, bikes and scenery! not sure why my saddle's at such an odd angle...

I've biked at Afan once before, on a different red trail (the one that's currently closed).  From that, I remember endless horrible uphill to start with, then nice swoopy singletrack and a few terrifyingly steep downhill bits.

This one... pretty much the same!  All the 'up' is at the start - which seems to take forever, but at least it gets it out of the way.  Then the more interesting bits!  Again, lots of nice singletrack.  But nothing too scary and steep, so I was mostly really enjoying it.  I'm not very good at actually standing up on the pedals, but I think I'd improved a bit by the end and generally felt mostly in control of things.  So that's good

Sadly I had to miss out on the rest of the weekend - camping, drinking and apparently not very much surfing because of hangovers - due to other commitments.  But it was very good to catch up with people again, yay.

Do now need to invest in some cycling gloves though.  And figure out why my rear brakes were sticking so much...

tags: cycling friends Wales