14/9 Hidden Valley Off Road

Into Our favourite valley!

One of our best off road routes is the 'hidden valley', but to make it harder and more varied we were trying a new extended version  that avoided going back on ourselves and took the distance to a more challenging 33 miles. Starting next to the only pub at kingston we were soon heading up towards the top of the SDW via the rutted bumpy track past Lewes prison. Once on the SDW it was easy rolling terrain up to Ditchling Beacon still sporting freshly painted allez allez signs) before taking a right hand turn for the mysterious hidden valley.
 We all love this valley, its so peaceful and very few people seem to know about it , so apart from the sheep, we had it all to ourselves. At one point we had to laugh when Ivan took a bad line and ended up in a rut so deep that it was halfway up  his wheel with sheep desperately jumping out of his way . The rut was so deep that the only way out was to stop and physically lift the bike up. 

The First Of Four Punctures!

The bridleway left the valley and took us out parallel to the A27 and into Stanmer pub. Although we had only completed a third of the route we decided to have a quick cup of coffee at the tea shop as this would be the one and only tea shop we would meet in the whole ride. After steep climbing back up towards the SDW we were enjoying a fast descent when Duncan picked up our first puncture. Just as Duncan had fixed his puncture, Derek discovered that he too had got one. Putting the wheel back into Derek's frame proved rather tricky and it took four of us working together to get the wheel back in. 
We now began the super steep descent south back towards the A27, such a relief to be going down it rather than up. Crossing the bridge on the A27 we all knew that we had around 5 miles of continuous climbing to do to reach Woodingdean, I had been anxious about this all day but as it turned out, apart from one initial section that was too steep to ride, the rest was an enjoyable steady climb up a relatively smooth surface. Derek was enjoying it less than me and after riding for three days in a row, his legs finally decided they would go no further and he had to abandon taking an easy short cut back down to Kingston where he would meet us at the pub. Myself, Ivan and Duncan pressed on curious to see what these new tracks would be like. Apart from one long rarely used section that was too narrow and bumpy to ride, the rest of the tracks in this area proved to be fast and wide and so were great fun. Our rendezvous with Derek was delayed when it was my time to have to replace a puncture, only to have to do it twice when the replacement tube turned out to have a hole caused by the valve rubbing against the rubber. Our entire stock of inner tubes was now depleted and we still had six miles to go, if we had another we would try have to try one of Duncan's notoriously useless emergency stick on patches. Fortunately our run of punctures had come to an end and before long we found ourselves in the most agreeable position of going down the punishing steep 'white lane' into kingston instead of the usual ascent. A quick pint and packet of crisps at the pub finished  off what we all agreed is a fantastic new route.  

Duncan Enjoys The descent Down To The A27