North out of Colchester on the e28.X on a 10-mile ride to the picturesque village of Dedham in Constable Country, and back again. It was a beautiful sunny September weekday – to begin with, that is….
Maximum power level 5 (briefly) but mostly 1. Battery remaining: 30%.
| Komoot routes | |
| Outbound: | https://www.komoot.com/tour/2568588735 |
| Return: | https://www.komoot.com/tour/2570370688 |
My wife, Melanie, was also on the outward leg having arranged to meet friends in Dedham for lunch. I went along for the ride but then came back separately – thankfully well ahead of the torrential thunderstorm that accompanied her bedraggled return that afternoon.
HISTORY
We headed out of Colchester on the Ipswich road. After a short distance there is a combined cycleway and footway alongside the highway. Its surface is very uneven but it is better than mixing it with the cars and lorries.
The environment improves dramatically once you are able to turn off onto dedicated cycleways that zigzag beneath trees and beside quiet urban side roads. Very pleasant to be on.
Severalls Lane lifted us over the busy A12 dual carriageway and into the countryside, then Langham Lane took us past the former RAF Boxted, used by various USAAF bombardment and fighter groups during WWII – now partly farmland (whose owner kindly let me do some drone filming of my chum’s vintage US Army Jeep a while back), and partly an altogether more modern solar farm.
A right turn at the crossroads in Langham itself took us past the charming, pink-walled and thatched Lyme Cottage – one of several thatched houses in the village.
GEARS
We then took a longer route than necessary to Dedham, but one with much smaller and quieter roads, at least at first. This did involve going up Nightingale Hill, which came upon us unexpectedly around a bend between high hedgerows.
I thumbed the Estarli into power level 5 and strolled up. In my mirror I could see the front light on my wife’s Trek receding rapidly, however. Once she caught up, it turned out that she had found herself in much too high a gear as the road curved and steepened suddenly. It is only a 6% gradient but as she was not expecting it she had lost momentum.
Regular readers will know that I am not a fan of gears generally (and derailleurs in particular), and the incident did feel like a vindication of my theory that “it’s an e-bike, you don’t need gears”. Of course you do, to regulate pedalling cadence, but maybe not the typical eight or nine most bikes are equipped with. Melanie mostly uses 7 or 8 (of 8) when riding along on the level.
The last stretch was along bigger roads although still with little traffic this Thursday morning.
QUIET LANES
After a refreshing cup of tea I left the others at Dedham Art and Craft Centre, to make my way back towards Colchester, having plugged a different route into Komoot that would take me along some of the “quiet lanes” I had seen referred to somewhere or other.
Not long after the start I had to ascend Castle Hill out of the village: peak gradient 7% but I kept in power level 3 to preserve the battery, uncertain at this stage how far it would stretch. A modest workout.
Then little lanes that went across bigger ones, making my way across country. Home Farm Lane and Little Bromley Road, onto Bromley Road and up over the A120 back into the city.
All pleasant enough but dare I say a bit boring, unless you’re a fan of rural industry: the area is very much agricultural rather than countryside.
Suddenly I found myself at the northern end of the Salary Brook Cycle Route, part of which I have been on before. So, this is where it comes out.
Salary Brook is a great cross route but, dear me, it is not in a very good condition these days. Nevertheless I traced its pleasant but increasingly bumpy meander back to Clingoe Hill – where the eastern end of Colchester’s new Rapid Transit route is nearing completion – then the short ride back home.
By this time my wrists were really hurting and giving me twinges of pins and needles. I attribute the discomfort partly to the uneven ground, and partly the forward leaning seating posture on the e28.X with the standard straight handlebars.
That is one of the reasons I have opted to have the raised, ‘Dutch’ handlebars on the new e28.X that I have ordered. Wait – another one? Yes, to replace this Blike subscription version I have had this summer, with certain modifications that I think will suit me better.
If, that is, Estarli can ever get around to building it: so far it has been more than six weeks, and counting.
Watch this space.