Five Belles go to Glorious Goodwood

Ladies Day, Glorious Goodwood, July 28 2011

Artemis statue, back at Goodwood after being moved from The Trundle.

We had a perfect viewing position and very close to the bookies also!  I think Karen had two winners and I had one winner and a place. Elise, I think had one winner also. We all home with a little more money than we arrived with!

Frankie Dettori at the finish line after winning his race.

We had a wonderful day out and this is going to be an annual Belles event - it's already in the BB's diary for 2012!Elise, Caroline, Angela and Karen all met at my place at about 11.30am, loaded Karen's car with our picnics and bottles of pink champagne and made our way to Car Park 8 for a picnic before the racing.

Angela

Karen making sure there wasn't any chocolate left !

We saw some wonderful sights, a perfect day for 'people watching'...

Bras on heads...why??

Very high heels, plus plasters....

Lots of stretch limos....

After racing we returned to the car and while everyone was queuing up to leave the course we were happily tucking in to the remaining picnic and champagne! Tony and Peter very kindly collected us at about 8pm and drove us all home.


Tired, but a thoroughly enjoyable day - thanks to everyone for making this day such fun!

Saturday, July 23

The BB's Club tops have arrived!

We're pink ......and can be seen from the moon!!

We all were proud to wear our lovely new tops, but there were two Belles (who were relegated to the back of these two pics) who wouldn't wear their nice new tops - apparently holding back until our 1st Birthday Ride on August 21! 

As you see, they were both upset about being kept in the background!

Doreen being confronted by one of the drivers in Goodwood asking why she wasn't in pink as with the rest of the group? She didn't really have an answer.

We set off in our bright and brand new tops from Goodwood Hotel, there was a classic car rally starting from Goodwood at the same time and I think aiming to get to Outer Mongolia??

Cycling up New Barn lane, turning right at the cross roads, we headed towards Upwaltham, down Duncton Hill, which was a bit of a thrill with all that free cycling, we stopped in the village for a drink, Claire had been bitten by something, I think a bit of Savlon may have helped the sting.

Heading towards Heyshott passing through some beautiful countryside.

A curious rooftop sculpture, looks like a dragon and his slayer perhaps?

Making our way towards the lovely cafe in Cocking - Moonlight Cottage. Scrambled eggs and smoked salmon, lovely sandwiches, superb cake and cups of tea and coffee to prepare ourselves for the Cocking Hill, which actually was a lot easier this time around. Claire told us we had used up over 1,000 calories so far - excellent, no guilt about eating that cake then....

Charlton Hill - geting easier also!

Now the easy bit...cycling down Kennel Hill and towards the start of the ride in Goodwood. Reached home at about 2.15pm - 35 miles cycled and over 1,000 calories used up....very good day!

Thanks to everyone for coming out...Doreen, her sister Angela, Claire, Karen, Caroline and Elise.

Next Thursday the Belles are off to Glorious Goodwood - Ladies Day on Thursday, July 28...here's hoping for sunshine!!

Easy Belles Ride - Sunday, July 17

Sun, rain, wind, shooting, scrumping, puncture, tea and cakes!

An action packed ride this one, which was supposed to be an Easy Belles ride! We all met at the start of the Centurion Way to discover there was a Triathlon in progress. Not a problem as we weaved in and out of the runners along the track.

The section of the track which runs along the Midhurst/Chichester road Leyla spotted some apples gowing along the hedgrow so we stopped and had a taste. They looked delicious but on tasting they were extremely sour!

We reached West Dean village and Leyla found she had a puncture. The ever ready Belles got out their tool kits and set to work! Elise had a spare inner tube so this was inserted but found that it had narrower fitting than the original.  As it was beginning to rain we decided to cycle on to West Dean garden centre and consider our next steps over a cup of tea.

Taking another look at that inner tube...

All sorted, we repaired the original tube and squeezed it back into the tyre.

Clay pigeon shooting along the way.

 As soon as we left the garden centre the heavens opened, so we all waited a few minutes underneath a tree. 

Cycling home there were still quite a few runners on the track...

We finally arrived back home at about 1.30pm - rather longer than planned. It was good to see everyone - Elise, Joanna and Leyla. There will be another Easy Belles ride in August - date tbc.

The next ride will be a MTB ride on Saturday July 23 and we're meeting at The George pub in Eartham. Further details will be posted on the Blog shortly.

Charity Ride, June 25

£426 raised!

Thanks to all those who made this possible!

The day started off at lunchtime with Ellie, Angela and myself tying the balloons all along the route. Poor Ellie was stuck in the back of my Land Rover finishing off blowing up the balloons, which were kindly donated to us by Bike Week.



Doreen blowing up the balloons and tying them along the route, most of them lasted .....

Back home for a quick change and then back to the start for a 4pm meet. The turnout was very impressive, with 35 people turning up. Thank you to everyone who made our first BB's charity ride such a success. We had people who hadn't ridden in years, young Grace who's now been named as our Baby Belle. I hope some of you will come back and join the BB's again soon. It occurs to me since this ride that we should have a monthly Easy Belle ride...details to follow!

At the start.....lovely and sunny, thank goodness!

Thanks also to Mercy who kept us all topped up with Jelly Babies throughout the ride and of course those wonderful pink tassles and pink horns!...

Mercy and tassles...

Man tassles also.....

Josie Dew joined us with Molly and Daisie on her wonderful trike - which was much admired by one and all. She signed the three books which she had donated towards our raffle.

Elise led the first group towards Bosham. Our route was towards the railway crossing then over onto the Legionary cycle route...

From here we cycled along the side of the Roman Villa, crossed over the Fishbourne road and then cycled along the quiet country lanes to Bosham and to the ferry meeting point, we hardly saw a car on the roads.















Here, we waved for the ferry....Tim kindly loaded each and every bike onto the boat, I think he made 4 trips for us!

Once landed at Itchenor we made our way to The Ship Inn for supper. The service and food here was great and many thanks to John and his staff for making this an enjoyable evening for everyone.

Nigel, our very own Bike Doctor met us at the pub and I hear he repaired a couple of bikes - so many thanks Nigel. I'm speaking to him soon about setting up another bike maintenance course, if anyone should be interested please email me. Nigel's contact details are on the main Blog site.

Outside the pub....

After a lovely supper we made our way towards Salterns Way and back home via Chichester Yacht Club.

It was a beautiful evening....

Seeing a selection of wildlife along the way....

Look closely, you should be able to see two ears sticking up out of the wheat at the top of the picture, just underneath the white house ....

We returned to the start of the ride at about 8.40pm. We all said our goodbyes...again thanks to everyone who made this ride such fun and a success, everyone seemed to enjoy themselves!

Good luck to Ellie and Angela in November!