Our 2026 Glow Ride was one of around 90 taking place across Great Britain. We had a good write up in the St Albans Times the week before and we had twice as many participants expected as last year. We were delighted that invitations to St Albans Deputy Mayor Cllr Juliet Voisey and Herts County Council St Albans North Division Cllr Helen Campbell had been accepted.
The weather forecast was .... well, as last year there was a storm heading our way, but was not predicted to reach us until after the ride.
Nineteen of us gathered outside the Council Offices, first picture shows (l to r) Deputy Mayor Cllr Voisey, organiser Rona Wightman, Cllr Helen Campbell, in the others you may admire the flags, the banner and our South Herts CTC special hivis vests.
We set off round the corner to Upper Marlborough Road and then made our way down the Active Travel Fund contraflow cycle lane on Marlborough Road and safely across London Road to Keyfield Terrace using the Active Travel Fund traffic signals.
Cottonmill Lane and Prospect Road got us to Verulamium Park, and once you are past the sports facilities it is very dark. A tip from the organiser's webinar was to get a megaphone, a tip from Rona is to buy one from Connevans
(link) rather than big river online.
The megaphone was left in the pannier at the Verulamium Museum regroup as we did not want to interfere with the performance of Macbeth in the old barn theatre, so we carried on through St Michaels and across the resurfaced and freshly line-marked Verulam / Redbourn Road to get to Oysterfields. The recce had identified roadworks happening on Down Edge on the day of the ride, and thus Cllr Campbell got to admire the freshest of fresh tarmac and paint instead of the grim rough surface she had been repeatedly asking to have repaired. Result!
Along Batchwood Drive on shared use path - campaigners muttering about too narrow and should be continuous over side roads. We have reported the overgrown vegetation to SADC, they are usually good at acting on these reports. Further muttering about vegetation and width as we made our way through to Harpenden Road, and then another very dark - but rather lovely - stretch up to Bernards Heath playing fields.
Out onto Sandridge Road and back to the start, the very lightest of drizzle just beginning as we said our farewells.
Rona says: thank you to everyone who supported the ride, especially thank you to the Fabulous regulars for marshalling and Nela and Anne for the images.
No comments:
Post a Comment