A 10:30 start from the Petrie Arms start point saw 8 riders ready for the off. Oh hold on a second Lawrie is on his way we will wait for him. Ah here he is. No it isn’t. It’s Steve making a surprise entrance. Ah here is Lawrie, we will just wait a minute or two so he can have a rest. And then yet another rider arrives, it’s Jim with fixed up hands and knees! So now we are 11 and set out on Franks run to Feizor.
Off we set through Billington to Whalley and right turn towards Accrington and then left through Simonstone towards Padiham where we turned left to Barley for a comfort stop. From here it was on towards Downham but a turn right over the hills to Blacko and then on towards Gisburn gave us some stunning views over the countryside to the South side of Pendle towards Barnoldswick and most spectacularly as we rounded Pendle Pill we could see lined up across the Ribble Valley to the west, Longridge Fell, Beacon Fell and Parlick Pike and to the north the flat top of Ingleborough. A super view of our part of the county and the West Riding of Yorkshire. We joined the busy A59 for a few hundred yards at Gisburn and quickly turned left towards Long Preston. We turned off to go to Settle and Giggleswick to approach Feizor from the South. The Cafe was not too busy and all 11 of us were able to get round a table made of a huge piece of slate. The cafe provided us with its usual selection of baps, sandwiches, teas and coffee and Richard thought he would have a Chicken wrap. This turned out to be a complete meal with big chunks of chicken in the wrap with salad, coleslaw and a basket of chips! Not like the wraps you get in Boots and garages! A few spots of rain fell on us here but not enough to need moving to shelter and the shower soon passed. Now Frank had a surprise for us. (I like Franks surprise items!) We turned back towards Giggleswick and then followed the road towards Langcliffe where we turned into a small track under the Settle Carlisle Railway to end up in a big car park and then we walked back towards the entrance to see the surprise. What a surprise. A huge Hoffmann lime kiln. This was operated by the Craven Lime Works and although dilapidated and without its chimney it is a very large and unusual industrial relic.
After exploring the kiln we set of on the return journey using the A65 to Clapham and left across the moors and through the Forest of Bowland, round Stocks Reservoir and into Slaidburn for another rest stop and some more tea!
We left Slaidburn the way we had entered and took a small lane towards Bashall Eaves and seemed to cause an old resident a lot of upset as he had to grab his dog to keep it out of the way of the noisy motorcycles. Not sure what he said but it seemed to be along the lines of “keep your motorcycles off my road!”
A fine run was then had back to Whalley, Billington and finally to the Petrie Arms.
A great run out thanks to Frank with no nasty incidents on the roads or issues with the bikes and fine weather.