OD Ride Report, Breighton Airfield, 22nd June 2019, Led by Alan Broom

Cracking weather, cracking ride, cracking company - what more can i say?

Apparently I am expected to say a bit more having offered to do the write-up!!

It was perfect riding weather when 10 of us set off on Alan Broom's maiden OD ride, not that you would know it was his 1st team 5 lead from the confident & detailed briefing he gave us before setting off.

We turned left from Squires & headed at a good pace towards Fairburn Ings, Birkin, Chapel Haddlesey & on to Carlton negotiating lots of cyclists, the odd horse or two & lots of long grass verges which does impede the view round the lovely bends Alan found for us.

We then backtracked on the little used but wiggly Gowdall road via Pollington to our coffee stop at Crown Garden Centre on the A19 just below Whitley.  We found some seats outside as it wasn't too busy - very unusual for a Garden Centre on a Saturday morning.

3 of the group had to leave at this point including Tim & Kayleigh who said they had some shopping to do.  I obviously assumed it was wedding related but was reliably informed it was "proper shopping" - they were heading for Infinity in York!

So 7 of us set off for the 2nd half of our ride.  We hadn't been going too long when we came across the railway barriers @ Askern & waited for what seemed to be the longest train ever to pass through.  Eventually we made it through Moss & Sykehouse only to arrive at the canal bridge which was just going down after a canal boat had taken priority.  Soon on our way again we headed up to Airmyn & across Boothferry Bridge & on to our final destination of Breighton airfield.  Despite the members only sign at the gate Alan lead us confidently down to the Crew Room cafe where we sat outside for about 2 hours & watched the fabulous old planes (& Mash helicopter) take off & land.  He had wangled us in as invited guests. 
Somewhere along the ride (I can't actually remember where) we were led into the obligatory team 5 u-turn which Alan ended up doing all on his own.  We just waited for him to turn round & come back down the right road!
A big thank you to Alan for a great ride & to Nigel for keeping us all in order from the back marker position.

As observed by Anne Dufton



Here's the route: