tour reports » West Country

Spent the 14th to the 16th June visiting the West Country and was lucky to get the last 3 days of blue sky and sunshine. The party include a K1600 BMW and Triumph Sprint GT both will pillions and my R1250RS. The attached GPX file shows the route, which was designed to suit the pillions on their first trip this year, so planned riding time was limited to 6 hours each day, which we achieved. Apart from the area around Bridgewater it proved to be a good bike run with a good mixture of road and if you fancy a few days away I can recommend it. If you catch Dorset, Devon and Cornwall in the sunshine it is a beautiful area to visit so don’t be in too big a rush to head for the channel.
This time of the year you must be prepared to meet some traffic but it was not too difficult to deal with it and I was surprised at how helpful many of the drivers were in aiding our overtakes. A word of warning, some roads like the B3315 leading to Lands End are not your normal ‘B’ roads being single track in parts. Also you are likely to meet a bus round the next corner so you need to be cautious. The Britannia Inn near St Austell and the Hoops Inn near Bideford looked after us well and come recommended. The meal stops worked well but check opening times. Despite phoning each one to check this the Quantock Café near Bridgewater was closed on the Tuesdays we visited. The Blackmore Farm Shop, a few miles after the Quatock café came to our rescue and is one I would use again.
As members would expect the bike was faultless and proved again what a great Sports Tourer it is.
The only negative was a very old car driver who tried to pass me on the inside in Lyme Regis, when I was stationary in traffic. He made contact with my nearside pannier and started to push me over. Struggling to hold the bike up and shouting at him to reverse, he did do that and by luck the bike and I did not go over.
[[File:Lands End 3 actual days.gpx]]