The rain stopped sometime during the night and before first light the constellation Orion was visible through the tent door. The inside of the tent was awash with condensation and things seemed to take longer to get packed away. I was on the road by 7:30am heading in an easterly direction for Long Marston and then on to York. I wanted to cycle through the City centre so just followed the recently risen sun. It was the equinox so the sun was a good indicator of east. One of the great advantages of being on a bike is that it doesn’t matter where you are in a city, or how many double yellow lines or no parking signs there are it is possible to get off and walk around to take a few pictures or check the map and then continue on your way.

Dawn over Marston Moor.

River Ouse, York. From the bridge.

The Castle, York

Windmill at Brind.

 Over the river the castle and then city walls came in to view. I continued heading generally east but most of the sign posts just indicated ‘ring road’ which wasn’t much use to me. Eventually I found a sign containing the road I was looking for, the B1228. It wound its way generally south toward Goole and that was my next main objective. The road was flat and only had light traffic on it making it a relief from the busy ‘A’ roads of yesterday. My only problem was the wind which seemed to be gaining in strength. The forecast was for westerly winds but they were coming from the south making some stretches difficult in the headwind. But most of the time I was able to potter along at an easy 14mph which I was happy with. At Brind my small scale map showed a windmill and I almost missed it behind the bushes. It was probably the smallest I’d seen and was fairly ruinous but some remains of the wooden sails were left.

The main tower was brick and reasonably intact. I continued to the small town of Howden where I stopped for a while in the Town centre. It was very picturesque and I bought a pork pie and slab of cake to eat by the cross in the centre. Unlike many town crosses this wasn’t ancient but dated from about 1909. Adjacent was a magnificent church with half in ruins and the rest in tact and in use.

Howden and the cross

Howden Minster.

My bike and Howden.

Goole harbour.

I continued along the B1228 into Goole which was nothing like what the map indicated. It seemed to be mostly docks but with not many ships about. Over the river I was on a wide eventually straight road which crossed a vast area of almost infinitesimal fields. They were huge. I left the A161 at Eastoft and took a delightful lane through Luddington and then to the bank of the River Trent. I couldn’t see the river because of large embankments. My map neglected to tell me that I was in Lincolnshire. I followed the road south into a fierce headwind. Across the river was Flixborough the scene of a catastrophic explosion in June 1974 which killed 28 workers on the site. I crossed over the Sheffield and South Yorkshire canal at Keadby and joined the A18 to cross over the River Trent.

I left it to follow the B1216 but soon found myself back of the A1077 road. Eventually I left it to follow the B1430 into Burton-upon-Stather. I managed to find a shop where I could buy some bottled water for my next camp. Descending to Thealby I crossed the valley to climb steeply up to rejoin the A1077. I turned left and got my first view of the Humber Bridge in the distance. The road turned sharply east and I descended half way before turning right towards Winterton. I soon turned left where I joined the old Roman Road Ermine Street. I found a gap in the hedge where I went into a recently seeded field to find somewhere to pitch my tent.

The River Trent.