Thanks to Stu and Dee for their hospitality - it was a really great event

Nice to meet lots of new people, despite feeling like I know a fair few of them already through online-only interactions

Day 1 solo (in very changeable weather), Day 2 riding in good company (and better weather), Day 3 back to solo again (and riding in the sun!).

Food was great, loved the cheese and meat, plus the cheesecake, bacon buttie was epic too

Late start on Sunday for me - I woke up at 7:20am thinking I should grab a few more minutes sleep. 2.5 hours later at 9:50am I woke up to find the majority of the field had already gone!! Sun was out though, packed up my kit and Dee very kindly made me the epic bacon buttie. Had an easy roll back to the car and a relatively painless drive home

@RichardG - sorry mate, I promised I'd wake you up when I got up, but that's not much use when I'm waking up that late! Hope you managed to get some kip

John, the flickr link's not working for me? Just get a 404.

Working OK for me - https://www.flickr.com/photos/25655510@ ... 2602/page1

Forgot to say thanks for Tussock Racing. It was far tamer than the normal death-march-tussock field, and cracking fun

@JohnClimber - great photos, you did a sterling job as official unofficial photographer

Working OK for me

Ta, it didn't like firefox.

Thanks to everyone for turning up. A lot of effort went into the preparation for the weekend so without you guys it'd been all for nothing (it is soooo much easier to put on a cycling event ). The clear up took quite a while as Stu has already said but at least the sun was shining, no midges and some newly found music tracks, thanks to you, were blasting out in the valley.

If anyone is interested, here's the music playlist (in no particular order):
http://bearbonesbikepacking.co.uk/bearstock-music.html

Thanks Stuart and Dee for all the vaguely exciting efforts to make a fab weekend happen.
Lovely to meet some familiar faces and new ones too.

Becky had such a good time she's now talking about joining me on some bike-packing excursions

Big thanks to everyone involved. When I injured myself at the start of the week I didn't think I'd be able to make this, but I polished off my "harden the f*ck up" gear, got on with it, and had a great time. Especially on the way back, which despite Stu's bloody route (I'll have to post some things about that separately) turned out to be a ride to remember for all sorts of reasons.

Great to see a bunch of people I've met on events before again, and also great to meet a bunch of new faces too. Some real characters.

Oh, and well done to David (javatime) for staying with me (and entertaining me with anecdotes) on the first couple of days. That can't have been easy.

summittoppler wrote:tbh, despite having no net or repellent I seem to have got away scott free!!

That may have been the overly harsh red wine affecting the deliciousness of your blood.

benp1 wrote:@RichardG - sorry mate, I promised I'd wake you up when I got up, but that's not much use when I'm waking up that late! Hope you managed to get some kip

Ha, no worries buddy. I was going to try and say goodbye but you looked pretty peaceful. I did manage to get a few alcohol assisted hours.

Edit - Oh, and I'd love to see more photos. I know there were definitely a bunch of people taking them.

Big thanks to Stu and Dee for bring it together.
This finally stopped my dithering and made me get with kit I've been gathering!
Great atmosphere, amazing food and good to meet new faces.
The route from Caersws had some navigational challenges and it was impressive and sometimes worrying going under the windmills!!
Suprised myself on the climb out the morning after, singlespeed and untrained legs seemed to go ok....the shorter route back was welcomed.

......longer routes for me next time.....

Cheers Tim.

yes John my legs are itching off, yet there was nothing there yesterday

I'd like to echo all the thanks and gratitude posted here for Dee and Stuart.

We took the easy llama route to a place beginning with the letter 'M' that ends with the sound of 'lith' for the ride home. I'll look up the spelling later as I'm too embarrassed by my pronunciation. Thanks also to Graham and Mike for being our riding buddies along the way as I've never gone from a to b with anyone other than Dan.

As for the midges, well, I've been eaten everywhere and suffice to say I'm glad I kept my knickers on during the night or I dread to think how I'd be feeling now.
I'm set for a night dosed with antihistamines, (terrible reaction), a bit of housework and a garden to mow in the morning before I get on with transcribing the funniest interview I've ever had - with Wicksie, (I'll check that spelling later on too), the first ever Tussock Racing World Champion. What a champ!

I'm so pleased that getting to meet everyone didn't mean I had to race anywhere. Bearstock is the coolest party on the planet.

Thank you.

Meraid

Farawayvisions wrote:before I get on with transcribing the funniest interview I've ever had - with Wicksie, (I'll check that spelling later on too), the first ever Tussock Racing World Champion. What a champ!

That was brilliant. Was lucky to be there to witness it in person.

here are a few of our photos,

eve seemed to enjoy her first Bikepack anyway...

happy bikepacker




nice veiw


me CLEARLY WINNING


the big tarp




i will never be soft again



but still didnt make it through the rivver ... Barny and eve went round...



we rode with barny on the way back , that was nice to meet new people





so ye thanks again !

it was a great weekend many thanks Stuart and Dee. Food was superb, great company, great location,
it was a good short route to Mach with new friends Mike and Graham. when we turned up at the station it was touch and go if any of us would be allowed on the train but all was good
i hope to see everyone around Wales in the future although to avoid a vetoe i will have to wait until the memory of midges has passed. i didn't get any reaction myself but Meraid is suffering badly still

Dan

mpolo did they let 4 of you on with bikes, if they did we know who pipped us to the post,

there was already 3 on the train from Barmouth and the 4 of us and they let us on

Nothing else to say really, great event , crackin food and the cheese cake was amazing :)
thanks to Stu and Dee for getting us all together
Glad i opted for a tent rather than a tarp due to the midge issue ... and
my only unhappy moment all weekend was all the punctures i had there and back !! ... small block 8's are crap !
roll on next year

Huuuuuge thanks to Dee and Stu for a truly Fantastic weekend, sorry i out stayed my welcome and thanks so much for the loan of yer Errrrm shoes??? Lol
your directions worked a treat for me but i had to cut my ride short as my shoulder problem really kicked in and was in agony for most of today (monday) i did make it up to Colwyn bay but had to hop a train back as far as Warrington, so its Physio for me this week as soon as i can get an appointment, same time again next year

That was my first visit to Bearbones HQ, and I had a cracking weekend. Cheers to Stu and Dee for everything – I'm still not quite sure how you managed to squeeze so much fun and tasty goodness out of 20 quid per head.

And you're all a very friendly bunch. Thanks @benp1 for teaching me the fantastic guy line tensioning knot (very handy for shortening a guy line down to 6 inches without cutting it) – I'll be using that a lot.

And cheers to Chew for suggesting the route to Mach, up the lane behind the house. I really enjoyed that ride. Good company, beautiful scenery, and a cracking descent down to the ford. I'll definitely be back for a WRT (or two) …

Ha, he taught me the very same thing this weekend. He must have had his teachers hat on for sure.

gma wrote:Thanks @benp1 for teaching me the fantastic guy line tensioning knot (very handy for shortening a guy line down to 6 inches without cutting it) – I'll be using that a lot.

This one? http://www.netknots.com/rope_knots/midshipmans-hitch or the very similar http://www.netknots.com/rope_knots/tautline-hitch

Neither, oddly enough. Was a lot more similar to the second one though.

It's very similar to the tautline hitch but slightly different. The main benefit is it's slippery i.e. you can undo it with one pull of the cord

I've called it a guyline tensioner hitch/knot in the past, although I'm sure there's a proper name. I picked it up over 10 years ago when I was bushcrafting a lot, it's a great knot that is very useful - I leave my main two lines without line locs so I can easily bicycle it to trees, posts or anything else

See here - http://paulkirtley.co.uk/2011/how-to-ti ... line-knot/

Incidentally, I hank up my lines in the same way as on that post

Yes, it looks like the first half of the tautline hitch but with a slippery hitch to lock it rather than the original loop. I've a recollection of seeing that site before. Looks a useful way of tying it if you've a long line that you keep for those occasions where you can't get anything close to hand.

whitestone wrote:Yes, it looks like the first half of the tautline hitch but with a slippery hitch to lock it rather than the original loop. I've a recollection of seeing that site before. Looks a useful way of tying it if you've a long line that you keep for those occasions where you can't get anything close to hand.

Yep, it's also useful if you're using line-locs and
1 - you need to shorten them past where the line loc goes (i.e. line loc stops at 50%and you want the guy line at 25% of it length)
2 - where you want to attach to something you can get around with a line loc (e.g a bit of fencing wire)

(my 2 main line are straight lengths of cord attached to mini carabiners, others are line loc'd)