The weather was very hot and sunny again. Everyone had money so we decided to do Haldon forest with a car-assist. It was 11.10 by the time Michael had finished talking to Zac and Callum F about Friday! We wasted a bit of time when Michael went up to the A380 and the had to double back to the A38, but eventually we parked up, unpacked the bikes, bought some pasties and set off around 12.10.

The routes have been completely revamped since our last visit. All the tracks start in the same place and in the same direction now, and the red track (which is the one we decided to do today) is now much easier and consequently much more fun. Clearly they have taken advice from health and safety experts.

Much of the route was new, in fact pretty much all of it was, but it still went past the bottom loop near the old black jumps. That route, which used to be red, is now black “extreme”, so Ash and Callum did it and found it had been made easier than it used to be! Overall we liked the new route a lot, but we were delayed partway round when Zac and Callum F got pinch punctures at the same point. We used Ash’s spare tube for Callum’s bike. Zac tried fixing his with sticky patches, but sadly they lasted all of four minutes and Michael had to replace them with the spare tube in his pannier -which turned out not to be punctured after all.

We got back to the car park at around 2.05, went to the café and Ash saw three old school friends there so we got 10% discount. He had a caramel slice, Michael had a milkshake and Callum O'B had a huge bowl of chips and resented even a single chip being taken!

Finally we explored the two trial areas with jumps and ramps before packing the bikes at 2.35 and getting home for around 3.10. Callum O'B went home to get some money, then they all left around 4pm.

We set off around 7.15, travelling down the A38. At one point we were undertaken by a crazy driver in a black car near Ivybridge. When we got to Plympton we were not surprised to find that the same black car had caused a pile-up on the dual carriageway.

We went to Sainsbury first at Marsh Mills for ten minutes, then proceeded to TenPin for our bowling session. There are no family deals after 7pm now, so they wanted £5.49 for each child and £6.99 for Michael - and that was for a single game! Michael declined to play, but the others had a good game and Ash won overall with a score of 114 with the rest all below 100. They all had fun regardless of their scores.

We played a little pool when we found some tables that actually worked, then returned home for 10pm exactly.

Callum O'B stayed home with toothache today, but when Zac brought his friend Fionn on the ride we still had a respectable number of riders.

The plan this morning was to head for Venford Reservoir, but Lawrence was recovering from a cold virus that he picked up on Friday and was a good deal slower than usual. He lost us when he waited in Scoriton until we came back for him - he said he didn't know he was supposed to go on! On the climb from Michelcombe to Holne he slowed to a crawl so clearly we weren't going to make Venford today. We spent some enjoyable time in the park by way of compensation.

Fortunately the Holne café was close at hand and everyone wanted to go there, so we settled down for coffee, cakes and scrambled egg on toast. We then returned home via Hembury Woods where Tao and Ash rode all the way around the edge of the fort.

Lawrence was ill tonight but after an hour of chat and games everyone was up for a music quiz. Ash and Jerry were the team leaders, and we had rounds on pop music, TV themes and movie themes. Jerry proved quite knowledgeable, winning some of the rounds outright. By the end of the evening there were only two points separating the teams, so it was effectively a draw although Jerry's team did have the edge. Everyone really enjoyed the quiz and didn't want the evening to end.

Michael was away in Paris today so the ride was cancelled.

After a short session of games three of the group wanted to watch the movie Inception, so they watched most of it in the lounge on Blu-ray with surround sound and thoroughly enjoyed it.

Tao was late today, arriving at 10.40 instead of the usual 10.15, so we decided to do a local ride rather than the originally-proposed car-assisted ride to Exeter. Tao was pushing for something harder and full day even though Lawrence and Callum O’B probably weren’t fit enough for that, so we compromised by heading for Totnes with the option of going a little further if everyone was up for it.

We rode out along Colston road, delayed for a few minutes when Callum’s chain broke.
Then at Dartington, on the cycle path near the water wheel, Jerry’s tyre went flat: apparently he had broken off the end of his Presta valve earlier when pumping it with Michael’s pump but hadn’t mentioned this fact to Michael. To make matters worse his rim wouldn’t take a Schroder valve, so we had to take Ash’s Presta tube out to replace Jerry’s and then put Ash’s spare into Ash’s wheel. This was all rather a waste of precious tine. There was some amusement when we noticed that the tube Jerry took out had sellotape covering a small hole – he blamed Jack for suggesting the idea!

The wind was really picking up now, but it was still generally bright and sunny with occasional cloudy spells. We went to Morrisons café which turned out to be amazingly cheap. Lawrence bought a full fry-up and ate everything except the mushrooms and tomatoes which he gave away to Jerry. Callum had a hot dog, the rest of us had drinks and cakes. It was good to get a Latte for less than £1.50!

Tao and Michael decided on the shorter route home, so after spending a little leisure time at Totnes Quayside we took a link track Tao knew from Bridgetown through Bourton to the Gatcombe Tracks. Unfortunately this included a huge climb which really discouraged Lawrence – he ended up walking most of it. He does have some problems with his bike though, and he liked the idea of Michael doing some repairs to keep it going until he gets his new bike.

Ash and Zac did jumps at the bottom of the track into Littlehempston, then we returned straight home via Staverton with Lawrence picking up a bit of speed as we got closer to home. When we got home at 3.15 Callum was being asked by his parents to return home for a trip to London. For some reason he didn’t want to go and preferred to enjoy the social at Crofters, but after some persuasion he agreed to go on the understanding he would get to see Tin Tin on Wednesday. The rest of the group watched the conclusion of Inception while Tao went home and returned with a delicious-looking Apple Crumble, made with apples picked from Michael’s trees.

Everyone except Zac and Lawrence started the evening on the trampoline, then we moved on to a session of Charades which seemed to be popular with everyone. It was evidently not quite as popular as last week's music quiz, however, as they opted to return to computer games for the final hour.

There had been rain overnight and it was still raining a bit at 9.30, but it had stopped by 10.15 and remained dry for the morning. Lawrence left a note on Facebook saying he couldn’t come today.

Michael suggested a morning ride as there was a risk of rain in the afternoon, and we all agreed on Hembury woods and the track to River Dart Country Park. Several wanted to do the lower Hembury track but Callum O’B refused, saying he didn’t want to get muddy! So we went up the main hill through the woods, which caused a little friction between the two Callums.

Callum O’B took ages to get to the top, but once there he was fine. Someone had tied a piece of string across the side of the gate at the top of the Holne Woods track, but we got through that without too much difficulty and then enjoyed the excellent track descent to River Dart Country Park.

Something was afoot in the park today. In the place where the tents can usually be seen there were literally hundreds of cars parked everywhere, and the park seemed packed with thousands of people, mainly children. The explanation soon became apparent when we saw the BBC events staff: they were recording Live and Dangerous Days Out, and tickets had been available for some time from the BBC website. There were big marquees, presumably with animals the kids could touch, and lots of cheering and applause coming from within.

We didn’t stop, pressing on home for 12.40. This was perhaps a bit earlier than some had wanted, so we’ll try to ride further in future, but everyone was happy enough to play on the trampoline when we got back.

Nobody had brought enough money for the proposed cinema trip to watch the movie In Time, so we contented ourselves with a trip to Tesco to buy food items like burgers and sushi and then returned to Crofters to eat it all around the bonfire that Gavin had lit - it took a while to get going as the wood was wet, but it got there in the end. We also had a few cheap Asda fireworks that had been donated to us to add a fizz to the evening, and Hayley kindly provided some cheesy things and some pumpkin seeds.