High on Morridge, this lamb was found trapped – but not hurt – in a cattle grid. Carefuly freed and handed back to his momma gently, the good deed for the day was done.

Day three of the good weather last weekend, Bank Holiday Monday saw me go for the first big ride of the summer – and it’s a journey I’ve done bits of before, but this time the other way around; starting by getting a train to Macclesfield, I traversed the Dane Valley, crossed The Roaches, hopped up to Morridge and came home via the Weaver Hills.

At the Weaver Hills, I undertook an odd little personal springtime ritual – I went to see a patch of red cowslips near Calton that I try to get to see every year, for no other reason than I love them, it’s one of the few places I know them to regularly grow.

It seems odd to have an emotional attachment to a clump of wild flowers growing in a hedgerow on the the Staffordshire Moorlands. But that’s just how I roll…

The route was Macclesfield – Macclesfield Forest – Bottom of the Oven – Wildboarclough – Wincle – Bearda – Swythamley – Roach Road – Hulme End – Morridge – Waterhouses – Calton – Ellastone – Uttoxeter – Buttermilk Hill – Marchington Cliff – Scropton – Tutbury – Anslow – Barton – Alrewas – Hanch – CHorley and home. All in, 107 miles.

It was blazingly hot, but the riding was good, although the views were misty and hazy. But it was a brilliant day.

Hopefully, the first of many this year. I waited so long for this.

For more of this sort of thing, my 365daysofbiking journal is still running…