A Grand Day Out

Only "Arctic" Mark and I today. Rumours of an appearance by Jim turned out to be unfounded...
No word from Tom since Wales either, we can only assume that he has been consumed by lycra-induced XC shame or that his rotator cuff tear has taken longer than the anticipated 3 days to heal.
After a visit to Head for the Hills for Dan to inspect Mark's dodgy fork seal we were on our way. We decided to try something a bit different so we climbed up the Pilgrims Way to the top of Ranmore to ride the "Log Pile of Death" and then gave Mark his first taste of Abba Zabba, a tricky technical series of steep, rooty drops followed swiftly by Blind Terror, Blind Terror 2 (as the names suggest) and Numbskull. These are a series of linked technical challenges and not for those of a weak disposition so hats off to Mark for getting down them all in one piece.
We then took the Abinger Roughs and crossed the A25 over towards Holmbury, ascending the hill via Control Car Park 9. We rode "Resevoir Dogs" which was wet and gloopy and then our favourite "Barry Knows Best", getting plenty of air off the little kickers. A rest stop at Peaslake Stores for tea and cake and a chat with "Dave and Dave" one of whom turned out to be a fellow Ulsterman. We had a look at Pedal and Spoke, the new bike shop in Peaslake selling various accessories and more interestingly hiring out Head Cams which sparked Mark's interest...I'm sure he'll be trying one soon. We chatted to the owner who is a local lad and his mum who was trying her best to embarrass him. Good luck, I think he'll need it when the winter closes in and the mid-week trade dries up.
Back on the bikes we rode to the Pitch Hill summit via the little gap at the top. Mark cleared it at the first attempt before cursing me for not telling him it was a "Feckin' gap jump" - although as I pointed out if he had known it was a gap he probably wouldn't have done it! We took the trail from the summit which includes the rooty descent and stone platform jump, now with a low hanging branch to make it more interesting! One more climb to do the trail with Tom's infamous pile in jump on it. I also tried the table top diversion in the middle but it's very tricky to get enough speed to really fly it.
We then began our journey back to Dorking, via Telegraph Road and through Abinger again. The final incident of note was Mark coming off quite hard on the rutted bridleway down to the A25 and hurting his back. It didn't make him feel any better that I had pointed out that the track was quite tricky before we started. We finally rolled into Dorking at 2.30 for a couple of well earned pints outside The Star.