A member of the UKGers forum had laid on an invitation ride for big trailies and novices over some of Salisbury plain and anxious to try out some new territory and also to see how my Metal Mules performed on the rough stuff, I was keen to sign up. I became rather less keen as I traveled down yesterday to the meeting place in pouring rain and at one point, practically no visibility. I stoppped at a Liitle Chef about 20 miles from my destination for a warming cup of coffee and dithered about whether I should turn back or not. I am so very gald I didn`t because I had a wonderful day. The rain eased considerably and for the rest of the morning it was intermittent showers and grey clouds but in the afternnnon, the sun came out and we had a lovely wamr bright day - as one should at this tie of year I feel!

Our guides were all local to the area and knew the plains like the backs of their hands, including the ranges and when it`s safe to cross them!

The rain ensured we had some nice puddles to play in..

We also forded one river that was quite deep and I wondered if the panniers would lifet the rear of the bike high enough to reduce traction! Evidently not enough to prevent me getting through and the panniers stayed totally dry inside. However, the topbox was a different story. I had put a full bottle of water in it and all the bouncing around destroyed it and all the stuff I had really wanted to keep dry and had therefore carefully put in the topbox, was suddenly not so dry! A valuable learning experience. Another was the fact that a road atlas made with a spiral binding can become a loose collection of pages as the spiral unscrews when subjected to a lot of bouncing around!