Welcome to Silverdale. Just south of the mainly mountainous Lakes in a tucked away corner of north Lancashire; a secret, undulating, verdant oasis bypassed by the honeypot bound hillwalkers and mountain bikers, ripe for an easy day's skateploitation.
A lovely day out road testing the new heel brake and flat wheel set-up. A few miles of rolling, lush countryside, ancient woods of oak, yew, beech and holly seasonally bedecked with ivy; forest glades dappled with wintery sunlight, resonant with the melodious call and response of the blackbird and the throaty smokers' cough of the jay. The timeless scent of woodsmoke drifting lazily in the air and rich, moist earthiness of leaves being gently recycled by nature on the forest floor.
A sound in the distance. A vague rumbling and incoherent mumbling, becoming louder. Protestations about undulations. A hidden red deer nuzzling acorns discreetly from the loam pricks up his ears.
And then:
The deer leaps gracefully into deep cover. The jay hacks a spitball and coughs out its fag as it darts into the higher branches. Farmers fling themselves in their own slurry pits in terror...well we can hope can't we?
Yep, it's all gonna be shattered next week by the banshee shriek of the heelbrake failing to slow the skating lunatic's
mad descent
on the
unsuspected and unsignposted one in four that appeared from nowhere around a blind bend. Ah, the smell of burning urethane in the morning, there's nothing like it.
Heelbrake testing in the wild to
commence next Tuesday.Photos of Silverdale nicked from flickr
Courtesy:
focusmania
Jenny Mackness
spg_mutts
ministry
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