where's oily been ?: To Lancaster cancelled

Well Peeps, my planned ride to Lancaster has had to be cancelled this weekend due to the icy weather. The original plan to ride to St. Michaels airfield and overnight in the tent on Friday night, riding back Saturday was scuppered because Clare had to work away over the weekend leaving me to stay home to look after dog.
The alternative was to ride there and back on Saturday but i cancelled that due to ice.

I still had to get out on the bike though and burn some calories off, get some fresh air so i dug out the old faithfull GT MTB and set off across the fields.

GT Aggressor

CLICK PHOTO TO ENLARGE

Route: Radley Common- Peel Park- Houghton Green- through field to flooded quarry- under M6 to Croft- Risley- Birchwood- Rixton- Manchester Rd. to Newcut Lane- onto Woolston Newcut pathway- along River Mersey to Kingsway Bridge - home on the road down Kingsway.

Through Peel Park

This is through a field leading to the flooded quarry at Houghton Green

Me and my shadow.

Just see how muddy it was.

Under the slip road from M62 to M6 North

Little did i know that it would get worse

And over the M6

Going down a track that leads along the M62 to the Birchwood
junction, I took a left turn down a track that goes behind Risley
Prison, where it started to get a bit muddy, well very muddy in places.
At one point, along a dissused railway line, the wheels sank that much
that i came to a full stop and had to turn round. No photos 'cause i
was a bit busy sinking.

Here going across Risley Moss you can see how
frozen the ground was in places. I did slip and come off at one point when I braked. It was sometimes better to ride in the puddles.

view across the moss

After crossing the Moss and going through Rixton, I intended to get onto the banks of the Mersey and go underneath Thelwall viaduct but the path has been closed due to bank errosion. So i stayed on the A57 to New Cut Lane and went along the path that follows the River Mersey from there.