Mud plugging. Can this count as a swim?

Saturday morning, up at 8:00 am and ready for an off-road adventure in Epping Forest. From what the local dog walking fraternity say, the forest is muddy and wet wet wet, and judging by the amount of rain that fell the night before it certainly ain't going to be a dry ride … Can't wait to get out there.

Got to High Beach to meet the others and headed off to begin a spin on the upper trails. Unusual amount of surface water for the time of year, the foliage has sucked up as much of the rainwater as it can leaving a mass of water all over the trails. Normally, heavy rain means heavy mud, but today it was all about the wet mud.

Having teared it up in sliding fashion on the upper side it was time to give the normally wetter lower side a deserved going over. Heading down to the brook where we normally hop into and across the river bed, we were greeted with a torrent of a river about 8 feet wide and flowing fast where there would normally be a trickle a couple of feet wide. In we popped with an almighty splash. (see the attached video clip).

At this point we could quite easily have been swimming as the depth of the water was up to 18 inches at the deepest point. Fun, fun, fun.

Having ridden for two and a half hours in tough going boggy trails it was time to head back to the High Beach tea hut for a well earned ham and chees roll followed by a piece of cake and coffee.

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