Setting Google as your default search provider in IE9

A complete change of topic from my previous postings, but as I've just worked this out, I thought it might be useful for other people.  (I'm not sure why I bothered, as I mostly use Firefox anyway!).  This seems to affect people who aren't in the USA.

In IE9, go to Internet Options > General tab > Search section, > Settings.

Then, if Google isn't listed under search providers, (as it wasn't for me), click on "Find more search providers..."

This is where things got frustrating for me, because when I searched for Google in the 'Internet Explorer Gallery', Google UK would only come up as an accelerator, not a search provider.

In the top right hand corner of the screen, there is a location dropdown. For me it said UK & Ireland (English). Click on this and then change to United States (English).

Then click on 'Get add ons' (the screen will have changed) and search for search providers again, and Google will appear - this is the .com version.

You can now set this as your default search provider, though IE still had a couple of sneaky attempts at changing itself back to Bing.

Phew!

The Way of the Roses

I’d dreamed about cycling from Lancaster to York for years whilst living in Lancaster, to somehow join the dots of all the places I knew well in between. However, I’d never been sure a) whether I’d make it that far and b) how to go about it. Certainly cycling along the way I’d drive, along the A65 and A59 seemed pretty unappealing and all too likely to end with me ending up squished. Fast forward a few years, and I read that a new Coast to Coast cycle route, “the Way of the Roses” had been launched with the aim of linking Lancashire and Yorkshire by a route crossing the country from Morecambe to Bridlington.

Now, this seemed like a bit of synchronicity, as George and several KMC & MMMC chums had lately linked Lancashire and Yorkshire underground. Little was I to know that I’d manage to link Cumbria before them too! More prosaically, since George had just got a new job and our planned trip to Font went out of the window, I suddenly found myself with rather a lot of holiday going spare.

There was only one problem as far as I could see. I hadn’t done much cycling recently, further than a couple of commutes and a handful of mountain bike rides, and with the nights drawing in and the Lakes flooding season approaching, gaining fitness by cycling didn’t seem that appealing.

Still, I was intrigued by the idea, and found myself Googling around for places to stay and advice on the route (which, since the trail was barely a month old was hard to come by). Then I found myself buying the map and booking three days off work in the middle of October.

At this point, I got quite worried. I wasn’t bike fit. I couldn’t find my bike pump. Where was I going to stay on the first night? How was I going to get back from Bridlington? Would I freeze or drown in a puddle? It suddenly occurred to me that I must have some natural predisposition to do silly things around the Autumnal Equinox (i.e. the OMM).

So I did the natural thing, and buried my head in the sand, with the occasional lunchtime reverie looking at maps online, and more than one 5am wide-awake-eyes-wide-in-panic session. And so the days passed.
Suddenly, it was the night before I was due to set off. First on the agenda was to pick up my bike from the bike shop, where it had been deposited after George had attempted to replace the bottom bracket, only to find it was welded tightly with rust. Feeling much lighter in the pocket, I then ran around buying bits and pieces that I’d lost moving house earlier in the year. The evening was spent putting things in plastic bags, and feeling a mild sense of panic.

I had sneakily got George to drop me off at Arnside station on his way to work so that I could get the train to Morecambe but having said our fond farewells, I looked up and saw the train smoothly pulling away from the little station. Arse. It became apparent that most of our clocks were a good five minutes behind Northern Rail’s. And the next train wasn’t for an hour. So all of a sudden, I was off, cycling through the frosty air along the quiet lanes of the most southerly part of Cumbria and into Lancashire.

The start of the route at Morecambe, with the Midland Hotel in the background

A mere 10 miles later and I had reached the start, on Morecambe prom. It was a beautiful Morecambe, and the sun shone on the bay and the hills around the Duddon estuary on the other side of the bay looked close enough to touch. What a start to the day! I had envisaged taking a picture of my bike by Eric Morecambe’s statue, but embarrassingly failed to find it, and didn’t want to waste any more time, so after a few quick shots of my bike in front of the signpost marking the start/end of the route, I set off on the Way of the Roses proper.

The route wound it’s way along the Lune, along familiar paths I had cycled on many times whilst living in Lancaster. By the time I got to the Crook o’Lune, I already felt I deserved (and needed!) a stop, so bought a much needed cup of coffee and some flapjack, which I sat and ate in the sun, gloating that my colleagues would be drinking their 10 o’clock brews in the office. I then spoilt things by getting lost cycling out of the car park, and trying to convince a well meaning lady who wanted to give me directions that I really shouldn’t be heading along the cycle track. Instead I had a rather steep (and seemingly somewhat unnecessary) pull up through Halton Park to contend with.

Coming out of the tunnels at Clapham

I’d like to say the next few miles through North Lancashire and into the Forest of Bowland rolled by, but they didn’t; I had to walk up an embarrassing amount of hills, and the miles didn’t seem to be ticking down at any rate at all. However, by lunchtime I had made it to Clapham. A cheese toastie and a pot of tea seemed just the thing at the time, but I did regret them somewhat when I had to push my heavily laden bike up through the tunnels out of Clapham.

A short section of off road – and even a very brief bit of single track – to Austwick left me feeling very grateful that I was riding a hybrid-cum-shopping-bike and not a proper road bike. Then I climbed up to above Foredale Quarry and Helwith Bridge, and actually felt like I was making progress when I freewheeled down into Settle. However, the biggest hurdle was yet to come: the climb out of Settle and up High Side.

The big problem was, I’d actually done this climb the week before, on my mountain bike, with a cracking hangover at the end of a day’s biking, into a headwind. When I say ‘done’, ‘struggled to push the bike up the bleeding hill’ would be a more fitting description. This time the pushing up the hill actually seemed no worse, despite the weight of the bike, and at least I got an amazing freewheel all the way down to Airton on the other side.

The next few miles, however, passed in something approaching misery. I was pretty knackered, and it was starting to get dark. Finally, I made it to the B&B (Bridge End Farm), where I was plied with tea and cake, then had a much needed shower, followed by tea in the pub, a brief chat with the other residents (a retired couple from Arnside who were very keen cyclists and put me to shame with their tales of double coast-to-coast trips), then bed.

Near the top of Greenhow Hill, day 2

After a terrible night’s sleep (no fault of the B&B, but of my legs aching horribly in the night – how could I have forgotten to bring ibruprofen?), I set off bright and early next morning in intermittent showers. I started climbing out of the valley far too early in the day for my liking – a very steep hill out of Appletreewick took me up on to the moors, and then over Greenhow Hill. Suddenly, the Vale of York appeared before me, with the White Horse at Kilburn just visible, and I felt that I might actually do this – or at least get to York!

However, I still had a long way to go. I made my way through the chaotic streets of Pately Bridge (where the whole town seemed to be being dug up), and then struggled up to Brimham Rocks, at least safe in the knowledge that all the hills were nearly out of the way. I eventually found my way through the stunning grounds of Fountains Abbey and Studley Royal (somewhat scared by the eerie and very loud cries of the rutting stags!). A shin-thwacking walk through the narrow streets of Ripon was at least improved by finally getting some lunch and a cup of tea. I then only got slightly lost trying to get out of the town.

Once out of Ripon, the rest of the ride to York passed in a state of high boredom and longing for the mince pie I had neglected to buy from Greggs. The monotony of the flatness, which I had been longing for when slogging up steep hills, was broken by Boroughbridge (especially the Devil’s Arrows, where I considered a bit of bouldering), the pay bridge at Aldwark and RAF Linton on Ouse. After a stop just outside York to fix my bike lights, I wobbled into Huntington and arrived at my parent’s, to find them surprised and relieved that I’d made it.

Of course, having effectively made it home, day 3 was always going to seem like an addendum, and I had earlier had doubts about whether I’d be able to stir myself to leave a nice warm bed to cycle away from York. However, I surprised myself by getting up and out before half past 8, and soon found myself passing through Stamford Bridge and then winding through flat fields and countless villages with duckponds and ‘beware toads’ signs to Pocklington.
 
From there, I turned on to a single track road, passing a luxury golf course on one side of the road and a Buddhist retreat on the other, and started the climb up to the Wolds. This however, seemed luxury compared with the previous two days – a long but scarcely noticeable climb was followed by a fast swooping descent and then a climb out of a village into a wonderful winding valley, filled with highland cattle. I kept on expecting a big climb, but except for a steep few metres right at the top, it never came. Instead, I popped out on top of the Wolds at Huggate. I squinted into the haze, trying to see the sea.

The Wolds

I charged down empty roads to cross the busy Bridlington road, and then across that into what I’d always thought of as the Wolds – vast open fields, and acres of nothing but sky. At this point the wind picked up and it started to rain. Great. Onwards, through more duck pond villages, through Driffield, the self-styled ‘Capital of the Wolds’, and onwards in briefly hot sun (a sure sign I must be approaching the sea side, I thought!). Once again, I got lost leaving Nafferton. The whole area is an odd mixture of quaint villages and rather end of the world feeling flatland hamlets, and I started to feel I might be bewitched into riding round these roads that wind around and then suddenly strike out arrow-straight across the countryside for ever more.

Somehow, I found my way to Burton Agnes, sprinted across the A614, then started the final climb of the trip, up to the Roman Road along the ridge, catching my first views of the North sea. I had looked forward to cycling along this road (not least because I thought it would offer a mixture of flat cycling with good views and a bit of history thrown in). However, the verges were full of fly-tipped rubbish, and the whole road had a distinctly odd feeling. This intensified as I neared Bridlington.

Bridlington

This, I realised, was a bit of a problem with the whole trip. Bridlington has a nice little old town, but as you descend to the sea, I realised it didn’t compare terribly well even with Morecambe on the looks scale. I found my way to the prom, and then down to the shore for the obligatory dipping the bike wheel in the sea (which I’d not actually had time to do in Morecambe!). I then pootled a little further along the prom until I found the end/start post of the route. I had done it. 180 miles (plus a bit extra for getting lost). For each of the three days I had cycled further than I ever had done in a day before. I had arrived at the other side of the country. However, there’s nothing like a East coast seaside town on a grey day out of season at dusk to put the dampners (often quite literally) on any form of excitement. I took pictures of my bike underneath the sign. I’d like to say that the retired couples strolling up and down the prom looked at me in awe, but they didn’t, as the had no idea what I’d done, would have thought it was just a bit peculiar anyway, and, moreover, weren’t at all interested.

The End

I pushed my bike down to a tea shack on the prom, where I tried to console myself by ordering a huge waffle, strawberry and cream confection, but the woman behind the counter dourly told me they’d shut the grills off and so I couldn’t have anything hot (it was 4pm). I eventually found a chip stall in one of the arcades where my brother and I had played on the one armed bandits and tuppeny shove machines as kids, then sat and ate my semi-cooked chips, drank my tea and then went to find a train back to York.


More photos of the route

Running it out...

This time of year always makes me feel like I'm climbing, and can see the top of the pitch, and decide just to keep going for it and hope I don't fall off. In climbing, this doesn't always work out that well, as has been demonstrated this year - in life, at least it just usually means I end up with a stinking cold by the week before Christmas.

I'm looking forward to a break at Christmas so much! Nearly 2 weeks off work - hurrah!

Falling

Following on from my woeful weekend climbing performance, bad (ok, atrocious) weather forced us to the wall again last night. Although we got there late, and half the wall was flooded, I was looking forward to climbing. However, once again, by the second route I led (a F5) I was a gibbering wreck, and volunteered just to belay George for the rest of the night.

Fortunately, he was having none of it, and persuaded me to try falling off instead. I unwillingly made my way to the bottom of the easiest route in the middle of the main wall and, after some inevitable prevarication, set off. I got to just below the fourth clip - and managed to let go. Result! Up to the next, level with the bolt this time (though I was still clipping from quite low down).

Pause. Pause Pause.

Let go!

That was ok! I felt steadily more confident even though I was getting higher up the wall, and although the intent was to keep falling off, I was able to focus more on the moves and waste less energy feeling generally sick.

I tried a couple more routes, and although I didn't have a 100% success rate by any means, but things were much better. By the end of the night, I even tried a very overhanging F6b - and got over half way! Well, as they say, you can't get hurt if you're in the air (can you?).

(Not) Turning the Tide

Well, when I last posted, I thought things were getting better with my climbing and I was starting to get my head back together. However, a trip to Northumberland this weekend set me straight on that!

It was a great weekend with much better weather than was on offer in the Lakes - we headed to Kyloe-in-the-Woods on Saturday, and Bowden Doors on Sunday, both of which turned out to be great venues. Northumberland has always had somewhat mythical status in my mind as the hardest climbing in Britain, a whole County full of sandy sandbags. I was pleasantly surprised, though - the grades in the newest Rockfax guide felt reasonable and the rock was lovely - grit-esque friction but with flutings, lacy sandstone edges, pockets and much more solid than I had expected.

However, when it came to leading, despite finding an easy, well protected, very pleasant VDiff (Russett Groove), once again, I sucked. Big time. I did the ever so slightly trickier start, and then realised that I didn't have enough small-medium sized wires. And set off into full panic mode. I downclimbed and lowered off, and then sat at the bottom mentally and literally beating myself up. How could I possibly be so useless? It didn't help that at the back of my mind I knew I could almost certainly easily and safely solo the route, if I could just not panic needlessly.

I finally did pull myself together, the ropes back through, retie and then lead the route with less flapping, but once again felt I had let myself down.

Monday was spent joining the Bank Holiday masses at Lindisfarne - also something of a disappointment, though that should not have come as a surprise, given it was probably one of the busiest days of the year on the island. The romantic notion I had of a castle on a tiny island in the middle of sand and sea was shattered when I realised that the castle was on the headland of a substantial island, complete with village with tea rooms and souvenirs and crab stick vans. We elected to leave quickly before we got cut off by the tide and had to stay there for another four hours...

We headed home on a circuitous route through Alston, stopping at the excellent Hartshead Cafe, then an impromptu gear shopping trip to Keswick, and finally a waterslide of a ride back over Dunmail Raise. Back in Kendal, everything was starting to flood and once again we thought we might be cut off by the tide that was starting to run around the car park.

In the shadows

It has been a strange year for me climbing-wise so far.

We did quite a lot of climbing over the winter and spring, and at the start of April I led my first HVS, Lakeland Cragsman at Sergeant Crag Slabs, Borrowdale. It may be something about the name of the route, because although I've probably done trickier VSs, I started to feel like I was getting somewhere.

A month later, however, we headed to Pembroke for May Day Bank holiday weekend. I'd been to Pembroke a couple of times before at Easter, and although I'd certainly been intimidated by the place, I had fond memories. However, this time, for some reason, I wasn't in a great frame of mind for climbing.

And it was busy - every climber in Britain, and a few from elsewhere seemed to be packed into this picturesque little corner of Wales. Add to this a sea state that meant the lower ledges were getting very wave-washed and it still being bird banned season, and the easily accessible, non-soggy crags were heaving.

On the Sunday, we headed to Crystal Slabs to meet up with friends there as G had manflu and, unusually, didn't want to climb much. It was, inevitably, somewhat crowded. No VSs were free, so I headed up Crystal Edge feeling somewhat resigned. After romping up the easily angled slab, I had words with myself, placed a good cam and then pulled over the overlap. I realised I only had a couple of moves to make and life was about to get a lot easier. I reached for a small hold, and then another on the arête, and then went to work my feet up and rock over onto a tiny ledge on the arête. I pulled up, moved my feet.... and then suddenly I was pitching over sideways, off the edge of the slab, with my gear some 8 feet below me.

I tumbled down the corner, knocking various bits of me against the perpendicular walls, letting out the occasional clichéd 'oof'. And then I stopped. It was time for that horrible few moments post-incident where one has to take stock of the damage. Only my left arm seemed to hurt, though nothing was sticking out at funny angles. I steadied my voice, already embarrassed at making a spectacle of myself in front of the hordes, and called for G to lower me down.

Once I'd been through the tiresome business of going into shock and sitting for 20 minutes or so with my legs pointing back up the slab, I dared have a look at my elbow. I'd ripped my windshirt. And those blood stains were going to be a pain to get out.

We packed everything up, and G carried everything back to the top of the crag whilst I staggered after him, and dripped blood back to the car. The rest of the day involved a scenic trip to Haverford West A&E for an x ray and stitches, then a potter round Pembroke (after I'd changed my no-longer-beige climbing trousers for something less scary for the general public).

We made it back up to the Lakes the day after. It was a couple of weeks until I could bend my arm again (which made life more difficult than I would have imagined), and another four or so weeks until it felt nearly normal again and fit for climbing.

However, my head has taken longest to mend by far. After an initially good start at getting back on and leading, I felt I was becoming more and more scared every time I tried to lead something. As soon as I stepped off the ground or the belay, my head would cloud with dark thoughts, and I would become convinced I would somehow sabotage myself, and throw myself off the crag. Even though my gear had clearly held well when I fell, I became convinced I couldn't place it, that I didn't know what to do with this assortment of shiny, jangly stuff weighing me down. Moreover, would it stop me from getting hurt again? I very much doubted it.

I rather wondered whether I would manage to enjoy climbing again. I had enjoyed following the occasional route, and spent a lot of time bouldering, with some (relative) success, but as soon as I found myself on the top end of the rope, the chattering demons massed again, I would get a few feet up, gibber, retreat, cry. Repeat, repeat, repeat.

However, as summer passes, I'm starting to feel this change. I led an easy (but run out) sports route at Foredale Quarry (never the most reassuring of places), and it actually did feel easy. For the first time in ages, the fog of panic didn't descend when more than a few feet up. I felt relaxed. I didn't even mind so much when I stepped things up and tried to lead the next route at my usual lowly sports grade - an rested and flailed on the crux. A week or so later, I also managed to do my first V3, at Fairy Steps, Lancashire, and felt that I was starting to enjoy pushing myself again, that maybe I'm able to climb after all.

Of course, it shouldn't matter to me. But it does.

Things I have learnt this weekend

1. Don't count your chickens 'til they've hatched. Or returned to the coop. Or something.
   
2. Some times it's probably better to go the long way round.
3. Cycling in slushy snow is rather hard work.
   
4. One shouldn't forget to wear one's cycling shorts when going on a rather long bike ride... ow...

http://picasaweb.google.com/nettymif/WhinfellAndTOtherBorrowdaleBiking#