As we drove down towards the West Country on the Friday night we had a vague inkling that Mother Nature might be against us. Pulling off the M5 at Gloucester the rain was still beating on the roof of the van as though gravel was being poured on it and the thunderous noise every time we went through a puddle was alarming to say the least.

Mind you, this didn’t seem to be bothering Dan too much; curled up in a little nest of rucksacks and sleeping bags he was dead to the world as we trundled on through the night. He even managed to ignore James singing tunelessly along to S Club 7 on some god-awful coke-fuelled-DJ-infested tinpot local radio station that we picked up somewhere near Stroud.

Eventually we reached our overnight stop to be greeted with tea and cake. It seems it’s always worth popping in to see your parents now and again!

Next morning we were up earlyish, looking dismally at the weather as the rain lashed off the windows and sipping tea morosely. Bugger.

Finally we threw caution to the wind and hurled everything into the trusty Escort van and set off for our start point at Minehead - the jewel of the Somerset coast - praying that the weather was going to relent.

Driving through Wiltshire and Somerset the weather showed now inkling of improving, and as another squall swept in we passed the distant blue boxes of Hinkley Point nuclear power station, and waved cheerfully as we passed.

Hundreds of amusement arcades, fast food restaurants and pubs clutter the seafront at Minehead, filling the air with the smell of chip fat, neon light and the incessant noise from a thousand bleeping, shrieking video games. The stale odour of obsolescence possessed by tourist resorts well past their sell-by date surrounds the whole town. In fact, Minehead lost its beach the other year and had to bring in hundreds of tonnes of sand for the tourist season, always a sign of a tip-top resort don’t you think?

Despite all this Minehead does have a pleasant old town that nestles on a hillside above the dayglo-vomit of the seafront and it’s here we headed for.

We parked the van on tree-lined road somewhere in Minehead’s leafy suburbs and quickly unloaded, hoping that no irate citizens would come out and move us on for being maliciously young and carefree in front of their mortgaged-to-the-hilt retirement home and regulation issue Ford Mondeos. Also it had stopped raining and we wanted to get moving before the next shower cloud careered in from the Bristol Channel.

There were a few twists and turns through the back streets before we found the start of the South West Coast Path that we would be following for most of the day. It began on tarmac, but quickly thinned out to a gravely piece of singletrack that hugged the cliff and looked out across the water to Wales.

Within a few miles it began to climb unpleasantly, causing the usual groaning and wheezing that the first climb of the day always induces. The path leveled out on top of the cliff and we took the opportunity to have a quick break and admire the scenery. Although it isn’t the largest expanse of water in the world the view across the Bristol Channel is still pleasant enough and there’s the added novelty of trying to spot places in Wales too (’Er¦is that an oil refinery?’).

Unfortunately we could also see clouds scudding in off the sea trailing tendrils of rain like big, black jellyfish, which probably meant we should get moving again.

As we trundled along it was clear that it had been raining properly not too long ago as the trail was awash, almost like riding up a steam in parts. As the freezing cold water sprayed my calf muscles it made me wish I’d bothered putting tights on that morning.

After churning through several fields we reached the top of Bossington Hill and the first descent of the day, down to Porlock. Maddeningly as we began to drop so did the first fat spots of rain, lightly at first but then with increasing ferocity. And of course the descent was grassy wasn’t it, creating a surface with all the friction of a greased otter. Most of it was rideable if you kept yourself from touching the brakes and thought calm thoughts (ohhhhmmmmmmmm) until one short steeper section. This ended with a sharp 90 degree left turn and a rather inconveniently positioned bench. Suffice to say we all made it down, demonstrating varying degrees of control and talent as we each threatened to do ourselves a nasty, bench- shaped injury.

Continuing on down the track we experienced the delights of attempting to turn on slimy rocks (you can’t) and discovering what happens when you decide to leave the ground (it comes back to haunt you) before cruising into the outskirts of Porlock and a rural-life museum complete with goats. Nice.

The rain was coming down harder than ever by this point, creating a wall of water in front of us, so we took refuge underneath the awning of a Porlock bookshop. There is only so much perverse fun that can be derived from standing in the cold and wet, peering into a bookshop and giggling manically at books that no-one would ever want to read (’100 greatest weapons of all time’ ‘Russian tractors for beginners’ ‘Travels through cheese country’) and we can safely say that it’s about 10 minutes. 15 if you’re really bored.

Thankfully the rain eased off before we went completely insane so we got back on our bikes and pedaled off to Porlock Weir to find some more wholesome fun.

Unhappily what we found first were some snotty horseriders who castigated us for ‘racing’ down the road and veered their steeds across our path. Given that we were moving slower than any cars that had passed them, it seemed slightly unreasonable to us and we er¦ dicussed their opinion with them. It ended with the line: “If you can’t control your stupid animals then you shouldn’t be allowed on the road love.” delivered by the ever-diplomatic James in his best Yorkshire accent.

Cursing the equestrian world in general we rolled off again, only to pause for a quick photo opportunity on the beach, before heading off again.

There is actually a choice here, you can either stay on the South West Coast Path and sneak along a stretch of footpath complete with stern ‘No Mountain Bikes’ signs, head up one of two bridleways or ride up the Worthy Coombe toll road. In the interests of self-preservation we choose the toll road option; this starts at a small tollhouse complete with a grey-haired old lady and a small Yorkshire terrier who cheerfully takes the 25p it costs you to travel up the road.

We set off the steep road climb at a crawl with brilliant sunshine now beating down on us, slowly reducing us to boil in the bag status as we steamed inside our waterproofs.

At the top we followed several white roads before rejoining the coast path, traveling along roller-coaster doubletrack between high hedges for several miles until we reached the Exmoor National Park ranger station at Cosgates Feet.

Sheltering briefly inside the walkers hut we took the opportunity to ingest malt loaf, chocolate and all manner of good things, before venturing inside the shop to buy postcards (as you do) and liquorice allsorts to remind us of home.

Bidding a cheerful farewell to the conversation-starved National Park ranger running the shop, we stepped outside the door to find it raining yet again just in time to reduce the next descent to ice-rink status. We reached the bottom unscathed and bedraggled and, looking at our watches, decided to skip the next climb we had planned in favour of pelting along the tarmac.

As Dan rightly observed the map showed several of those dispiriting ’steep road’ arrows closely packed together, and lo and behold the road pointed upwards for a while before we turned right onto a wide track that plunged into the woods and followed the East Lyn River in undulating fashion. At Watersmeet House, another NT center, we had the option of more hardtop faffing or being morally dubious and following the river on a footpath.

Given the piss-wet through nature of the day we assumed correctly that there would be a lack of walkers about and so set off down the footpath like frolicking pixies, enjoying the twists, turns and injury-potential of the path that eventually deposited us in Lynmouth.

It was here in 1950-something that a huge thunderstorm deposited a biblical amount of water on the hills which thundered down the West Lyn River obliterating a large part of the town and killing several people. Obviously there’s no sign of the destruction now and all was peaceful as we sat in the seafront park, looking out at the slowly drifting rain clouds and ruminatively nibbling chocolate.

At this point there were only two miles to our home for the evening at the ‘Sunny Lynn’ campsite, so we set off expecting a nice cruise to our caravan. Only things never quite work out like that do they? It was only as we checked the directions to the campsite and clocked the ‘Unsuitable for Caravans’ signs did we realize quite what we were letting ourselves in for. It was a head-messing 1:4 gradient that stayed 1:4 for two whole miles of lactic acid-induced misery that had us cursing God, Devon and bloody-minded civil engineers who build murderous bloody roads.

Half-riding, half-collapsing into the caravan site we stumbled into the office, frothing at the mouth and babbling about enormous hills with a wild look in our eyes, we probably scared the proprietor somewhat. Which is the only reason I can think of for the malfunctioning gas fire in the caravan, the poor site food and the fact that they charged us for a box of fucking matches to light the aforementioned fire. Duly narked we retired to the nearby pub (’You want to avoid that one’ one of the campsite employees warned us ‘They’re a bit queer in there’) to drown our sorrows with ‘Exmoor Stag’ beer.

Next morning there was the usual griping as we pulled on still-damp kit and tried to warm-up wooden legs before heading off for a fried breakfast that was to haunt us for the rest of the day every time we belched.

We trundled up the first road climb and then crossed the busy A39 following a minor road towards them there hills. At this point I was chased by a three-legged sheepdog, much to the amusement of the others and much to my shame. In the distance we could see the proper hills of Exmoor rearing up to greet us and a choice of two tracks wending their way up onto the moors.

There was a striking contrast between the grazed farmland at the foot of the hills and the moorland at the top, the dividing line a dry-stone wall that sliced the hill neatly in two.

Looking at our OS we picked what we thought would be the better of the two tracks and set off. However, we soon found ourselves in a series of fields through which the path meandered and then disappeared, leaving us to fight our way across a tussock-infested, marshy field. Unfortunately this was to set the pattern for the rest of the day.

It did improve for a while though; just through a gate we stopped and snacked on the morning sunshine and biscuity things and admired the view. It looked like a child’s version of the countryside: gently rounded hills with a small river meandering through the fields and the occasional fluffy sheep dotted about the place. Even the trail improved too; we’d joined the ‘Tarka Trail’ and this turned out to be a recently surfaced path leading to the top of the hill. Sadly this lasted all of five yards on the other side as we and descended wetly across yet more fields to join the B3358 to Simonsbath.

We span off down this for a while and just after the village we climbed again and at James’ suggestion took a bridlepath climbing to the ridge on our left. Yet again this lasted 100 yards before we found we were climbing through soft, wet grass into a headwind. And you can guess what happened at the summit can’t you? The heavens opened and rain lanced down from a leaden sky forcing us to crouch behind a wall to gain some sort of shelter and utter threats of bodily harm to our navigator.

The descent was insane too; slippy, steep grass with huge ruts everywhere just waiting to send you arse over tip and all into driving rain. Horrendous barely describes it, I would rather have had to lick sheep’s piss off a nettle than had to do that again.

At the foot of the descent we sought solace in nature and hid from the downpour in the middle of a thicket that proved, well, less than waterproof. Typically as the sun emerged and we started out again we rode all of 100yds before finding a large tree with a perfectly dry area beneath it. It was another exasperating moment in a day full of them.

Along and up the road and then following some more desperate bridleways through muddy fields full of disinterested cows, the day was not getting better!

After a bit more of this mental torture we turned onto a rubblicious track that was to lead up Dunkery Beacon. With a tailwind and a full suspension bike this was an absolute joy. However if you possessed a rigid alloy bike with all the suppleness of a clubfoot then it was absolute murder I’m told. A lesson there I think!

When we finally reached the top of the beacon we could see the descent squiggling away in front of us with more twists and turns than a bad suspense novel. And so off we went, hurtling down it with the appropriate yells and rather lovely it was too; rocks, ditches, more rocks and a helter-skelter’s worth of corners. And it’s made of that funky red sandstone that gives your bike a pre-rusted appearance and produces puddles of day-glo mud.

It would have been the perfect end to the day except that there was one more climb between Minehead and us, and judging by the direct route through the map’s contours it had a certain theme to it. The track hauled its way up through a wood, little more than a gully full of loose rocks and the occasional tree root. We all gave it a good go but the unrelenting gradient forced us off our bikes. Eventually we topped out in a forest clearing which then led to a wide and steep fireroad descent through the forest (interesting with no brakes eh, Dan?). Eventually we dropped down onto a short section of singletrack and then onto the Minehead road, from where we swooped back into the old town and to our waiting chariot.

All in all a mixed bag of riding; there seems plenty of Exmoor to exlplore and some of it looks good fun, however there are an awful lot of duff bridleways there too. That said, Dunkerley Beacon almost makes it all worthwhile.

Thanks to Dan and James for agreeing to accompany me along the route and to Jim and Naomi in Bristol for the tea, beer, cake and baked tatties. Sorry about the teapot Jim!