Taking the car means that bicycle and I are driven to whichever place of work is appropriate for the driver. For Frood, this means Alphington, at the south end of Exeter. I get out, bicycle is unshipped, I say cheerio to whomever did the driving and then hurtle off to work.

Unloading at Alphington means riding out from Marsh Barton, past the Cattle Market, then up the hill to take the short section of dual carriageway (40mph limit) past the sewage treatment works at Countess Wear, over the lights-controlled roundabout, then a right about 250m up the inner bypass onto Old Rydon Lane. We're largely talking the section between the Dawlish roundabout towards the bottom left and the next one where it says Countess Wear. The Cattle Market is in the next map section to the left, not shown. There is a relatively recently installed cycle path running between Exminster and Exeter. This comes in at the Dawlish roundabout, where the section of 50mph dual carriageway from the Cattle Market splits into the road to Dawlish and the road to Countess Wear and the Inner Bypass. It is a shared-use path, undelineated between peds and cyclists (not that delineation ever makes much difference, and can't, legally) with seven - count them, seven - conflict points, the requirement to cross the road three times, and the added bonus of being both a popular dog walking route and having other cyclists coming straight at you from the side as they leave the canal towpath route.

Needless to say, paths aren't gritted, and I don't use this one for other safety reasons; including doing about 20mph up that stretch, which isn't safe on the pavement. It's much more fun to pile along the main carriageway. After all, it has two lanes and they are reasonably wide, so cars can get past easily enough: on the odd occasion they are moving and not stuck in a jam. Still, the ice is a major factor - the last thing you want is to take a spill on some ice and fall off the path into the road, thus doing something unexpected. That's when drivers are likely to hit you, when you're doing something unexpected.