[SallyintNorth]

Time to announce this on TAS, I think.

Many will be aware that spinners the world over participate in the 'Tour de Fleece', spinning during the Tour de France.

Well, this year, the Tour of Britain cycle race passes through the sheep country in Wales, the north of England, southern Scotland, the Peak District, East Anglia, and ends in London.

A group of us felt it was too good an opportunity to miss, and so the Tour of British Fleece was born.

It's a simple premise.  Like the Tour de Fleece, when the cyclists 'spin', we spin.     The British Fleece bit is that whenever they go somewhere, we aim to spin the fleece of the sheep they find there

So on each day (it's an 8 day race, no rest days), we all try to spin either a breed or type of sheep local to or associated with the area, or of a sheep that's actually local to the route (or both, of course.)

We've got a group set up on Ravelry, with lists of the Stages / Days and appropriate sheep, links to information about the sheep and their fleece, a Swapsies thread for people to share their fibre and enable others to participate on as many days as possible, a thread for meetups along the route so people can go and spin local sheep as the cyclists spin by, and so on.

I know that not everyone wants to do Ravelry, so figured I'd better start a thread here, too.

[SallyintNorth]

Days, routes and sheep :

Day 1, Sunday Sept 6th, Beaumaris to Wrexham: Welsh breeds including Lleyn, Welsh Mountain and Black Welsh Mountain, Welsh Mule, Welsh Half-bred, Badger-faced, Balwen, Speckled-faced, Kerry Hill. (KH is from east mid-Wales but close enough, especially if you haven’t any other!) Also Blue-Faced Leicester / Crossing Leicester and Border Leicester.

Day 2, Monday Sept 7th, Clitheroe to Colne: Rough Fell, Lonk. Also Blue-Faced Leicester / Crossing Leicester and Swaledale.

Day 3, Tuesday Sept 8th, Cockermouth to Floors Castle, Kelso: Herdwick, Castlemilk Moorit, Border Leicester, Cheviots (both North Country and South Country), Scottish Blackface, Scotch Mule, Scotch Half-bred. Also Blue-Faced Leicester / Crossing Leicester.

Day 4, Wednesday Sept 9th, Edinburgh to Blyth: Scottish Blackface, Scotch Mule, Border Leicester, Scotch Half-bred, Cheviots (as above), Blue-Faced Leicester / Crossing Leicester.

Day 5, Thursday Sept 10th, Prudhoe to Penrith : Hexhamshire / Northumberland Blackface, Swaledale, North of England Mule (both Swaley Mule and Blackie Mule), Blue-Faced Leicester / Crossing Leicester, Rough Fell, Herdwick.

Day 6, Friday Sept 11th, Stoke-on-Trent to Nottingham: Whitefaced Woodland, Lonk, Derbyshire Gritstone. Lincoln Longwool, Leicester Longwool to stretch a point.

Day 7, Saturday Sept 12th, Fakenham to Ipswich : Norfolk Horn, Suffolk, maybe Cambridge?

Day 8, Sunday Sept 13th, City of London: Romney, Southdown (stretching a point.) Also, not sheep but socio-geographically relevant, silk.

[SallyintNorth]

Meet-ups-wise, Gilsland is making a big deal out of this on Day 5, Thursday 10th Sept.  All the village groups will be doing something and we will be spinning either along the route if the weather's ok and it's safe to do so, or in the Village Hall as the cyclists pass.  We'll be spinning all day, actually, so do come and join us if you would like!  Let me know if you're planning to come, though, so I can brief you on road closures, etc.

The day before that, we think Haddington Spinners / Edinburgh Guild will probably do something or a few things.  Hopefully [member=29505]Spinningfishwife[/member] will update us once she knows more

[Fleecewife]

Thanks for the info Sally.  It sounds fun but it's not my thing    I will be expecting pics and a report here after it's finished though.  Have a great time 

[Bionic]

I think it sounds fun too but its all too far away from me. Also looking forward to the pics 

[SallyintNorth]

I think it sounds fun too but its all too far away from me. Also looking forward to the pics 

Oh, no it isn't!  There's a meet-up in Wales on day one - I'll get the info and report back, and we're not all following the bikes about, y'know, we're just spinning relevant fibre on each day.  We've got at least one very active participant in the US!

[SallyintNorth]

Okay, it's [member=130242]wrigglefingers[/member]  (Jill Shepherd) and hilltopkatie (Hilltop Cloud) and it's

somewhere on the descent from Llanberis

I've asked for a bit more info!

ETA the 'mention' - I'd forgotten wriggly was on here!

[Anke]

I wish I had time to spin in August....

[Dogwalker]

I think it sounds fun too but its all too far away from me. Also looking forward to the pics 

Oh, no it isn't!  There's a meet-up in Wales on day one - I'll get the info and report back, and we're not all following the bikes about, y'know, we're just spinning relevant fibre on each day.  We've got at least one very active participant in the US!

Wales is quite big you know and takes a while to get from one end to the other , you have to keep driving around the mountains.

[SallyintNorth]

lol, tell me about it.  We've hills to the south and moorland to the north, two huge and very sparsely populated counties...

But the point is, for anyone wanting to join in the fun, the Tour is in Wales on Day 1, so anyone can spin some Welsh fleece on that day.  If they're in Wales, even better!  And if they can make it to the meet-up I can guarantee they'll have a fantastic time - but I shall spin Welsh fleece in my front room in Cumbria, and share my thoughts and results with like-minded spinners on Ravelry and on here (if any )

And on Day 2 I shall spin Lonk, and share my findings with others who have done the same all over the country - and beyond.

On Day 3 it's Castlemilk Moorit for me, Day 4 black Cheviot, day 5 I shall spin a few as we'll all be together in Gilsland, will see the race and spin all day.  Day 6 Derbyshire Gritstone, Day 7 Norfolk Horn and Day 8 Southdown.

[SallyintNorth]

So, there has been a lot of Welsh fleece spun all over the UK - and beyond - today!

For me it was Balwen, from a batt from Griffiths Mill.

It was softer than I'd expected it to be - but that's not saying a great deal 

It'll join the collection of yarns to be woven into cloth to make a bag.  Already in there are two colours of Badgerfaced (the Torddu considerably softer than the Torwen) and some grey Jacob, which has made a much softer yarn than it felt when I was spinning it!

Some of the Woolly Outlaws were spinning at Sutton on Trent Festival, spinning Speckled-faced Beulah and Black Welsh Mountain.  One of the Cumbrian spinners of Scottish descent spindled grey Welsh tops on the train home from Glasgow after a weekend with her parents.  There's been Torddu spun near Consett,   A lady who lives on today's race route span the fleece of a local sheep.  She didn't know what breed it was at the time but has since discovered it was a Ryeland!  Others have reported spinning more BWM, blue-faced Leicester (let's face it, where there are hill sheep, there are Leicesters!) and one in South Scotland is spindling Lleyn.

[Bramblecot]

I ought to join in really in the City of London as I am a Freeman  (well woman, actually) of the City and entitled to drive my sheep over London Bridge!    Does that count as local sheep even if we are now 3 1/2 hours away?

Good luck with the spinning.