What a relief it is to have temperatures drop back down to the normal mid-20s. Suddenly you have your energy back. In a week they say it’ll rain, so Sunday evening we headed out to follow our noses through the Purbeck Hills and happened to pull off a perfect 10-mile (16km) loop out of Corfe Castle in the course of our three-hour ride. We actually rode the loop above anti-clockwise (which explains the wrong direction photos), but I think it flows better clockwise and includes the best ridge top trail in Purbeck. The climbing adds up to only 240m.

Leaving Corfe Castle town square, you cross Corfe Common and ride up through Kingston Woods, then follow a high road west with views north to Poole Harbour and south to the Channel. Then, at a car park set off on a gentle grassy unfenced ascent along the broad rim of Encombe House’s ‘Golden Bowl’ to Swyre Head hill tumulus and trig point.

From Swyre Head, it’s a rutted then stony track down Smedmore Hill with views across the sea to Kimmeridge and Portland, until you drop steeply to meet a country lane. Follow it over the Corfe River and up to reach a turn off which climbs steeply onto Ridgeway Hill; nothing your e-bike and gear range can’t manage. Interestingly, we found both this and the Smedmore gradients much smoother than a few weeks ago. My theory is that passing users as well as the lack of rain has let the lose soil and sand fill the holes and smooth things off; a kind of organic grading. The next downpour will wash it all away, expose the stones and make it rough again.

Once on Ridgeway Hill with a view down across the downs and valleys where you’ve come from, you have a glorious, airy ridge-top ride with one quick road crossing, before more ridge riding ending with a drop down a narrow track via an awkward gate to Corfe Castle and your start point.

With a few rests it’s easily doable in less than two hours. When we did it there were about 14 gates to negotiate, though a couple of others were open when previously they’d been closed. For a seaside splash and a snack, at the bottom of Smedmore Hill left leads 1.5km down to Kimmeridge Bay (cafe).