Originally Posted by forrest_m
The riding over here is great, though, so if the racing doesn't work out, you should definitely try to hook up with a group - even the smallest town will have a cycling club that meets saturday or sunday morning.
I did that once when visiting a small town in the south west. Everyone very friendly, no problem about the visiting Brits tagging along. But very, very fast from the off. I'm thinking, "nobody told me this was a crit" within a couple of kilometres.
Not trying to discourage the op from doing it, it was great fun until I disappeared out the back in the hills.