James Cole, Simon Martyn, Will Farara, Andy Morley-Hall & Rob Penn
From 1st to 10th September, five of us aim to ride from Land's End to John O'Groats with our kit on our backs and no support team. If we succeed, we will have covered a thousand miles in ten days. Admittedly, this is no Herculean feat, but we are overweight, hovering on forty and scared of the gym. It's going to be hard. It might be fun.LeJoggers
Sitting in the saddle, we hope to turn our sweat into pounds and if you would like to make a donation to one of our 2 chosen charities, please visit "www.justgiving.com/midlifechallenge" or "www.re-cycle.org".
Many of you have been very generous in your sponsorship already and have asked if we are keeping a blog of our daily progress. Well, if we can work out how to use Simon's mobile phone camera and our friendly B&B hosts have PC's, we might just be able to put a few entries here.
All you have to do is click on the "Last Added Entry" below (or just scroll down) to read our latest update. If you want to make a comment, just click on the "Add Comment" link at the bottom of the last entry
Thanks for your interest and support.
James Cole, Simon Martyn, Will Farara, Andy Morley-Hall & Rob Penn
Travel Blog Posts
September 10th 2006
The final countdown.... de dah duh daaaaa, de dah duh da daaaaaaaaa After 9 long days on the road we set out, stiff and creaky, for our final day's ride. We had somehow managed to get our sums wrong, in that our intended route would have been somewhere in excess of 130 miles. This sort of distance could well have broken us. So we re-visited the maps and managed to reduce the distance to 110 miles, whilst still avioiding the busiest main roads. We headed off from Tain, up the A9 over the Dornoch Firth Bridge and drafted 40 miles up to Helms Deep (aka Helmsdale). A light tail wind and beautiful blue skies eased us up the singl track A897 which followed the Wick railway line and Helmdale River. It was beautiful and remote and ... read more
September 9th 2006
Blogeers Note: The further north we headed into Scotland the greater the difficulty we had locating computers and uploading photographs. As a result this entry is being added a little late. After the head wind heroics of yesterday, Day 9 was due to be a relatively short day, with reasonaby flat terrain loch side up the Great Glen and with a light tail wind. All went well initially as we hugged the edge of Loch Lochy for the first 30 miles, but things started to go a little awry at Fort Augustus at the head of Loch Ness. We stopped for a cup of tea at the local sheep dog trials, watched a few rounds of the event and bought some raffle tickets in aid of the local hospice**. We were somehow persuaded to take the ... read more
Day 8
Published: September 9th 2006Europe » United Kingdom » Scotland » Inverness-shire » Fort William
September 8th 2006
The weather improved overnight and we had good cycling conditions to go with the spectacular scenery of the Kintyre Peninsula and the Islands and then on to the start of the Great Glen. We also saw the tidal races of Loch Etive and went for our first swim of the trip in Loch Linnhe. Cold but refreshing. The day ended with an evening ride into Spean Bridge against the backdrop of Ben Nevis as the sun was setting. Simon narrowly avoided being run down by a red Toyota and we ended up with a few pints of heavy in the Commando Bar. Muscles are now aching quite badly and our packs are getting heavier - just 2 days to go now XXXXXXXXXXX PS - having problems uploading photos - will try and update later... read more
September 7th 2006
Ouch! Today was hard work. A strong north westerly wind right in our faces made cycling very difficult, especially as we had 4 or 5 big climbs to traverse. We left Ben and Silvy's at 8.15 am and arrived in Tarbert (which is just north of Arran) at about 8.30pm. Part of the reason the day was so long was because we had two ferry journeys - one onto Arran and one off. The scenery around here is spectacular, as it was around Dumfries. So a mixed day of fantastic views and hard cycling. Also, we are definitely feeling the wear and tear of 7 days in the saddle. We are getting sore and achey and each day it takes us a little longer to warm up and get going. Our packs feel heavy and we ... read more
September 6th 2006
Finally crossed the border into Scotland today. We have taken it very steadily after yesterday's very long stretch - 13 hours on the road - and so have taken a slightly more direct route into Scotland. Weather has stayed pretty good. There was a storm in the night, but we missed the rain. Wind has moved round to the west / north west which means that we are into the wind at times. Drafting has become more important. Simon had a chain break today, Andy lost a couple more spokes and Rob had another puncture (that's 5 to Rob!). We are getting very into our bikes and doing all the mending and fixing. Will even cleaned all the chains and gears at the end of the day. (See picture outside bike shop in Carlise to get ... read more
September 5th 2006
Wow! What a day. We have really seen some of the country today and had a real treat along the way .... but some of the hills would not be out of place on Le Tour. The day started well and we made good head way around Manchester and up Northwards to Blackburn. We passed Ewood Park and then started our climb up into the Forest of Bowland. The road up from Clitheroe to the first peak was steep and long, but the second climb up to the Trough of Bowland was by far the longest and hardest we've experienced on the journey so far. It seemed to go on for miles and miles and took every bit of our strength and sweat. On the plus side - the weather was OK and the views spectacular. ... read more
September 4th 2006
As usual, we have arrived late and tired but happy. Another good day in and out of the saddle as we travelled through Shropshire and Greater Manchester, finishing up in the Knutsford city limits. Weather was good, the roads generally flat and morale reasonably high, excpet when we tried to find a decent meal in Market Drayton - don't bother it's all fried or frozen. We also had one puncture and one spoke break, but otherwise mechanics are fine. We are really getting the hang of drafting - which is where we all stick close together and the man in front deflects the air away from the following team members allowing them to use a lot less energy. When it works it's great and we get quite a rhythm going in the "Green Train". A quick ... read more
September 3rd 2006
A good day today. We've now covered just over 300 miles in 3 days. They've been long days - we've been on the road around 8AM every day but haven't arrived at any of our destinations before 7PM - and some have been harder than others (see Day 2). Today we crossed over the Severn Bridge (see photo), briefly dipped into Wales, and then on through the Wye Valley, passed Tintern Abbey and the Monmouth raft race, and into Herefordshire. We had a lovely lunch stop in Monmouth as Rob's wife, Vix, and their 3 lovely children came to meet us. We are now being very well looked after by Simon's Uncle Willy and Auntie Sarah (who are very kindly putting us up tonight) and are treating us to wine, dinner, a clothes washing service and ... read more
September 2nd 2006
We're writing this a day late in Simon's Uncle Willy's back garden and already the memory of yesterday's VERY WET ride is fading. But it was WET and hilly. Some of the hills south of Exmoor were so steep it felt like you were about to go on a rollercoaster ride. We had only managed 40 miles by 3pm, having got lost, had a broken spoke to deal with and also hill after hill after hill .... At our lunch stop in South Molton, we still had 70 miles to cover before bed, it was raining, it looked like there were going to be more hills as we were still in the middle of Exmoor and it was now 4pm. But we made great time in the afternoon, mainly thanks to the B3227 between South Molton ... read more
September 1st 2006
It's been a long, long day, so just a quick entry this evening. We left Land's End at about 9am after cycling there from our B&B and taking the obligitory photographs (see attached). Unfortunately we were too early for the Land's End sign post to be attached to the pole - they take it away each evening to stop it being stolen! Still the sun was shining and the wind in the right direction. We made reasonably good progress during the day, but a little slow due to lots of map reading, one crash (Rob - not too bad) and 3 punctures. Also - lots and lots of hills. Cornwall is as hilly as everyone says it is. We stopped for lunch (3pm!) in Colomb St Major, and sat down in the local church yard with ... read more
Tot: 0.083s; Tpl: 0.003s; cc: 16; qc: 88; dbt: 0.0534s; 1; s:notus w:www (50.28.61.183); sld: 1; ; mem: 1.8mb
