Albania 2018. Day 5 Korçë to a hut somewhere in the desert the south of Erseke. 70km. 1200 ascent. Last nights meal was very good and followed a similar pattern to previous nights. Did I mention the cheese in previous blogs. No? Well there was lots of it. And do you know what I am intolerant too? Yes, you have guessed it - CHEESE. However, the red wine was good and I am looking forward to my feather pillow. Breakfast was a good mixture of eggs, sausage, cold meats and loads of cakes, which put Michael into extacy. The first few kilometres out of town was a gentle climb on a dirt road under upgrade. There were the usual sights of donkeys grazing at the roadside complete with their heavy wooden saddled, which they never seem ... read more

Albania 2018 Day 4. Pogradec to Korce 63km, 600m ascent. Luckily the weather forecast was wrong yet again and we awoke to glorious sunshine after another great meal last night. We started with the usual comprehensive salad and cheese, of course since I cannot eat cheese. Roast vegetables and the specialty Koran fish, which is only found in the nearby lake of Ohrid. I don’t know if should say this but quite a few of the group are now drinking red wine. At 8.30 we set off to ride along the lake to Macedonia to visit the St Nahum Temple. First of all we had to tackle the border police and get our passports stamped as we left Albania. Thinking I was then in Macedonia I rode around the corner only to be confronted by another ... read more

Albania. 2018 Day 2 71km 1000m ascent. Good breakfast at the Hotel Austria in Tirana with bacon and egg, continental breakfast of ham ,cheese etc and croissants, cakes etc, mango juice and coffee. Everything you need for a good start. Luckily the weather was fine and little cloud and warm enough for shirt and shorts. We followed the guide’s van out of town and then followed the planned route up the mountain to our coffee stop at half way. The lunch was almost at the top, by which time the temperature was hitting the 20’s and the views on the ascent were magnificent. Lunch was salad and chips with Creme fraische (I think) and for the meat we had spit roasted goat. Quite nice, once the eyes were taken out. A little more climbing and past ... read more

Cambodia overview Overall Cambodia is a very interesting country to visit with lots to see over the two weeks of cycling. The planning was excellent and the guides from Peak DMC were first class, looking after us really well. The temples were interesting and were worth the visit and we were not overkilled with too many of them. We had some pesterers selling things, but not overly so. Sihanoukville was a bit disappointing through being dirty and untidy for a seaside resort and had several people begging on the street and beach. The main beach would be good but for the litter and raw sewage draining into it. There is another cleaner beach 2km away but it is still scruffy and disappointing to see our first obese westerners waddling down the street. Almost all of the ... read more

Day 13. Sihanoukville. Tuesday 23 Jan The best sleep this week and a good breakfast before wee set off for Sihanoukville by the main road. The road got busier the further north we got. Good lunch if noodles and veg for $2.50 after which the road got even busier with heavy lorries. Mostly 10 wheel rigid tippers and 5 axle artics. Lots of makes such as Hino, Hyundai, Volvo, Mitsubishi and American Sterling with long noses. We have never seen as many HGV,s as this all week and think that there was a quarry nearby since there were a couple of weigh bridges on the roadside. This made it quite unsafe for cycling since they were going quite fast with little room to pass,especially when we came to the narrow bridges. Chris actually fell off into ... read more