Just completed our end to end challenge for our 60th year
Posted: 1 Sep 2012, 1:33pm
My husband saw it as a challenge - it was indeed challenging at times but the majority of the time it was just eating up the miles watching the tarmac disappear under my wheels. I walked up a lot of hills with my husband waiting for me at the top.
Some of the campsites were appalling - no other word to describe them. One of them had a pitiful shower that I refused to use - a camping area that was literally on a hill apart from a v small area that we put our two man tent on and a sink that was open to the atmosphere to wash your hands in. No strip washing there then! They had the temerity to charge £15 for that and on another site that was really, really lovely with all the facilities you could want they charged us £6.
In the whole of the journey the thing that surprised me most was the lack of flat roads - I hadn't realised that the country generally was so hilly. The other thing that really, really annoyed me was that the weather was [inappropriate word removed] and also the wind was literally in our faces the whole way apart from the last day when we rode from Penzance to Lands End.
Worst things? Taking a short cut on the map to find it was a huge hill 1:10 and then when it rained so hard I just got out my rain poncho (that everyone laughed at me for taking) put it on and crouched on the floor with my head down in a layby until it stopped.
Weirdest thing - We met a cool guy in a lay-by in Scotland and he was saying he had just completed the trip. we chatted for a while and because my husbands back wheel buckled we had to go into a shop called the bike shed in Devon and there was the same guy trying out a carbon bike!
Another weird thing - there were lots of gloves by the wayside! Big ones - small ones rubber ones canvas ones masses of gloves - if I had picked them up I would probably have half a bin bag full.
We bought 2 Country Explorer bikes from the Edinburgh Bicycle Co-operative to go on. Both of them needed the front wheel tightened up as they started to wobble because they became so loose and the very helpful guy in the bike shed in Devon who repaired the buckle for us said the wheels were cheap rubbish and to swap them out for mavic ones. You live and learn.
The only thing I gained was bragging rights and to honest I am not much of a bragger so it all seems a bit pointless now. So glad to be back home in my soft bed with my soft duvet. *Sigh* Margaret.
Some of the campsites were appalling - no other word to describe them. One of them had a pitiful shower that I refused to use - a camping area that was literally on a hill apart from a v small area that we put our two man tent on and a sink that was open to the atmosphere to wash your hands in. No strip washing there then! They had the temerity to charge £15 for that and on another site that was really, really lovely with all the facilities you could want they charged us £6.
In the whole of the journey the thing that surprised me most was the lack of flat roads - I hadn't realised that the country generally was so hilly. The other thing that really, really annoyed me was that the weather was [inappropriate word removed] and also the wind was literally in our faces the whole way apart from the last day when we rode from Penzance to Lands End.
Worst things? Taking a short cut on the map to find it was a huge hill 1:10 and then when it rained so hard I just got out my rain poncho (that everyone laughed at me for taking) put it on and crouched on the floor with my head down in a layby until it stopped.
Weirdest thing - We met a cool guy in a lay-by in Scotland and he was saying he had just completed the trip. we chatted for a while and because my husbands back wheel buckled we had to go into a shop called the bike shed in Devon and there was the same guy trying out a carbon bike!
Another weird thing - there were lots of gloves by the wayside! Big ones - small ones rubber ones canvas ones masses of gloves - if I had picked them up I would probably have half a bin bag full.
We bought 2 Country Explorer bikes from the Edinburgh Bicycle Co-operative to go on. Both of them needed the front wheel tightened up as they started to wobble because they became so loose and the very helpful guy in the bike shed in Devon who repaired the buckle for us said the wheels were cheap rubbish and to swap them out for mavic ones. You live and learn.
The only thing I gained was bragging rights and to honest I am not much of a bragger so it all seems a bit pointless now. So glad to be back home in my soft bed with my soft duvet. *Sigh* Margaret.
