On the eve of adventure

"If you worried about falling off the bike, you'd never get on"

(Lance Armstrong)

I'm very close now. Twenty Four hours and I'll be in the sky somewhere between the Sahara and the Congo. Many things have not been done today, but many of the important things are sorted and most importantly my bike stands all tooled up in the corridor outside my room. It looks good, but damn it is heavy!

Gonna get some sleep.

Dress rehearsal

Had a bit of a practice putting stuff on the bike this evening. My bike (currently without a name, all sugestions welcomed) came back from the bike shop after it's service today. Got it done at Cycle surgery on Holloway Road and they kindly gave me the unused bits of my chain and some spare spokes for the road. So first job was to attach a front rack to let me use front panniers and get some weight off the back wheel. In the picture you can see the all important blue water bag, this will be very weighty when it is full. As is Rob's tent (the green sausage under the water bag)

Everything seems to fit on OK, does feel rather heavy though (as Tommy can testify) and that's without most of my kit.

Lizzy's wedding at the weekend was amazing. We all had an amazing time. Mum n Dad looked very proud of her and Rob did an excellent job as an usher directing everyone about, especially for the photos. There are a few pics up on my facebook site, including one he sent from the boat she and Damian sailed off down the canal in for their honeymoon. Am very envious of them, weather is perfect at the moment.

I had a bit of a 'moment' before leaving Oxford to come back to London. Last time I will see Mum n Dad before heading off and I know they are very worried about this trip. Guess preparing for it all and finishing dissertation got the better of me for a minute, but feeling better about it all now. I've just finished reading Al Humphries first book "Moods of Future Joys' about his solo trip round the world on a bike and sailing ships. He often talks about how going solo leaves you open to big highs but also big lows. So will be expecting a few more 'moments' in the weeks ahead on the road, but hopefully even more highs! I guess this is one of the motivations for writing this blog. Not only should I have a great record of this trip once I get back hopefully meet some people on the road and perhaps learn to write a slightly more entertaining style of prose through doing it, but it is also a way to share what I'm doing and stay in contact with family and friends who can leave me comments (hint, HINT!) down the right hand column of the page (please keep it clean)

Is getting late and the battery on my laptop is going flat. Sadly no smart arsed quote prepared for tonight so time for B. E. D. I bid thee adieu.

Training - Tour de Londres

Took a ride in the sun with Tommy, Ben and Jack yesterday. They're all training for Sandy Balls, a half Ironman and needed to get 50 miles done today so we teamed up for mutual benefit (after all I need to get a few miles under my belt as well). Once I started planning a route I realised 50 miles around London allows you to see quite a bit of the City.

Here's where we went,












We set off late morning heading down the Euston road, across Hyde Park and over Hammersmith Bridge. Richmond park was as usual beautiful, but quite a few cars with the warm weather. We passed a small herd of Fallow deer by the road. The stags still had velvet over the Antlers, this will all be off by the time I return form Africa.













In the park Jacks's front brake fell off and I was stung by a bee (yes OK not much of a war wound, but I was going quite rapid when I took this bullet!),








Then back through Central London along the Embankment, over Tower Bridge to Greenwich, crossing back north of the river on the Woolwich ferry,

... through Canary Wharf and the City and back up to Islington.

Great ride, but ominously I started bonking in the last km to Angel. Think I'd just gone a bit hard from the ferry back through the Docklands and forgotten to eat anything. Felt pretty knackered. Was worried because this was only just over 80km and, as you can see from the previous post, I'll regularly need to be passing well beyond over this distance if I want to get ocean to ocean under my own steam. But the difference is speed. We covered this distance (including stops) in three and a half hours. I'll have 12-13 hrs of day light (admittedly the middle of the day may well not be rideable due to heat - particularly in the Kalahari) but this will allow me to go much, much slower.

When I think about things which may stop me covering the distance in the allotted time (my physical ability, equipment failures, getting sick etc...) I'm imaging a bus stalking me to scoop me up and take me to Maputo... as a failure, something like the car following the top gear presenters on some of their challenges a voiture balai.

...as I waited outside Waitrose for Tommy to bring my some chocolate milk and tantastics the bus of doom felt very close.