updates

Clearly this blog hasn't bee updated in a while.

Points of interest
I got to Paris alive
I'm back again (alive too)

The full story of the journey will be written up, I promise (it's worth the wait too). I can't do it until the sensation in my fingers has returned and my wrists have healed (I don't have enough strength in my hands to open a bottle of ketchup).


Checking out but not CHECKING out.

Dan

Day one (imaginative title, eh)

so the first day's ride is over. I've fallen short of my distance by 50 miles but the going was really tough. The increased load on my bike from all the food water and clothes added alot of drag on the climb, plus the inclination of the hills was something I hadn't expected. I hit bad weather, and bad food at the border. The thing that had been creatively named a cheese burger was tough to force down, but i was hungry. standing in rain and a gale was beginning to depress me so I headed straight off.
Nothumberland had two distinct features, desolate steep hills and hundreds of scooters. The two are not related. The ferocity of the hills meant I felt like I was climbing to the top of the world at times. Even to push the bike up was a struggle. I carried on through Nothumberland where people live in isolated farming communities, mostly to do with sheep. Their dogs don't really know the difference between me and sheep as one tried to herd me into the pack on the journey. Dogs really dont like me.

I was beginning to struggle and it was getting really cold and windy. I knew that I had to finish the first day early so I needed to find a place to sleep. As time dragged on I was becoming more desparate to find a spot. Eventually I saw a sign for a camp site and chose to head towards it. 6 miles out of my way but what the hell. as luck would have it, 2 miles later I found a perfect field and chose that instead. I'm now overlooking the derwent reservior and it is beautiful in the sunset.

I must check front tyre in the morning, green goo is oozing out of the sides

As a side note I've seen 3 dead deer, 2 dead badgers, 2 dead rats, loads of dead pheasant an rabbits and one decapitated head from a barbie doll. Good night.

10 hours to go

This is going to be short because I have a lot of packing and preparing to do and I have a killer headache too. I'm almost prepared mentally, but I'm not sure I have enough pants for the entire journey, I'm looking forward to eating a couple bags of nuts, I have finally washed my red t-shirt, my headlight batteries are charging and I'm really thinking hard about printing out my insurance certificate but I'm also thinking about drinking the nice champagne that Catriona bought today.
Tomorrow I'll be on my way. Once I set off all this will mean nothing because I have just one thing to do. Get there.

Essential new toys for me, a boy.

With only a week until I head off I have to admit that I've been procrastinating a little dealing with the finer points of my trip. Last night I had another look at my route but really all I did was fiddle with way points without any real aim or outcome. I've been thinking about putting dried banana in a bag on my handlebars but I still haven't got round to getting the bag, or the dried banana. I'm even thinking of passing on my visit to the bike station in favour of sitting in the living room and playing Xbox. I think it's a protection mechanism, a way of allowing me to accept the reality of my decision to ride to Paris in the time I've given myself. If I weren't dreaming of killing zombies right now then I'd probably be insane with worry about the journey. I know in reality that I'll get all the little things completed in time and all will go swimmingly but it helps to try to play down the seriousness of the plans sometimes, it's necessary to have some distractions.

This morning I got up super early. I was woken up by Catriona handing me a bowl of cereal telling me that she'd poured the wrong type out. That was nice because I didn't have to get out of bed to eat, which no-one can complain about, but also it was handy because I needed to be at the post office really early to collect a package. After a quick ride to the sorting office and back I jumped into bed to unwrap the package because, if we're honest with ourselves, unwrapping your package in bed is where it should be done.

The package turned out to be my free loader, a solar powered charger. It was a happy moment as I'd been worried about running out of power for my phone and PDA on the trip.

When I got back from work later that day I had another surprise, a big blue polythene bag. I guessed that it must be my bivvy bag though I was a little surprised at the size. It was much larger than I thought it would be. As with all things that are wrapped I had to unwrap it quickly and messily. After the unwrapping it was very necessary to get into the bag. Oh man, that thing is great! It may be made for a giant but it is so comfy and cosy that I am actually looking forward to sleeping rough just to use it.

Well it's the evening now and after having unwrapped stuff, charged stuff, drunk cider and watched South Park I feel that I have had just the right amount of distraction. I'm going to finish off my bike maintenance tomorrow and by sunday I'll have all the songs together and a printout of the route. I'm really looking forward to going!

How to make things difficult

So yesterday morning it dawned on me that I had 11 days until I had to get on my bike and ride to Paris. Things have crept up on me quickly. Knowing from experience that pedalling takes a lot of energy and given the massive gaps in my training, I decided to 'mod' my bike. I had been in a bike shop earlier on in the month and had been talking about what I could realistically do to my bike to make it better. There were really only three choices; get a new, larger, chain set (the front cogs on the bike), make my wheels bigger or buy a new bike. The last option would cost a small fortune (I'm so broke that even the thought of buying a bike wilts my bank card) the second option isn't even possible but the first option, by some miracle, became a reality because I happened to be in the only shop in the UK that had a discontinued product that was exactly what I was looking for at a bargain basement price (don't ask me how I know this, lots of phone calls, web searches and a really lumpy malt shake were involved).

I had become the proud owner of a new Shimano chain set. I know the theory is that by increasing the size of the cogs I can pedal less and gain more speed (great!) and as a someone who has dedicated many years of his life to looking for an easier way to do something I could see great potential in this product. Only one thing stood in my way. I didn't know what I was doing. Not seeing this as a problem I enlisted the skills of the Internet to find me the answer. The Internet didn't let me down, it produced the bike station, a charity organisation where you can rent space and tools to help you maintain your bike as well as give you expert advice and a cup of tea, all for £3.00 an hour. Weyhey!

After finishing work yesterday I was itching to get to the bike station and start the job of upgrading it. I wasn't really sure where the place was so I figured that I'd use the GPS navigator I've attached to my bike (yes, I have TomTom on my bike, what can I say?) to help me find the way. I fired it up and started typing in the city to locate the building I was looking for.

"E...D...I...O, damn, fat finger syndrome, I'll start again, E...D...I... err what's that predictive answer coming up with? Looks like El something or other."

I couldn't quite see from the glare on the screen, it was a beautiful sunny day.

"E...D...I...N... now I'm sure this isn't right. It says El Rosario. Start again, concentrate, type the whole city in, the thing must have heard of Edinburgh. E...D...I...N...B...U...R...G...H. What does it spell? EL ROSARIO!"

I was stunned and confused. All I could find were weird Spanish sounding places that I'd never heard of. After going through all the settings I discovered that the PDA had conveniently deleted all the Western European maps and left me with the Canary Islands. Clearly I was going to have to do this the old fashioned way. Ride to where I thought the place might approximately be then cycle up and down the street, avoiding asking anyone local where it was, particularly any cyclists, (I am a man after all) until I happened upon the place by accident, which was exactly how it happened. I love it when a plan comes together.

Once there things had to look better. I was in a building with loads of other cyclists busily working on their bikes. It felt homely. I had a plan, sort of, I would strip my bike until I got stuck, then call for help. I took the bolts out of the cranks, then called for help. It had been a good 5 minutes of unassisted work. I was proud of myself. Unfortunately it was really busy and the guy's who worked there were unable to get to me very quickly, fortunately there was someone on hand who I thought would be highly qualified to help. There was a Dutch guy replacing his chain set was next to me. What more qualified person did I need? He was probably born on a bike. I asked his advice and he kindly gave me the tool I was looking for. It was a special extracting tool for removing the cranks. It looked simple enough to me, screw one bit on, screw another bit till the crank pops off, have a cup of tea.

Try as I might I could not get the dam thing to screw in, even after one of the assistants showed me how, then actually did it himself on one of the cranks. I turned to the Dutch guy again, he had been so helpful the first time.

"Could you help me do this? I seem to be genetically unable to screw this thing in or I seem to lack the special screwing skills needed for this type of job."

In that really cool and comedic accent that the Dutch have he said "sure, I'll put it in for you" and he did.

So the screw bit was in the hole, all I had to do was tighten it up, do the other bit and hey presto, crank removed and time for tea. I tightened it up, I started extraction and kerrrunch. I had stripped all the threads off the crank. The Dutch guy had cross threaded the tool, I hadn't checked it and now I was sweating bullets. I grabbed an assistant and he confirmed my worst fears. The crank was ruined and there was no easy way of removing it without causing extra damage to the bike. My only option was to use a pipe splitter and a mallet and thump off the crank. I was told this method was going to damage the frame and break the bottom bracket shoulder then asked did I want to do this. What could I say?

"Have you got another shoulder?" I queried. He told me he did and so I elected to whack the hell out of my bike.

Final damage:
one ruined chain set.
one damaged frame.
one smashed bottom bracket shoulder.
Me very sad indeed.

Time was running out, and so were my wits. There were thirty minutes left before the place closed and I had a very poorly bike. After a tense moment where we thought there was no replacement shoulder, one was found then I very quickly rebuilt it, with the help of a wild haired one eyed man and a lot of nervous energy. The bike still needs a new chain, possibly a new rear dérailleur, a new bottom bracket and some more work in the garage to correct loose brakes and cables and currently has excessive drag on the cranks when pedalling but apart from that it is fine.

Here's hoping that all goes well on Saturday when I take the bike back to the workshop. I guess as long as I'm really, really far away from it then what could go wrong?

As one light extinguished another was lit

Since preparing for Beltane this year it has come to light how my family has influenced me in my path. I discovered that many of my family members are followers of an earth faith or social based belief of one sort or another. My grandmother was a humanist and my first knowledge and experience of this was at her funeral, one of the most beautiful tributes to a person's life I had ever witnessed. My great aunt a member of a Celtic community has strong beliefs in the pagan calendar and my mother, a hippie at heart, has strong beliefs in natures power within us (interesting that it is all the women in my family that believe these things, in a matriarchal society one can truly see that love, sharing and nurturing are the fundamental reasons for existence, not war, power and oppression); however even with this background the preparation for this Beltane was particularly difficult for me.

My work commitments and money problems aside I also had to deal with the harsh reality of my Dad's illness. On the 1st of April I was given the news that my Dad's brain tumour was confirmed as terminal. After a two year battle ,where things had looked victorious, it was a shock to discover and hard to come to terms with. After visiting him I felt that although the inevitable would eventually come there was plenty of time left for us, though we lived hundreds of miles apart we could still enjoy each others company.

Two weeks after this I received news that my father was critical. Two weeks. I rushed to see him to find that he had deteriorated at an alarming rate. No longer was he the powerhouse of a man I knew as a child. Only through sheer determination could he manage to walk a mere couple of feet. His eyesight gone,and the left half of his body limp he was almost helpless. Yet his strength still shone through. He was determined to battle the rigours of his disease and approached his end with dignity, there was still a flame within him that burned brightly.

On April 30th, during the final walk through I received word from my mother that my dad was unlikely to make it through the night. I asked my mother to let me know when the moment had happened and she agreed to my request. At this point a strange calm came over me. I could think of only my father and Beltane. I wasn't sure how I would cope with the photography if my father passed away during the event; however I knew that he would want me to finish the job. He was the kind of person that showed dedication to what he believed in and I felt that it would be an honour to him to do the same.

At 10 pm, as the Nied fire was lit, my father passed away. The poetry of this is something that will stay with me forever. It's as though my fathers death, his return to mother earth, was part of the story of the seasons. As winter is ushered out, the energy and vitality of the coming summer begins to affect us, like a father, like a reincarnation of him, it will nurture and protect us and prepare us for the harshness of winter, our future as adults.

As I have processed the photos of that night I have recalled all the parenting that my father has given me and I realise that though he has passed away he lives on in my actions. It is because of his beliefs and his guidance that I am who I am. He lives on, in part, through me, and the people in his life that he has touched. It's an immortality we will all achieve, our only choice being how we are remembered, positively or negatively.

So, I want to thank the society, with their views on life as we know it, for providing me with the support I needed during this time. Without knowing it you have helped me through this difficult time, all of you.

I want to thank Photo point. As a group of shy, retiring photographers we find it hard to be openly emotional about things at the best of times, but even so, this year the group bonded tremendously, as can be seen in the photos of the night, and with this bond I was able to work within that unit during an emotionally rocky time.

Lastly I want to thank Catriona, my girlfriend, who with female intuition knew exactly how to support me and help me through this period of my life. Without you I would be nothing but a compass with no needle, you give me direction and purpose and I love you for it.

So I hope once you have read this that you can take something away from it. Look towards the future as a path carved by those from the past. How you walk that path is your choice and how you treat those that you meet on that path will determine their own journey too.

Feel free to pass this message on if you feel it touches you in any way. Light, no matter how dim will always help guide us.

My first 100 miles...awww

In a bid to prove to those around me that I could ride long distances and be fine the next day I set myself a challenge. I was going to cycle from Dalkeith to Jedburgh, buy a cake and a cup of tea, carry on to the border, take a picture for proof then skip on home for supper. That would be a round trip of 110 miles and something I felt was easily achievable given my fitness and determination.

After having a chat with Catriona and her mum and doing some chores, I set off towards Jedburgh on the A68 at 12pm, 4 hrs later than I wanted to.

My inventory consisted of:
1 bike
1 rain/wind proof jacket
1 bike lock
1 bike pump
1 litre of isotonic drink
1 bag of crushed, home made cereal bars
£5.00 in cash and a bank card
1 phone
1 PDA (for music)
1 idiot on a bike.

I hadn't even left Dalkeith when I realised just how up hill the route was going to be. Up, up, up, up, it never seemed to stop. I had a little giggle with myself when I passed Dalkeith's cat hotel but apart from that it was a bit of a slog. The signs telling me how far I was away from Jedburgh weren't exactly decreasing rapidly, I was going to have to adjust my perceptions of time. My first challenge came when I arrived the bottom of Soutre hill (as described by George Taylor, 1885, the bringer of Celery to Kalamazoo). I hadn't foreseen a large climb like that and I had to change my attitude to speed very quickly to compensate for the climb. Once I had navigated that hill it was fairly plain sailing all the way to Jedburgh, with the exception of my toes going numb due to the wind chill factor, something else I'd not accounted for when setting off. When I got to Jedburgh (43 miles from Dalkeith) I was greatly lifted in my spirits with the anticipation of a small cake and a cup of tea as a reward for my efforts. After a quick circuit of the town I discovered to my horror that all the cake shops had closed. I had arrived at 3:30pm and they had shut 30 mins before I'd got there. Typical. With no cakes on offer I popped into a chocolate shop and had a quick conversation with a woman behind the counter. We discussed whether it was a good idea to head to the border. She rightly said that I'd be disappointed if I didn't go, and then told me it was 10 miles up a giant hill. I thought she was right about the disappointment and wrong about the size of the hill. It couldn't be that bad. I bought some chocolate with my 5 pound note and then headed off. After the hardest slog up hill I've ever done I stopped to ask a motorcyclist how far I had to go. He said

"you're almost there, it's only 5 miles from here, but it's all up a really, really big hill".

Maybe the chocolate woman was right.

After cycling the hill from hell I finally made it to the top and the border. Surprisingly there was a bloke selling tea and hot dogs up there. Unsurprisingly I hadn't enough money for a hot dog, I'd spent it all on chocolate. I dug around hopefully in my bag and managed to scrape enough shrapnel together to buy a tea. It was like drinking a piece of heaven! After a really interesting conversation with the old chap in the hot dog van about cycling, cyclists and killer wild goats I prepared to set off back home. Not before getting a passing motorcyclist to take my picture at the border, as proof that I'd got there. It had taken me nearly 4 hrs to arrive at the England/Scotland border and I figured that to get back would be about another 5 hrs of pedalling given my level of fatigue. I thought that I was prepared for the worst, but I was not.

I'll be honest here and say that after cruising down the massive hill I found the going tough. Tougher than I'd ever imagined. I wanted to just lay down and sleep but that wasn't an option I could take. The road was full of magic hills too. To look ahead you'd swear that you were going down hill but in fact you were going up hill. It was so de-moralising.

The night began to descend. I now realised that the lateness of my start would leave me cycling in the dark for the last 20 miles. Also the weather had closed in. It became freezing cold. My fingers sang out in pain from the wind chill. They twinged and twitched from the constant pressure from the handlebars too. I couldn't feel my feet any more. The wind chill flowing through the tops of my trainers had frozen my toes and the pedalling wasn't allowing the blood to get back into my feet.

I eventually saw a sign telling me it was 14 miles to Dalkeith. I briefely felt elation, only to realise that meant an hour and thirty minutes cycling minimum. I had no idea of the time, no food left (I had some sugar sweets I'd bought for Catriona, which I refused to eat as they were a gift) and no will. I broke down, I couldn't cycle any more, the bike wouldn't move no matter how hard I pushed the pedals, I became convinced my bike had developed a fault. I phoned Catriona and told her I couldn't do it and that I needed rescuing. I was cold, tired, hungry and stupid to have thought that I could do this. She comforted me, she told me how I would feel if I gave up. She encouraged me to walk until I felt better then to try to cycle again. If after that I was unable to do it then I was to ring her back and we'd sort something out.

"You can do it!" she shouted down the phone.

It reminded me of the Adam Sandler movies; I smiled, agreed and then started to walk. Just as I did a murder of crows alighted from a scary looking tree and circled above me. It was like in the films when someone is in the middle of the dessert and the vultures are overhead, waiting for that moment when the victim draws his last breath before gorging themselves on his pitiful corpse. Then I remembered that in the films they always make it out of the desert alive. I recalled that fantastic scene in Ice Cold In Alex when the group emerge from the desert, head to the nearest bar and sink the most satisfying lager they'd ever taste. It convinced me that I'd make it home so I carried on walking imagining really tasty beer, ice cream, cakes and biscuits, hot sweet tea, anything to keep up my spirits. After about 20 mins walking I began to realised why the bike wouldn't move earlier on. I had been on another of those magic hills. I had been going up hill not down. I'd bonked (in marathon terminology, hitting the wall) and as a result has become confused and disorientated and without realising I had just ascended the last peak of my journey and the next 30 mins was going to be all down hill! I jumped on my bike with renewed enthusiams and cruised down the other side. I was practically home.

At 11pm I carried my bike up 3 flights of stairs and finally crossed the threshold of my home. I had made it. Unfortunately my ordeal was not over. After eating and bathing I went into what I can only describe as shock. I was sitting in a hot bath shivering. I couldn't warm up. Catriona put me to bed, got me some liquid and a banana and looked after me until I was normal again (if I ever was in the first place). I slept fitfully but at least I rested, and I was home.

Injuries sustained
Sore legs
The ends of the second to last and little finger on my left hand feel weird.

Lessons learned.
The road from Edinburgh to the border is horrific.
Planning is really, really, ridiculously important.
Rest when you need to. Don't ignore your body and push on regardless.
Local women in chocolate shops are more likely to know what the road ahead is like than a bloke who's never been to the area before.
Old people are really interesting.
When you ask someone to take your picture it's almost a guarantee that they can't use a camera.
Cycling country roads at night presents all sorts of problems from speeding cars to dead deer in the road, avoid cycling back roads at night if at all possible.
Last but not least. If you are going to do a 100 mile round trip for a cake, check what time the shops close!




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