Day 2 (at last)

Yes, the rumours are true - I am still alive and kicking. Just tech dificulties yesterday - we tried laptop, iPad, iPhone and Blackberry and none would connect to guest house WiFi so there was no way to post anything.

What a day it turned out to be though !
When I was with Clare one day visiting her old school (in Shropshire), I commented on how I'd like to bring my bike to these hills - what a great challenge they would be. To roughly paraphrase Sir Steve Redgrave, if I ever say something like that again you can shoot me !

The ride started off in leafy Chipping Norton. Wind was fresh but a little less head on so progress was pretty good. At one point I passed a vintage tractor cavalcade, some great old tractors including one like I learnt to drive on. Good job Dad wasn't yet on the van or I might not have seen him again that day (a retired farmer that can't resist a nostalgic trip).

Soon after the Garmin went a bit nuts and tried to send me via every main road possible. After having gone a few miles off route I got it going again and headed cross country to re-join the road I should have been on. It was then the term 'beautiful rolling countryside' came home to roost. Rolling ? Change that for flippin' lumpy !!  Over the course of the day I did 6800ft of climbing over 86 miles, that's more than I've done in a single ride before and my quads new it. Having said that - I did get some amazing views of this green and pleasant land in which we live.
Got to end of ride safely, the last 20 miles taking an eternity due to lumps but felt great (well I did after a couple of hours and a huge meal anyway).

Before I sign off - a huge thank you to Tim for supporting me so well. It takes so much grief away from me so I can concentrate on cycling - cheers Tim.

Also thanks to all the drivers yesterday for giving me plenty of space........well except this one bus driver - what a plonker ! And what a cheek to use my cycling jersey to clean a stripe down his bus.

Thanks also to a fellow cyclist who stopped for a chat when I was re-fuelling at the van and who donated £10 despite not knowing me from Adam.
All that was left was to sleep and dream of the Long Mynd.