Lands End to John O'Groats Monday 12 July - Thursday 22 July: 935 miles, 17 counties, 16 punctures (in all), 12 cooked breakfasts and too many hills.
There were good bits and bad bits, but happily the four of us, Charlie Armitstead, George McFerran, Esmond Tweedie and Christopher Villiers made it to our destination in one piece in our planned timeframe of 11 days.
Firstly and most painfully, one doesn't quite appreciate how hilly this country is: eleven days on a cycle has left me feeling well qualified to speak about this. The worst offending areas that we came across were surprisingly Cornwall and Devon - all the roads seem to be built across valleys rather than along them and at the end of day two I thought we might never make it! The Scots, while having plenty of hills, sensibly seem to run their roads around them - or perhaps we were just fitter by the time we got there! I did finally discover (unfortunately on the last day) the answer to getting up a hill was to stare at the ground in front of you and never look up at the summit - it is almost certainly false anyway!
It was also a bit of a revelation to find what a spectacularly beautiful country it is in places: in England some highlights were riding through Herefordshire (we stayed in a lovely little pub in Ledbury), Cumbria and Devon (despite the hills!). However I have to say that it was Scotland that really did it for me: riding off the beaten track in Dumfriesshire, up past Loch Lomond and through Glencoe were particular highlights. There is of course a flip side: almost inevitably it started raining as we moved into that urban sprawl between Liverpool and Manchester. Despite our best efforts to be open minded, I don't think any of us will be rushing back to Warrington, Wigan (there wasn't even a pier!), and Preston. North of the border, our skirmish with the vast conurbation of Glasgow was also pretty forgettable.
A cyclist is generally a hungry chap and we seemed to consume vast quantities of whatever we could get our hands on. Mostly this was pub food, which appears to be the same from top to bottom and quickly gets a little tiring: pies, garnish and all. In between meals we discovered that flap jacks are the answer - they keep you going longer than any chocolate bars we found. We stayed mostly in B&Bs with a range of some exceptionally friendly proprietors and others less so - the one common theme was a large cooked breakfast every morning as well as a healthy dose of chintz!
Despite getting a fair bit of practice at changing tyres, punctures proved to be the bane of our lives. We all suffered, but Esmond proved a particular offender, partly I think because his yellow tyres, while looking great, were in fact designed for use in an indoor velodrome! It was however a team effort to change the things and seemed to contribute as much sweat and angst as any of the largest hills we faced!
Much to our disappointment we didn't come across any other cyclists doing the same thing until we actually got to our destination. Satisfactorily, the majority seemed to have completed the journey in over two weeks. This however was evidently not the full picture, as the little old lady in the gift shop at John O'Groats actually looked relatively unimpressed as we boldly claimed to have completed the journey in six days!
Some inspiration was gleaned from reading in the papers of Lance Armstrong's astonishing feats of endurance in the Tour de France. However more importantly it also introduced us to the concept of the "peleton" - this is a method "slip streaming" when you ride in a close-nit line while rotating the man in the lead every mile. This made a huge difference, as not only did it provide some protection against the wind for the riders behind it was also much more sociable and seemed to make the time pass much faster.
Happily, despite our lack of cycling experience, we managed to avoid any serious injuries - the "peleton" did come tumbling to halt on a rather wet road in Cumbria. I was the unfortunate fall guy who hit the tarmac, but happily managed to escape with a scrape and a bruise and we pressed on just a little shaken up.
Lastly the arrival - yes, it was even better than expected! John O'Groats is not necessarily the best place for an extensive celebration, but we made up for things on our way back in Inverness. While I was hugely grateful to hand my bike to a courier in Inverness to take it back down South, I now have got it back and along with the others looking forward to getting back in the saddle.
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