The start...
Trip Start
Jul 08, 2008
1
16
Trip End
Jul 25, 2008
John O'Groats,
Scotland,
United Kingdom
Wednesday, July 9, 2008
It all started back in Vang Vieng in Laos where I was sharing a bottle of vodka on a bamboo hut balcony with a group of South Africans, an Irish girl and a guy from London. A couple of lads appeared next door and they had loaded up mountain bikes on their balcony. In the bizarre way that British people speak to each other when abroad but ignore each other in the streets back home a conversation was struck up and it turned out that TinTin and Lloyd were cycling from the Philippines to Vietnam (see http://www.youtube.com/user/CycleAsia). Many friendships were made that week in Vang Vieng and the guys ended up becoming good mates of our crowd. A few weeks later the pace of Vang Vieng took its toll on Stuart (TinTin) and he had to go to Bangkok to get a malignant stomach ulcer seen to. At the same time I was there to get an operation on my hand so it was in Bangkok that we really got to know each other
Setting up the trusty steed
. We stayed in touch, the Chinese wouldn't grant Stu a visa to cycle in China, he decided to cycle John O'Groats to Lands End when he got back home, I started off saying I would cycle with him for a day or two around Manchester, the romanticism got hold, I decided to do the whole thing, I mentioned it to Phil, the romanticism got hold, I mentioned it to Carl, the romanticism got hold and here we all are.The causes:
- Stuart and his friends were always doing his cycling for the mental health charity Rethink.
- Myself and Phil decided to dedicate ours to Cancer Research since we both know people affected by this. It is especially poignant to myself since my Uncle Ian died a year past during our cycle.
- Carl decided to dedicate his cycle to his father who died last year of Mesothelioma.
The route:
Over a 1000 miles from the barren reaches of Northern Scotland through the industrial North West of England to hilly Cornwall. Click on the text above for an interactive map. We will begin at John O'Groats which entails a journey with the bikes first to Edinburgh and then onto Thurso. This 8 hours scenic ride on the train with bikes cost us an amazing £13.50 each...amazing when considering I paid £6.80 for 15 minutes on a train from Taunton to Castle Cary a week ago. We will the overnight at the John O'Groats youth hostel on the evening of the 8th July before posing for a few pics by the signpost and setting off on the morning of the 9th...lets hope the wind isn't against us on the lat plains of Sutherland that morning...The plan is to camp so we will be carrying 10-15kg of equipment each on our panniers
Ready for action
.The warm up:
I set off on Monday from Airdrie to Edinburgh to meet the boys. After Sunday's test ride with the panniers when I got two punctures and my pump failed (daddy had to drive out and deliver a new pump) I was slightly nervous about the 40 mile ride. In the end it was mostly OK with just a small failure of my panniers; better to happen now than on the road I guess. Carl and Phil were waiting at Waverley train station fully kitted up in lycra...for the train to North Queensferry. North Queensferry is right by the Forth Rail Bridge with amazing views in all directions. We let ourselves into my sis's fella's house as it was open...later we discovered why security was so lax, Gordon Brown's house is just round the corner and there are armed police following everyone they don't recognize as Phil and Carl found out when the went for a walk and a pint. Angie (my sis) and Iain (her fiancé) made us feel extremely welcome with a massive carbonara with lashings of Rioja. Carl and Phil especially needed the carbohydrate since they had cycled 0.3 miles this far.
We all slept well and were up early as a result of the sun streaming through the windows
The bikes don't even need us...
. After lots of brews and making sure we had everything we needed and that all our electronics managed to communicate with each other we enjoyed our last shower in a nice warm house for a bit and got packed up ready for the cycle into Edinburgh. Call this 1st day giddiness cause we could have got the train from a mile up the road but instead cycled 15 miles into the town centre. It was worth it though as it was all on excellent cycle path. I am not sure if was all that oil money or what but they certainly know how to do cycle paths up in Scotland, we hardly touched a road the whole way. There must be money to be made in Edinburgh as the houses we passed were amazing. The journey was punctuated by Carl's left pannier jumping off his bike every time we went over a bump. When this happened Carl nearly crashed as a result of losing the weight from one side of the bike and everyone in earshot though he had wiped out...its nothing a few tie wraps won't sort out anyway. We arrived in Waverley station in plenty of time so nipped out and got a load of irn bru, scotch pies and rolls to make pie butties for the ride north. The train to Inverness was pretty normal but after that things started to get a bit strange. First we had to put our bikes in a carriage that wasn't going to be used during the journey as none of the platforms were long enough for 4 carriages (and boy they weren't...some of them were only 2 slabs on a bit of grass)...no sooner had we got seats on the train (more difficult than you would imagine as the wrong reservation cards had been put on every seat) than we all had to get off again as there had been a fire alarm on the train meaning they had to bring in a new carriage...Fortunately George, the nicest conductor British Rail ever had was on hand to calm everything down
Bamo on the road to Edinburgh
. When we eventually got going the train ride has to be one of the worst in the UK...it got delayed at every stop pretty much...some stops are 'request stops' meaning that you have to tell George you actually want the train to stop there.So in the end we were 45 minutes getting late into Thurso...phoning Stuart he told us that the youth hostel woman was being quite the oger they always were and was saying if we weren't in by 11 then we wouldn't be in...but she could sort us out a taxi to get us there on time. We did that in the end. The sunset (at 10.45 in the evening) during the taxi ride was one of the most amazing we had seen. The whole sky went a special orange colour.
On arrival I immediately remembered why I hadn't been in a Scottish youth hostel for almost 20 years...it was as it has always been; grumpy 50 something women running the show, sheet sleeping bags, lights out and all sorts of other inane rules. As we knew we would be too late for the pub we got a couple of cans for our arrival but had to sneakily gulp them down incase miss busy body caught sight of us. On arrival we were greeted by the rest of the guys: Kevin, Anthony, Stuart and Chris.
After the usual attemot at youth hostel sleep; being subjected to trying to sleep in the same room as 7 other men with all the snoring, farting etc that entails we managed to dodge miss busybody and all the hoorah Henries that were staying in the hostel and get straight out to John O'Groats for 9am....
Day 0
Miles: 15
