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Sports & Fitness

Fantastic Day

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A bay in America with the sun shining on the water

An American bay surrounded by trees when the sun it out.

The view from the top of a hill, looking down to the sea

A cyclist enjoying an ice cream in the sun shine.

‎And it was! About as good a day for cycling as you could get ‎with a strong sun in a cloudless blue sky, gently rolling terrain and a sodding great tailwind. Added to this, the bike seems to be running like a swiss watch and all I had to do was sit on the thing and watch the miles passing under the front wheel.
 
The scenery in Northern Oregon was up to the occasion with wonderful sandy shores, rock stacks and white breakers, all shrouded in a light mist for a bit of extra theatre. Oh yes, even the whales put in an appearance.
 
‎Even a puncture couldn’t wipe the smile off my face.  
 
What else do you need on a day like this? That’s right ‎a chuffing great ice cream 🙂
 
This is day 6 and we are a quarter of the way with 430 miles under our belts. Any more days  with the sun out like today and I might explode.  
 
 
Sent from my BlackBerry 10 smartphone on the EE network.

Devil Woman

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Two cyclists enjoying a break and having a coffee.

The job of sweeper mostly requires little more than riding slowly with the tail-end charlie. I am very good at it…if riding slowly was an Olympic event I would be in the medals, even without taking performance reducing drugs (or pies as most people call them).
 
However, there is always that nagging worry that one day EVERYONE on a trip will be fast. This has nearly happened on this trip. When the guests arrived they turned out to be a bunch of racing snakes with helium bikes and less fat than a veggie burger. Bugger.
 
This means I have to ride fast – I am nearly as bad at riding fast as I am good at riding slow.
 
To give you some idea of the extent of my problem I would like you to meet the pair in the photo. To preserve anonymity I will call them ‘Pierre and Katie’. The week before this trip they entered the Thruxton 24 hour race. Most people have the wit to enter as part of relay teams but about 40 idiots, including ‘Pierre and Katie’, entered the solo category.  
 
Pierre rode a gobsmaking 410 miles, placing him fourth. Katie ‘only’ did 361 but this placed her faster than all but 7 riders and the fastest girl by a country mile. I hate her. She cycles past me on hills grinning and whistling, brow untroubled by the sweat that is drenching me from head to foot.  
 
My sweeping is now being done from a veeeeery long way back – anyone encountering a problem will have time to completely rebuild their bike ready to watch me arrive and collapse sweating and gasping on the verge.
 
Bloody ‘Katie’!

Oh I Do Like To Be Beside The Seaside

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The cycling group beside the seaside in Westport, WA

‎Yes, we are now ‎at the seaside. Or rather we are at the Oceanside. Another cracking day for weather with clear blue skies, though tomorrow is forecast to be overcast and we may see rain on Wednesday.
 
So what do you do at the seaside? That’s right – get your picture taken with your heads poking through a silly board!
 
 
Sent from my BlackBerry 10 smartphone on the EE network.

Whale Meat Again

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 On Saturday we had time to kill while we waited for the last two riders to fly in.  Actually, rather a lot of time because we were awake at 4am….bloody jet lag!
 
We had a good old ‘Merican breakfast of corned beef hash at a diner, mooched around a mall then retired to a park to strategise is the sun.  I knew that there was a good chance of seeing whales on this trip but hadn’t expected to see one quite so early, an certainly not in a Seattle park:
 
One of the riders taking a break in the sunshine.

We also saw another rather curious thing in the park……a girl who had been sunbathing near us got up, moved  about 25 yards, sat down again and proceeded to take a ‘selfie’ of a rather intimate part of her anatomy.  We have reflected on this at length but have no explanation to offer.

Yesterday we finally started riding, 76 glorious miles down the side of the Hood canal in absolutely perfect weather.  It is good to be on the road again!!!
 
What with jet lag, the heat, and 76 miles under our belts everyone was tired and it was an early night. Unfortunately I was so tired that I fell asleep nursing a nearly full beer!  It seems that at some point in the night I tried to take a swig from the bottle but only succeeded in tipping beer all over my face…  If you have ever woken in the night because you are drowning in beer (and let’s face it, who hasn’t?) you will know it isn’t much fun.
 
Today we turn west and will actually be on the Pacific coast by bed time.

The Bridge

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Elton John but I’m not going to help you with them all! 

Has anyone seen the footage of the ‘Merican suspension bridge that fell to bits when it got caught in a cross wind back in 1940? It started to wobble and twist and eventually fell into the sea.  Well this was the 2nd attempt which has fared rather better.  It is the Tacoma Narrows bridge which we crossed on our way to Port Townsend with our first load of bikes and riders. 

Tacoma Narrows bridge which we crossed on our way to Port Townsend with our first load of bikes and riders. 
No excitements to report yet – no lost wallets or keys locked in cars but there is still plenty of time :-).

 
The forecast for tomorrow is clear blue skies and highs in the mid-20’s… I believe that fair weather is also predicted for Blighty so no real cause for smugness but, never the less, I do feel a little smug.

West Coast

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That’s not a song title I hear you say. Yes it is – Lana Del Ray. Only released this year and written specifically so I could use it in this blog entry. Thanks Lana.

It’s not a bad life, this running cycling holidays malarkey. However the downside, and it is a whopper, is that I actually get to cycle less than when I had a proper job and MUCH less than I would like. My ambition to cycle 10000 miles this year lies in tatters but I do have an opportunity for one grand end-of-season hurrah. Our annual Specific Coast Highway jaunt starts on Sept 13th and this year I get to ride THE WHOLE THING. We will be supported by Geoff (aka Big Geoff) who will drive the love machine; I’m not sure how I feel about that but he has promised not to take any liberties with her and if he breaks his word I’ll break his legs.

For my own amusement I’ll blog my way down the coast and hopefully the experience from a bicycle saddle will provide a slightly different perspective this year. We fly out on Thursday to make preparations (ok, buy a beer cooler) and start riding on Sunday so watch this space…..

Games Without Frontiers

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‎In the last 5 days I have been in Switzerland, Germany, France, Austria and Lichtenstein. In the case of the first 3 I have visited multiple ‎times. Occasionally, on‎ major road bridges, there might be a border post but always unmanned. On minor bridges and most land borders there are no border controls at all. On minor roads there is often no clue at all that one is entering a new country.  I suppose this is the Schengen agreement in action.

As someone who likes stamps in his passport it is pants; I also find it quite frustrating to frequently not know what country I am in. This a practical problem with a SatNav that assumes the address you are searching for is in the country you are currently in unless told otherwise.

I have just spent 5 days researching the first part of a new route along the Rhine from source to sea.  With only limited time available I have concentrated on getting the bit out of the mountains done and I am now is Strasbourg waiting for a train back to Basel and a plane home. I am especially looking forward to having my passport thoroughly checked but only after being made to stand in line with a load of Europeans who must find it completely be‎wildering.

Next week another adventure begins…..

Sent from my BlackBerry 10 smartphone on the EE network.

House of the Rising Sun

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‎Today should have been a lazy 50 but we had to re-do the 10 miles that we backtracked yesterday to find a hotel. It was still pretty easy going and we were in by 2:45 (no sweeping for me today).

We are staying in a small hotel in Mora. It was once a grand private house and is now a 15 bedroom hotel which we have completely taken over.  ‎The owners are lovely and very keen to impress us. When Rob arrived with the luggage they insisted he joined them for lunch then greeted all the cyclists with home-made lemonade. Tonight they are serving us a ‘tradditional’ Portugese dinner and my hopes are high.

We have a wonderful room overlooking open countryside (see picture) and tomorrow the sun will rise and greet us through our picture window.

Today was sunny and hot; the forecast for tomorrow is ‘chuffing toasty’. I here the weather is poor in blighty…….snigger.
Sent from my BlackBerry 10 smartphone on the EE network.

Nobody Said It Was Easy

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‎2 entries in 1 day….you lucky blighters. So, when the last entry was filed I was sunning in the park. The phone rang and it was Rob, my partner in crime, to inform me that he was outside our hotel for the night and it had gone bust. Bugger.  

To make matters worse it was the only hotel in town. Buggery bugger. We needed 16 rooms. Buggering buggery bugger.

To cut a short story long, we are in a very nice hotel that required backtracking 10 miles and the application of considerable financial grease……particularly upsetting since the original hotel was prepaid. Did I say bugger?

Running cycle trips in the sunshine is mostly money for old rope but not today 🙁

Never Ending Journey

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Today I am sweeping – this means riding with whoever happens to be at the back. I left the hotel 5.5 hours ago and have done…drum roll….‎35 miles. This may be a new personal best (worst?).
Sweeping relies on 2 specific skills:
1/ riding very slowly – I have a natural God-given talent
2/ being very patient and tolerant – oh well, 1 out of 2 isn’t bad
I am sitting in the park tanning my eye sockets while waiting for my wards to finish their 3 course lunch.
‎Last night we visited a Chinese restaurant (after all, when in Rome…..well something like that‎). The mad old crone who runs the place is known to us from our research trip last November and is the main reason for the visit. As with the previous visit, she spent the evening staring at us and cacklin hysterically every time we said or did anything.  

Sent from my BlackBerry 10 smartphone on the EE network.
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