I am an individual!

Managed to start at 8am only to find the roads were just ice. Not even patches, but completely ice over. Nihtmare as I had three 200meter climbs. If you stop, you will not start again as the back wheel will just spin on the spot. Averaged just 16kmph as even the down hill parts needed to be done incredibly slowly. The hills do have a bit of snow on them. There were sections where hail embedded itself into the ice, so that gave me a little grip. Constantly having your hands on the brakes in -2 degree weather makes your hands go numb very quickly. I needed to stop three times to warm them up as they stopped being able to squease the brakes. There was a bit of passing sleet but nothing as bad as yesterday but having a puncture in these conditions is really horrid. First step to changing an inner tube is the cup of tea. After the last hill, there was nice dip into “Peas Bay” where there are crazy people kite surfing.

Back out nd along a horrid dirt path next to the A1 and rail line. Here I was incredibly worried that I would get another puncture and I ran out of inner tubes. I would have to get to smewhere warm and dry to patch the tues I have up. So once I got to Dunbar I thought I should just call it a day. It was nearly 1pm and I would only have an 2.5 hours left before sunset to do a stretch that took nearly 5 hours in the morning. There were no more hills, but it was damn cold, weather report was predicting more sleet and I was getting worried about getting a puncture on the next sectin which looked like more dirt roads.Caught the train to Edinburgh. So, just 60km today. With the total distance sitting at 790km I am annoyed at not breaking the 805km mark needed to get the “Mini Proclaimer” (500 miles). Tomorrow I have a couple hours in the morning before I go to Manchester so I will have a little ride around.

Started before 8am with some lighs on because today was gonna be a very l9ng day. First whitby along thhe cinder trail and another puncture. Whitby was nice and allowed me to restock. Then the stupidly steep hills of yorkshire. Hovis adverts do not do them justice. Three 250meter climbs at 25% slopes. Murder. Getting through M’brgh was hell. Put me in a bad mood and behind schedul. After that iwent onto main roads to catch up some time. Got to newcaßtle very late but the last hour was through cities so there were lights. Went out with some people i met to bigg market.

First of all there was the ride to the Humber. The moon was out and the sun was only just rising at 8am. The bridge is massive. Then it was a long  long route along the side of the Humber. This was directly against the wind and with nothing shielding me from the horrid gusts.At Selby I got to see the swinging bridge. and the route to york has planet monuments along it placed to scale with their distance from the sun. The sun is in ofcause shining out of York. Short trip today at 100km but against the wind most of the way.

I did take a video over the humber and lots of pictuers, especially as I saw the bridge being swung, but there is a screwup abut this. I was just about to use the computers available at the hostel to upload them by putting the SD cards into the mini camera and use it as a usb drive. The damn thing realises it is not a card it has seen before and then formats it. So not only have I lost my camera photos, but also the stuff on my android SD drive. I just re-downloaded the maps onto the android card, but I lost a couple movies I wanted to watch. Grrr, and the day was going so well with no screwups.

My knee is starting to ache a bit. Will do some stretches tonight. Tomorrow is a long 140km day btu going east.

Stage one and it started with a hungover in Cambridge. First of al I overslept by an hour. Then I realised I forgot my bank cards once I was already 12km out on Cambridge. So that was 2 hours lost at the start of the day. The wind was very favourable and I was doing whole sections at over 35kmph. Then just after Wisbech everything started going wrong. First I started going the wrong way. Then the sun set and the rain started. I got a puncture in the pitch dark. Managed to change the inner tube with the rainpouring only to get another puncture a few minutes later. Inthe middle of nowhere lI spotted a house and made it there to ask if I could patch up my inner tubes in the dry. The patches don’t work in the rain. Both tubeshad more than three holes. Probably because I didnt realise I had a flat straight away. Qt that point I Ijust had to get a taxi for thelast 30km.