The streets of London are paved with......

Potholes!! Some of them would need a ladder to get out of them. It's also very busy (even at 6.30 in the morning).

As you have probably deduced, we eventually decided on London to Derby as originally planned. We took 14 hours to get back to Derby, which included 9 and a half hours of actual cycling time at an average of 14.7 miles per hour. I have never been so glad to see a 'Welcome to Derby' sign, although by that stage we were still pretty strong and kept a good pace going through the city, including a failed attempt at setting off a speed camera! We beat the welcoming committee to the finish line, so we clapped them in having driven all the way from Ashbourne.


Worst bits of the day were getting up at 4.45 am having gone to bed just before midnight, and then the miles between 95 and 110, just because I was bushed and couldn't eat any more energy bars. Thank goodness for bananas and Jeremy brewing up from the back of his car. What a star spending his entire day meeting us at assorted pubs along the way....hang on, perhaps there is some method in his madness!


The highlights were breakfast in Hertfordshire at Simon and Phillipa's, the tuna pasta bake and apple crumble which Tracy cooked for us on Friday evening and the fantastic English countryside we came through thanks to Carl's route, Martin's Tom Tom and Paul's programming of the aforementioned route into the aforementioned Tom Tom. We would have still been going had we relied on reading maps.

Between us we raised well over £2,000 for Ilam School, a massive thank you to everyone who sponsored me, it really helped me through the training to know I'd got all of that support. I'm also very grateful to Donna and the children for preparing a great bath and pasta dinner for when I got home.

My legs (and rear quarters) have been fine over the rest of the weekend, carrying loads of chairs and tables on Sunday afternoon was a bit of a struggle but I'm now raring to get back out on my bike.

It's been a hard slog and my old mucker Nige was never far from my mind. He's got a bigger, infinitely more important challenge on his plate. I feel fortunate that I can go out and ride my bike when I want, 'cos I know he'd love to be out there too. Get better soon old lad and the mountain bikes can come out of semi-retirement!