This morning was not a good morning to be me! I woke up with an even worse head-cold than I had yesterday and was rushed to get out of bed and to breakfast... From here we mounted the support wagon and picked up Ian....
Ian's uncle was very kind to cycle with us to the North of Junction 27 and by coincidence upon saying our good-byes, George's friend's Ronnie and Mike turned up on their rather fetching Trek Madones (I was very jealous!). Ronnie and Mike kindly agreed to be our guides to negotiate the perils of Preston. We cycled following them (with one section becoming very similar to a down-hill mountain bike section) but we were extremely grateful for their assistance as without it, we would have been in a right old mess!
We had the enjoyable prospect of a day of quite flat terrain which would be then interupted by the inconveneince of a rather large hill known as Shap!
After ridden through Carnforth, we stopped just outside Kendal which we made our base camp just before mounting the assault on probably the biggest climb of the ride! At the 68mile mark we started embarking on a climb which lasted to a summit at 1,400 feet over what turned out to be 15 miles! We were treated to some spectacular views before Andy and I became rather competitive and tried to see who would reach the summit first... Something that I won and then proceeded to celebrate over the final brow in a celebration reminiscent of a Tour De Framce Winner cycling with no hands and punching the air (on video I hope) but no prize.....
Here we took some photographs and met some fellow LEJOG'ers who were following a very similar route. From Shap to Penrith it was mostly down hill and we had a little bit of a race with the fellow LEJOG'ers which once again, Andy and I won - who says that we're competitive?!
We reached Penrith having sent Gerald and Anne forward to locate some establishment where we could rest out heads. We had lost 20 miles on our target yesterday due to the wind but unfortunately had no opportunity to recover some of the lost mileage, therefore we would have to try and make up for this tomorrow. Gerald and Anne found a corking B&B which has got the world's tiniest shower! For an individual who has a slightly larger "build" cleaning yourself in this over-grown sardine can became a rather comical event which lead to me standing outside the shower and showering my legs completely seperately! The toilet and bedroom also had some technology which I have never seen before including a light which switches on and off at the waft of a hand and a toilet seat which shuts itself without slamming down - A-Maz-Ing!
Today marked the half-way point of the ride and with only 4 days remaining, we are breaking into Scotland tomorrow... I have my passport ready and my immunisations done as we are going "abroad"!!!
Take care,
TK x
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