John O’Groats to Land’s End Challenge 29/4/08

Before setting off on my journey I have alreay been told so many different bits of advice. Warnings about salt crystals in socks damaging feet, solid soled shoes preventing bruising, the best combinations of salves and creams to prevent chaffing and nappy rash.

What I hadn’t got sorted was the bike and my own training schedule.

I decided to do the ride from John O’Groats to Land’s End primarily as it takes two days to travel to John O’Groats and only six hours from Penzance and finishing the ride and taking so long to get back just seemed demoralising. Also flippantly if you look at a map it is all down hill from Scotland…

There is a reason why people tend to do the journey from south to north, which takes into account prevailing winds and the severity of the terrain at the extremes, but I still decided to go my way. I planned all the routes, and booked the hostels and then set about arranging to get a bike suitable for the ride.

I decided to buy my bike through Cycle Scheme, which is something the Government developed to help commuters afford to buy bikes (you pay no tax on the purchase). I filled in all the documentation and placed my order with  my local cycle shop and got on with planning the other elements of the ride.

As the ride got closer I still hadn’t been contacted by the store to say my bike was ready for collection so I had to go around to check up on it and I’m glad I did, with barely three weeks til I was due off and no training rides completed - I was told that the model I had selected had sold out and they were not expecting delivery until the 19th May. This could prove a problem as I had planned to do my ride from the 1st to 15th May.

With the help of the team in cavendish cycles we looked into a couple of alternative bikes which I could do the trip on and left them to find out what we could get delivered in time.

Six days before I was due to set off I finally got a call saying they had managed to get the bike I originally ordered in and ready for collection. Picking it up was a thrill, I bought lots of equipment eg toolkits, medical supplies, 2 spare innertubes, puncture repair kits which I loaded into the bike panniers and rode off. I’d never ridden a bike with bags on the back and it felt very odd, but an experience I would have to get used to very quickly.

Packing everything into bags within bags I had to convince myself that I had covered every contingency. I’d arranged to meet my housemate in Chester on day nine of the ride with a bag of fresh socks and some clean clothes.

Setting off, I had arranged to go up to King’s Cross via my offices at Gt Portland Street. It did feel odd to be doing my normal commute but with the knowledge my day was going to be a lot different.

Everyone at the office had signed a card for me and I received some more advice and warnings. One of the girls tyold me how her brother had killed a sheep on a bike – my only question is what was the sheep doing on a bike in the first place?

Riding up to the station with a grin on my face, I was facing an 8 hour train journey. I’d packed a book to read whilst on my trip. I think I should have selected a longer one as by the time I had got to Newcastle I’d finished it. The journey was amazing and I now know how much I want to visit Newcastle. I thought the city looked amazing the journey into the city over the bridges by the waterfront was spectacular.

The train followed the coast and then went inland through the hills where you could see deer and snow covered peaks. The weirdest thing was the knowledge that despite travelling for 8 hours on a fast train I was only still 2/3rds of the way to the start. and I’d have to cycle all that distance and more in the next two weeks.

Getting off at Inverness, I made my way to the first hostel. My first impression was that it was huge and much more like a hotel than I had expected. As I pulled up I saw a fellow cyclist was going to the cycle store who gleefully announced that I was about to see “The best bike store in all of Scotland – It’s even heated!”

I made my way to the room and got my first surprise. The hostel dormatory had bunkbeds and all the bottom ones had been taken. Being a large bloke, it was a kind of odd to have to get up there. My real fear though was for teh person who had to sleep on the bunk beneath me.

The first person I met in the hostel was inspiring, less than 2 years previously he was paralysed, it had taken him over a year to regain his mobility and learn to ride a bike. He had just completed a cycle ride with his son in the cairngorms.

The hostel had a TV room where I met up with one of the cyclists I had seen earlier. She was hiding away from her partner who she described as “boring someone with maps.” At this point I made a vow, not to be one of those people that did that.