Back in Action – and Planning a new Ride

Ah well squared. The great 6000-mile bike ride from Cirencester to Hanoi didn’t come off, but there have been compensations. Since my last post, I was for quite a while in a bit of a grim state, recuperating at home from what a lovely young German neurologist – eventually consulted at the John Radcliffe Hospital […]

Dreams Postponed – the Bike Trip is Off

Ah well. It was worth the planning and the effort. But in the event, I’m not going to do the Great-2012-Bike-Trip-Of-A-Lifetime to Moscow and Hanoi. So instead of images from the road to Moscow and then from Beijing to Hanoi, let me illustrate this blog entry first (left) with the lovely balloons from Meg and […]

Pedalus Interruptus

Sadly, sadly, dear friends, followers and supporters, the feared flare of neck and nerves happened in Holland, and I’m afraid to have to report that today Tuesday I am back home in Cirencester, having been retrieved from the Harwich ferry this morning by my lovely Sue. As you can see from the pictures, I did […]

Farewell Blighty

In the final couple of hours before I get on the Saturday night ferry into Easter Day from Harwich to Hook of Holland, I bid farewell to England for the next six months with images of the most beautiful Cambridgeshire and Suffolk countryside and villages, reminding me why I so love this country and living […]

Day Two and Eating off a Plane

I know I said I wouldn’t post every day, but tonight, sitting in a warm pub in Old Warden, Bedfordshire, home of the world-renowned Shuttleworth collection of vintage aeroplanes which I’ll visit tomorrow, I couldn’t resist this one, of dinner this evening on a wing and a perhaps even a prayer. I’m preparing to camp […]

Up and Away

So, the journey begins. Forty miles north-east from Cirencester to friends near Banbury, and neither wind nor rain, nor even hills proved as challenging as I persuaded myself to expect. Averaging just eight miles an hour, progress across Europe will be slow – heading for Cambridge tomorrow, then Harwich, Hook of Holland, Munster, Bielefeld, Hanover, […]

Forecast of 45mph headwinds – why am I doing this?

With departure set for the day after tomorrow, just 36 hours away, I was amused trawling old photos to find this first recorded evidence of my passion for spoked wheels. I guess I’m under a year on the left, and about three on the trike on right. The photos will have been taken in the summers […]

One week left, Raven packed – and ready to star in The Standard

So, Raven is readied, panniers, tent and bags test-mounted and photographs taken for an article on the pending adventure scheduled for next Thursday’s local Standard newspaper in the Cotswolds. Fame at last… Below right is how my study looked with everything piled up in one great heap before being packed. (Note that Myshkin, aka Wussum […]

Fundraising progress (£1500 and rising!) and the elasticity of time

Two weeks today, and I’m off. Blimey. Moscow, Beijing and beyond beckon, and nerves both emotionally and physically seem to be charging up, as I bid farewell to my very-nearly-85-year-old Mum (on the right at Braunston last weekend having a go at the tiller of our narrowboat the Molly May), and both greet and also […]

26 days to go: Client endings & sobering reminder why maybe best to have quit journalism

With a rapidly closing 26 days to go until I pedal into the sunrise (going East, after all), three things to muse about in this weekend’s blog: The ending (at least for now) of the work of therapy during this coming week with some 20 brave individuals who’ve sat in that green chair in the […]