clairedavieswriter

It may have rained on the King’s parade, but the sun came out for ours.

I’m pleased to say that I have company for the first two weeks of my six week tour. Jon is smiling because he still thinks he’s going on holiday. Bernard’s stablemate, Colin, was feeling a little self-conscious with his shiny new yellow panniers.

They say every journey starts with a single step. The first step in my 2,400km journey was barely 10km long: a gentle ride in warm afternoon sun to Farnborough North. From there, we let the train take the strain down to Portsmouth. There’s no point over-exerting ourselves: after all, the project doesn’t really start till we cross the border into France.

On the train, we had our first conversation with a fellow cyclist – a lady carrying a sack of compost and a large flowerpot that almost certainly weighed more than our luggage.
Later, in the queue for the ferry, we were joined by four other cyclists – all men, two travelling together, the others alone, all with enviably strong looking legs. Too late now to worry about whether I should have done more training!
Lodgings for Bernard and Colin were spartan: we lashed them to the ship with a length of blue rope and hoped for a calm crossing.

Surprisingly, His Majesty was there to welcome us onto the ship, but appeared to have gone overboard with his attire. Perhaps we should have suggested he take a holiday after all the excitement.