5th August 2006

After 4 days it feels like I’ve already seen everything and yet I’m sure there is much more to come! Day 1 started slightly on the wrong foot by my expert packing techniques being proved less than expert within 100m of the front door, but things were soon rectified and we were on our way! The leaving sensation didn’t hit me until a little way down the road when it really dawned on me that I was now not just dreaming but living my dream. My bubble was slightly burst when at a stop I found I couldn’t release my SPD clip & so my shoe was stuck to the peddle, on closer inspection and after a bit of brute force we found I’d lost a screw at some point so it just turned round, Colin came to the rescue with a temporary fix but we then had to find a cycle shop in Petersfield to get the right screw :(

Day 2 threw another spanner into the works as Colin had been ill over night, after packing up camp we went into the local town of Billinghurst to find a doctor to get antibiotics, they have helped over time but Colin is understandably not as strong as he might be but is certainly doing a grand job. These delays began to make our Brussels deadline of Saturday night look doubtful. We also had a near miss on day 2 when an idiotic BMW driver decided to try and overtake us on a blind summit causing two cars to slam on their breaks & narrowly avoiding collisions.

Day 3 brought the inevitable UK rain! It looked a bit dodgy in the morning so we prepared ourselves but as the day went on it got wetter & wetter! Thankfully by the time we reached Dover at about 1pm the rain had eased. As we sailed away from our first country we were however soaked soaking wet while we enjoying our big plate of fish & chips! We got a little lost in Calais but once on the open road we steamed ahead as best we could. When we ran out of steam at Bourbourg we were nowhere near anywhere that we knew that had a campsite so when I went to get our stuff from the InterMarche I used my broken French to locate a campsite, a discussion ensued (so I just smiled!) Eventually they decided there wasn’t a campsite but the guy behind us in the queue knew of somewhere we could camp so we should follow him. We dutifully tailed this car for a few kilometres until he pulled in at what looked like someone’s house, he spoke no English so we thanked him for his help and went to investigate. We found that the house, the caravan and the shed/house were all unoccupied at the moment but as there were two of us and it was nice and sheltered we setup camp hoping for the best!

In the morning everyone had returned and but still no one spoke English but I did manage to convey my task to one of them after having to decline a coffee. We set off hoping to make Brussels but soon realised this was unrealistic despite the beautiful Belgium cycle lanes. We adjusted our route to head for Oudenaarde where we knew there was a campsite. The rain came again in Oostrozebeke about 20 km from out destination and as we stopped to get our coats we were frantically beaconed into the aptly named ‘Pitstop’, we were bought drinks sat chatting for probably close on an hour with a very friendly group of the pubs locals. I certainly hope I will be able to return to the Flanders area at some point and when I do I’ll be sure to look out the ‘Pitstop Gang’ again :) The Butlin’s style camp we stayed in Oudenarrde was an interesting experience but we met a very nice Dutch couple in the ‘restaurant’ who we chatted with over our ‘big meal for hungry cyclists’ (still no idea what it was!

Today we cycled into Brussels without much event apart from taking half an hour & 5 miles to find our way out of Oudenaarde (after a number of mis-directions!). In Brussels we saw a few of the sights before making our way out to stay with a friend of Crossroads. We’ve had a lovely afternoon of relaxation and recuperation and look to leave a little later tomorrow but hopefully still get most of the way to the German border.

Thanks to everyone for their messages of support and encouragement.

Tim