LEJOG - You were only supposed to blow the bloody doors off!

I’m gonna try to do my best to confuse you as I go.  It’s day 2 but in fact it's day 1 of the cycling.  Because of best laid contingency plans I found the B&B last night even though my crap nav does not do full postcode searches and I did not have the full address of the property.  Anyway I stumbled upon it late and because I had phoned to report a very late arrival I had the door code to get in.  

Breakfast was grand.  Oh how I had pondered over the poached eggs and beans on wholemeal toast the night before determined to start off on the right carbohydrate and protein foot.  However, Audrey II took control of my gob just as the ‘…and what would Sir like to have for breakfast…’ wafted in front of me which resulted in a full English being deposited on the table.  Oh dear.  Bad start.  And for the first time in many months I also saw sliced white bread on the sideboard in front of the toaster and so decided to go the full unhealthy hog and have white toast too.  

Yeuck!  It’s now that I realise just how bad the white sliced stuff is.  I was hit by the sickly sweet taste of sugar as I pushed a piece of it resplendent with bacon and tomato (the healthy bit) down my throat to a ravenous Audrey II.  And to think I used to eat up to a loaf of it a day.  Hell fire no wonder I was suffering from type 2 diabetes.

I was to meet London Alan and Kathryn at Land’s End today.  With an offer of a bite of lunch at 1pm calling, Audrey II encouraged me to get a move on.  I left in a slight hurry at approx 11:30 having failed to 1, change my shreddies (1) and put on the padded underwear and 2, to liberally apply bum cream.  A short detour to Newlyn’s small seafront public toilets sorted that out.  For some rushed reason I ended up telling a bloke in the bogs that I was just going to apply some bum cream which had him departing tout suite with a zuuup of his flies before he had, I think, finished (I don’t normally check for these things when I go into public toilets, honest)…

Now, my crap nav, which is going to do its best to take me to the other end of the planet, vehermenently disagreed with the direction I was taking to Lands End via Mousehole.   At every opportunity it was saying ‘do a U turn’, ‘DO A U TURN’, 'DO IT!'  Did it know something I didn’t?

The ride along the sea front on the Sustrans route 3 pedestrian and cycle path was pleasant.  An occasional ‘excuse me’ to day walkers is so much nicer than a bell.  Lah de da - all very nice.  I suddenly broke into a cold shiver with an immediate feeling of anxiety and foreboding.  I hadn’t completed the first mile of today’s ride but after what has been about 4 months of preparation the size of the challenge suddenly registered.  ‘You’re going where?  From where?  HAH you foolish fat man!’, ...said my brain…

Up ahead route 3 suddenly took off stratospherically in a way that one would expect it to become a set of ladders.  Envisioning Benny Cummerbums Dr Strange film with the twisting contorted streets, I decided I could 'zoom' the hill so I’m immediately up in the pedals and accelerating hard.  Push push push, argh Nooo!  Speed was lost at an incredible rate.  I tried to work down through my Roelhoff 14 speed via a twist grip but not a chance.  The bike ground with me still in 6th gear to an immediate halt akin to hitting a brick wall and embarrassingly, cos I knew that a couple of couples were walking up the hill behind me, I stepped off the bike.  And wheeled it up the last 20 yards or so.

Now considering that I intended to RIDE from Land's End to John O Groats, failing to get to the top of the very first short sharp hill hit me with an effect like Mike Tyson hitting a 10 stone wet weakling.  It crumpled me.  And that’s not all.  On the way into Mousehole its pretty obvious that the ONLY way out is by the road in the distance which was draped like a ribbon of, er, ribbon over Kathryn’s lumpy bumpy shoulders.  

Feck!  Low gear engaged and with a slow grinding push push, gasp gasp up I went.  At the bottom of the hill Ma Boy, who had been somewhat quiet since the run to Hornsea last week, suddenly re-appeared with a daaaAAA…. but before finishing his ‘D ‘must have looked up, seen the hill and with a click and slam of the bedroom door fecked off back under the covers.  

For what seemed like an eternity up she went.  Finally approaching the top another car driver crawled past with a jabbering passenger and his smily head stuck out of the window grinning at the sweaty fat man.  I think he said ‘well done’ under his guffaws…

I can just imagine it now.  A friendly Michael Caine type of a Sustrans route manager saying to one of his team who has totally misunderstood the meagre requirements of the Sustrans business case and who's totally lacking any understanding of the type of people likely to ride on Sustrans routes, the immortal words “You were only supposed to blow the bloody doors off!”.  C’mon Sustrans if you want mere mortals to ride your routes at least make them rideable.  After all I do not ride my bike to end up pushing it up rather steep German women [mountains - see earlier blog entry].  

Nothing else on the ride was quite as steep as the Mousehole climb.  But still lots of upsy downsey stuff, severe at times.  The wind had strengthened and even though I was heading in a south westerly direction it was bang into my face.  I now love the wind. Nonetheless, I said to an old gent in the village of Sennen towards the end of the ride that I thought the forecast was for a Northerly today?  “Norly?” questions the man, “Arrr, we only does Sour Westerlees round these paaarrrts… Arrr..”.  

I knew I was close.  Most of the farmland was scrubby like it had been sprayed with sea water and all the trees were bent over with tousled twigs blown pointily into a north easterly direction…

I arrived at Lands End some 45 minutes late.  London Alan was there.  It was not great to be robbed of mucho Bin Lids (2) by the kiosk’s spotty boy but a couple of Cornish pasties, or 1 and 3/4 of one, was great with a brew or three.  And great to meet London Alan too!

Kathryn, resplendent with menopausal handlebar moustache, stepped out of the Dan Dare airways (remember them?) string bag biplane and in her bestest German accent (being that she loves Germany) asked, ’… ziz iz Munchen ja?’ on arrival at Newquay international airport.  As the only customer all day at the Enterprise car hire desk she not only got a free upgrade to a brand spanking new Mocca, it was also given, she says, with a beautiful American customer-servicey smile. 

Myself and London Alan were waiting patiently at Lands End.  Earlier the keeper of the sign forgo the customary 9 quid charge to have one’s photo taken.  With a slight sorry for the fat bloke chuckle he said ‘…yer going where? Yeah, right…’ as we were shepherded through the chain gate. London Alan tried his best to avoid taking a photo of a fat silhouette against a bright overcast sky.

Here's one of me and Kathryn and the 5 bar gate post her arrival stood next to the cheaper version of the sign being that the keeper of Lands End had frogged off with the main one at the end of his day's piracy.

Here's a vid London Alan took of my departure, from a very short runway...

And so thats it.  I’m on my way.  Only 1187 miles to go.  1.2 miles in I remembered I hadn’t remembered to reset all the trip counters on the crap nav so all totals from now on will be 1.2 miles short.

Recalling what I wrote when I retired from BT, failure to complete this adventure is for the birds…

(1) Shreddies.  Underpants for fat men.  Shredding is normally what happens to them when a carbo loaded fat man decides to fart.

(2) Bin Lids.  Money. Mullah. Dosh. Quid notes.  It’s the stuff normally obtained through hard graft and results in mortgages being paid and kids / pets being fed.