Overall we are making good progress though as shown by the picture of just a few of the various lists we have been working through. We have lists for things to do, lists of gear, lists of tasks for a specific day and sometimes when we feel particularly disorganised we have lists summarising the other lists. All this serves to reinforce that while there is a lot to do we have done a hell of a lot of organisation to date.

A brief sample of some of the things that have filled our days for the last week or so:

• Turning our room from a cycle repair shop and storage area into a lovely tidy homely loft so we could show it to new housemates. Luckily this is mostly sorted with 4 potential couples all keen to take it.
• Visiting the dental hygienist which was terrifying for Emma and interesting for me. I got a new dental tool called the TePe.
• Purchased a bunch of new gear including helmet, Paramo Quito jacket and gloves.
• Ordering all our bike spare parts as well as upgrading our brakes to Kool Stop salmon
• Donated Emma’s old Mac G3 via freecycle.org to earn some Karma.

We are continuing to find things in our room to recycle or throw out. Both of us are enjoying the feeling of de-cluttering our lives and I’m amazed at how much stuff we kept that on reflection isn’t important at all.

Since the last blog I have finished off our new route map so thought I would plug it here. The map shows our planned route, actual route (when we start travelling) and allows you to make suggestions for places we should visit. Check it out and let me know if you have any comments on how it works.

Being one of a handful of free weekends before we depart, we had decided we should go for a test camp, as long as it wasn’t going to be too cold, or snowing, or raining and with the forecast promising sunny intervals and maybe even a high of 10 degrees, we packed rear panniers with enough to keep us warm for the night. Cue Emma telling Justin: ‘Pack a woollen jumper, it’ll be cold, assume it will be really cold.’

We cycled a familiar route to Hammersmith before turning the GPS on only to find that it was unable to locate any satellite signals. Cue Justin cursing GPS and wondering if he’d have to use the backup maps which we hadn’t even looked at. We tried again at Putney Bridge, this time with success and placing our trust in its automatically calculated route we headed south.

The endless suburbs of South London soon merged into the sprawl of Redhill, and busy roads through Gatwick and Crawley before the countryside opened up. We hit the hills (as well as geese, and sunshine) for the final 25 km to Streat.

Blackberry Woods is a tiny site with only 20 pitches, but its pretty special, being both open all year and allowing campfires. We weren’t really prepared for our outdoor excursion, half expecting that we’d head down to a nearby pub as soon as it was cold and dark, but as we sat in the fading afternoon light in our own private glade starting dinner, we decided to stay put and make a campfire. The sun set with the afternoon’s bird calls morphing into owls and you could see other tiny glows of fire in the distance until the last of our wood burned down.

The night was cold – so much so that in sleeping bags with all of our clothes on we woke up in the early morning because our noses were still freezing. Justin rolled into the hood of his sleeping bag, Emma pulled down her hat. In the morning the tent was dripping in condensation but we realised that we had forgotten to open any vents when setting it up.

Birds were up early but we emerged just after 9, grabbing breakfast at a cyclists tea shop in Ditchling before retracing our steps to Balcombe where we caught a train back to London. All new pieces of kit seemed to do the job so on the camping front at least, we’re feeling pretty well prepared.

a. Cable ties….Wait Em says we have enough….Phew!
b. Zip-lock bags
c. AAA rechargeable batteries etc.

So as you can see we are getting down to the real detail of trip preparation now. Our last major purchase was last Thursday when we picked up a new Katadyn pocket water filter off ebay.

Day 1 – Friday

On Friday I finished the build of the Samsung N140 netbook we will be travelling with. The netbook is now running a full development environment for the websites I support. I’m also able to maintain things like the Windows Live Writer plug-in I have written (more on that in a later post). So we are now working solely off the netbook which I have to say is suprisingly easy to adapt to. My main gripe is the need to use a “Fn” (function) key to enable the “Home” and “End” keys as I use these continuously when programming.

In the evening there was a break from chores and a possibly final dinner at local Indian restaurant Vijays where they yet again amazed us with the wonderful south Indian food. Almost as good as the food from our trip to India in February 2009.

Day 2 – Saturday

Saturday saw us fitting front racks to our bikes. Emma’s front rack is a Tubus Tara which feels very solid and was a breeze to fit. It stays in line with her silver accessory theme and will be completed at a later date with a dashboard bouncy head ornament on the tyre hoop.

My rack is the Thorn MK5 Low Loader which feels incredibly sturdy and looks really slick with its matte black finish to tie in with the overall colour scheme of my bike. Note I seem to be only talking about colour schemes in relation to the racks at the moment but don’t worry I will post a more detailed account of how the racks perform once we have been using them for a few weeks on the road.

Day 3 – Sunday

Today we have fitted bike computers and double sided flat and clip-less pedals along with making a new ground sheet and cover for the bikes. In the afternoon we started making a few plans for how we want to spend time with Emma’s Dad and Judy when they visit France and Italy in June next year.

Day 4 – Monday

Tomorrow Em has taken the day off work and we are visiting the Hospital for Tropical Diseases. We are expecting to get Rabies and maybe Tick Borne Encephalitis injections, so hopefully there wont be to many other vaccines recommended otherwise we will be out of arms for needles to be stuck into.

March – April 2010: UK / North West Spain / Pyrenees

Depending on weather vs levels of excitement we may cycle from London down to Portsmouth for our ferry on the 24th. In Spain we’ve allowed five weeks to get across the length of the Pyrenees. As that’s ample time we’ll first head west to Picos de Europa and might amble west a bit further / head inland towards Madrid / stride out for Portugal.

May: France

We’ll stick to the South but won’t stick too closely to the coast. With some days up our sleeves we may head into Switzerland or get into Italy before the end of the month. Or we’ll find a good spot to go swimming for a couple of weeks.

June: Italy or Italy / Croatia

Either cycle the length of Italy then catch a ferry to Greece or do a loop in the north followed before heading over to Croatia. Hopefully a liaison with my parents sometime this month. 
 

July / August: Med

Option A: Croatia – Bosnia and Herzegovina – Serbia – Bulgaria – Istanbul

The many countries option – we’d get away from the sea and head into some of the countries we know little about.

Option B: Greece through to Istanbul

The coastal route – a quick hop by ferry at Bari or Brindisi in Southern Italy to Greece before continuing East along the landmass of Greece.

September / October: Turkey

We’ll hang out in Istanbul for a while, decide where to spend winter and finalise plans for the next leg. Should be able to fit in some exploring of Turkey by bicycle. We could high-tail it from here across Russia by train at this point but chances are we’ll stick around for the winter.

November – March / April: Wintering

We’re keen to spend a ski season working in Bulgaria (or any other big snow filled mountains in Europe). Know anyone who would have us? Get in touch!

Spring 2011: Onwards to Asia

Our options are either Central Asia towards Tibet and the west side of China or Eastern Europe / Russia / Mongolia / China, some of that by train. Cycling the length of Mongolia sounds pretty amazing so we’re leaning that way at the moment. After China (which we haven’t even thought about yet) we’ll head for Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam, hopping off the bikes by March 2012 at the latest.

Panniers

We gambled on sending our older scuffed up pannier set back to Ortlieb just after Christmas. They had been well used as commuter panniers over three years or so, but Em noticed a stitch unravelling around the trim of her bag which she thought might be covered by the manufacturing defect warranty. We wrote a nice letter and thought, at best, they might fix it for free, and at worse they’d charge us more than the £10 quoted by canvas specialists in Camden to stitch it up. An email this week from wiggle said that Ortlieb have deemed that our perfectly usable panniers are un-repairable, but that replacements would be sent free of charge. We asked by reply if we could pay to upgrade to the lighter Plus version and wiggle said that they’d do that for free!

Bank account

Joint bank account opened with only one lost cheque and two lost applications however as the bank was making up for mistakes with above, the process moved along much more swiftly than the rumoured 6 – 8 week wait that we were anticipating.

Computer

Samsumg N140 Netbook brought from Ebuyer despite silly online purchase shenanigans which saw Justin almost buying same computer for £30 more than his original order. Ebuyer eventually redeemed themselves, delivering package next day and refunding overcharge. Drive partitioned and Windows XP replaced Windows 7 started after only five attempts – not that Justin’s a perfectionist.

Cell-phone

We did a quick search on the net for a reliable cell-phone with good battery life and the Samsumg D500 was the 5 minute research winner. We looked at a photo of one and realise it looks a lot like Emma’s – on checking it’s a D600, but it will do the job nicely. We brought a second battery for £2.50 on ebay instead of a whole new cell.

Also…

Justin’s mum’s Christmas package arrived containing the mugs we had our eyes on in Kathmandu, sealed top drink bottles and nice bamboo tee-shirts. Thanks Mum.

Pro cyclists can cycle LEJOG in less than a week. Most cyclists seem to take around two. We had to ask our workplaces nicely to get three weeks off work but we thought this would allow us to amble up the country, leisurely spinning at a speed suited to a summer holiday. In practice, we found it was just enough time to get us to the top, turn into a headwind and return to Wick for our train back to London.

We had a great time, but with some extra days up our sleeves we would have been able to climb Ben Nevis on a cloudless Scottish summer’s day. We could see ferries to the Orkney Islands from our campsite at Thurso and we might have managed a few days tracking puffins on this remote part of the UK. We definitely would have made time to catch up with friends we missed in Bristol, Hay-on-Wye and Liverpool.

We won’t really know how fast we’ll be travelling until we’re on our bikes, but we’ll do our best to make sure we have enough time to take opportunities when they present themselves; whether its a chance to catch up with friends and family, to stay another night at a tranquil campsite or the chance to lie on the grass in the sun for an afternoon.

I can’t wait.

After many months of researching, reviewing and studying our gear options the last few weeks have seen a flurry of activity from me on the purchasing front and a flurry of snow outdoors.

Snow

So its been snowing a bit the last week. I say a bit but judging by the meltdown in the First Capital Connect service maybe I missed something as I couldn’t get to work two days last week due to “adverse weather conditions”. Funny it had snowed for one day and all other train services I checked were operating even if the service was a little disrupted. On a more positive note though the kids school next door had a massive snowball fight which was fun to watch.

Eyes

Since I was first prescribed with glasses for driving 10 years ago I have lived my life as a “glasses agnostic”. Since living in London for the last 6 years I haven’t really driven so convinced myself I could see fine. I have finally given in though and between Christmas and New Years I visited Optical Express for a laser eye surgery consultation. The consultation was very thorough and I’m really glad I finally got it done as it was interesting to find out what type of treatment I was suitable for. I freely admit I was lured in by the tagline of “prices from £349” however the end result for me was that due to the size of my pupils I’m only suitable for the most expensive Wavefront procedure.

Being in full cost saving mode for the trip ahead I decided the cost was above budget and  to get myself a new pair of glasses instead. So using the brilliant service from Glasses Direct I had a few frames delivered to home for free and tried them out for a few days on friends. Decision made my new glasses should arrive in the next week or so.

Emma has also been looking at prescription sunglasses anticipating weather warmer than the snow covered ground outside has in mind, and today found herself a nice set of frames so should be able to get lenses for these in the next few days.

Feet

On today’s shopping trip we visited a few outdoor stores where I tried on a bunch of different light hiking boots. I’m planning to take a pair of MTB cycling shoes which have a good tread and I’ve used for walking, a pair of Teva sandals and a pair of boots that will be my multi-purpose hiking and walking shoes. I decided upon the Salomon Mission GTX boots after trying on a few other pairs of Salomon and one pair of Keen Targhee  boots. Putting the Keen’s on I initially felt very comfortable in them with the wide front giving my toes a lot of room. The Salomon Fastpacker was very light (around 400gm per pair lighter than the Mission) but had quite a “sneakerish” feel to it and although a high boot the ankle support was less than the Mission. So the Mission it was although surprisingly I found a size 8 to be the most comfortable when I normally take an 8.5 or a 9.

Justin and I have talked about travelling further by bicycle (and eventually this big cycling trip) for so long I can’t pinpoint the moment we decided we were definitely doing this, when our idea grew up and announced it was packing its bags and leaving. 

With less than three months before we pedal off, I’ve tried to piece together a timeframe showing how we decided to embark on this particular adventure, instead of taking one of the thousands of other paths we could have taken:

a) We’ve been thinking about this for forever

• Living in Auckland I read a second-hand copy of ‘One Foot in Laos’ by Dervla Murphy, which gave me a glimpse of the adventure that cycle touring could offer.
• At NZ Musician magazine, my boss Richard spun tales about his stint cycling and camping solo through France.

b) We’ve been talking about this for years

• We got fixated by the idea of cycling towards Russia, through Europe and maybe some of South East Asia. Ideas got bigger – cycling the Americas, across Russia itself – then contracted again – the train starts to look pretty good, the Americas could wait.
• Justin purchased a copy of the Adventure Cycle-Touring Handbook for my birthday.
• We cycled from Lands End to John O’Groats and find out if we still liked cycling, camping and each other at the end.
• We propose that we will start in Santander so we don’t miss out on Spain.

and with serious intent,

c) We’ve been planning this for months

• In August 2009, we started sketching ideas of where we might want to travel to on Googlemaps. Some of this was wishful thinking, but like a scatter-gram a pattern starts to emerge.
• In October I brought home a giant map called Asia to stick above our bed and blue tacked tiny scraps of purple card to it, plotting out 6 months to take us to Turkey.
• In December we sit on the bed facing the map with a pile of books in front of us and roughly sketch out countries and months and options. Justin pulled pillows to the foot of the bed and spends some of this time lying down looking at the possibilities in front of us. We break the trip into 6 month blocks (with get out clauses, just in case we decide that we’d rather be doing something else…). We realise we’ll still need a lot of information about Central Asia, Russia and Mongolia and China before deciding which way to go. We realise that we won’t see everything.

• Cycling to the top with stops for Cake – Part 1
• Cycling to the top with stops for Cake – Part 2
• Cycling to the top with stops for Cake – Part 3
• Cycling to the top with stops for Cake – Part 4
• Cycling to the top with stops for Cake – Part 5

Below are my twitter posts made during the trip and a rough map of our route.

• Penzance to St Ives via Lands End. A few big hills mousehole in particular. Lovely cream tea. Sunset dinner + camp on a cliff above St Ives.
• St Ives to Padstow very hilly but beautiful coast and every time you go up you get to come down. Rick Stein fish n chips for dinner yum yum.
• Padstow to Okehampton rolling hills n wobbling legs. A day of rain but good to know pasties are waterproof. Bunk house tonight to dry shoes.
• Okie to Holman Clavel lots of sunshine made my 7 hours cycling a bit easier. Hills a bit smaller legs just as tired. No local snacks today.
• HC to Priddy grey day but good views over somerset and lots of flat rd for a change. Wet evening in tent but local bacon + cider make it OK.
• No cell signal for a few days so no updates. Priddy to llanthony a big day. Severn bridge crossed. Enter the welsh valley as sun slides away
• Llanthony rest day for ems birthday. Washing. Bike tidy up. Bit of a hill walk to top of ridge then pub dinner with more than 3 ingredients.
• Llanthony to bishops castle. Beautiful bike ride from llanthony big downhill to hay on wye. Bbq for dinner and pitch with a view…again.
• BC to chester. Early climb over stiperstones with cake stop. A mostly flat grey day. Pitch view of calves + cows. Nav challenge of Lvpl 2mw
• Chester to Ormskirk via lvrpl. Zigzag along Wirral ferry cross the Mersey. Shards of glass, shutter doors, face down arrest. View of hedge.
• Ormskirk to Hawkshead. Massive day on flat plains. Brooding hills + thunder clouds ahead as we climbed hill from windermere. View of ducks.
• I just ate: bacon + mushrooms, muesli + fruit, steak slice, triple choc cheesecake + bannana milkshake. I think cycling is making me hungry
• Hawkshead to keswick. Rest day but got few miles done as sunny. Ride by Thirlmere lovely. View of White Pike hill from tent. Midges attack!
• Keswick to Anan. On Carrock Fell roaming ponies tried to eat ems towel. Lucky bike faster than pony. View of huge blue sky above Solway.
• Anan to Coylton. Cairspharn very remote sheep + wind. No accom in towns of boarded up houses. Camp in farmers field. View of million midges!
• Coylton to Brodick. Long coastal run to ferry then steep hill. Rhubarb crumble for lunch. B&B tonight after farmers field need a duvet.
• Brodick to Kilmelford. Coast to ferry low steel skies. Lunch at Tarbert co-op flapjacks rule. Camped in yard
  of pub. Midges bad again.
• Kilmelford to Fort William. Cool morn then hot. Swim in a loch max 2mins. Busy road to campsite beneath Ben Nevis. View of summit at sunset.
• FW to Inverness. Canal + Forest paths along lochs feels like a newly found land.Uphill to 400m for views across loch ness. View of fence.
• Inverness to Helmsdale. Lots of main roads today as few options. Saw seals bathing in sun. Tea + scone fixed my knee. Best hostel in world.
• Helmsdale to Thurso. Maybe best ride of trip. Big empty eggshell sky. Hills looming. Lochs reflecting. Deep fried dinner. View of thunder.
• Thurso to JOG. Windy ride. Think legs knew end was nigh. Photos with bikes. We made it. Celebratory bacon + square sausage bun. Onto Wick.

View LEJOG June/July 2009 in a larger map

Easter weekend we caught the train to Kings Lynn and then cycled following National Cycle Route (NCR) 1 across to Wighton with a detour to Holkham Hall and Wells-Next-The-Sea for best fish n chips ever. From Wighton Regional Cycle Route (RCR) 30 to Cromer. The next day we cycled down the coast again on RCR 30 to Hemsbey then followed our noses inland to Coltishall. Day three saw us return across country lanes to Kings Lynn. All up 300km or so not a bad longish ride for the first of the year and nice to stretch the legs a little beyond the daily commute. See map below for route details and photos.

View Norfolk Coast in a larger map