Pictures speak a thousand words

Fifty nine hours, fifty nine minutes and thirty seconds of constant cycling saw us here - the other end of the British mainland.

Enjoy the pictures. We do.

Re: High road, taking thereof

Tell you what, Scotland is beautiful.




Although you can always guarantee on someone coming along to ruin the view:

A quick note about progress

The more perceptive of you will have noticed that there is a lack of progress updates today. However, you mustn't take this as an indication of a lack of progress.

In fact, all teams are doing well. Tremendously well, in fact. So well that there is literally no time for the considered 'sitting down and writing about it' that we'd normally need. We're moving through the country at an unbelievable rate of knots. I'm writing this at a Travelodge in Dumbarton, north of Glasgow, on Saturday evening. My day started at 1.30am today in South Wales.

The original plan would have had us at Carlisle at this point, maybe breaching the Scottish border in the early hours of Sunday morning. We're a good seven or eight hours ahead of our original schedule. There are some scarily quick people on bikes. Whether the thought of a pint at John O'Groats is helping to concentrate a few minds, I'll leave you to guess.

But to sum up, we're doing well. And if you'd like to show your appreciation, you know what to do.

Oh. My. God.

Getting up at 1.30am is no fun.

Getting into a car in a wet and windy Travelodge carpark in Monmouth, Wales, is no fun.

Listening to Rob - capable of only two words, "Breakfast. Petrol." - is no fun.

And then I plant my foot down on the accelerator. "Where are we meeting up with team two, Tom?"

"How does Lancashire grab you?"

Blimey.

Mudguards optional

As we hit Bristol the rain started. There was a succession of misnavigations and morale started to slip a bit.

According to myth and legend, there is a cycle bridge over the River Avon. We couldn't find it. The good people of Bristol City Council clearly like to keep it a secret. Andy thought he'd found a way get over, so we drove over the road bridge to meet him in Avonmouth, taking ages due to roadblocks, etc. Then he called us:

"Erm, sorry guys, they've actually chained and padlocked it shut. You'll have to come back and get me."

"Stay where you are."

Which he didn't do. Because as we struggled back over the Avon, the call came through.

"Made it! Although I'm now stuck in downtown Avonmouth. On my own. On a racing bike. Erm, the natives are circling. Help."

So, employing intrepid swearing, we got back over the river to find him again. He'd handed over to the next team so the relay was unbroken. However, he was now being stalked by the locals. It was like a military extraction - Black Hawk Down without the helicopters.


And this was the wreckage we retrieved.

Cornwall, we have a problem

"We seem to have lost Greg."

"Is it serious?"

Greg was cycling on Cornwall's largest road. He had to take a left, the junction with Cornwall's second largest road. It is a big junction. He hadn't made it. Given this was the first time he'd been on a bike without lollipop sticks in the spokes, this was a cause for concern.

"OK," said JC over the phone, "we're going to go the way he may have taken. Can you guys take the northern route and start looking for him, in case he's realised his mistake and tried to correct it."

At one point someone was thinking about calling local hospitals. Nothing like a bit of measured drama.

But we found him. He had realised his mistake, but getting back on track involved, in his words, "the steepest hills in Christendom". Here he is explaining what happened, using his personal map:

True story: at the point I took this picture, Tom pointed out to Greg that he was holding the map upside-down. There is no hope.

Get a move on

The calls started to come through as we belted through the Cornish countryside.

"Er, fellas," said Rob, thumbing the map, "you know we were aiming for this point for the changeover?"

"I'll take your word for it Rob. At the moment I'm busy trying not to crash the car."

"Well, Jeremy's just called in and they're already miles ahead."

"Typical Finance boys. Always underestimate and over-deliver"

"Better step on it, Phil."

Right then...

A full English breakfast, courtesy of Terri and the team at Whitesands Lodge, and we in team 3 were ready for anything.

Well, I was, anyway. Rob and Tom seemed to be taking an age. So it was just me and the car:

And a monkey, for some reason:

You have to start somewhere

...and the somewhere in question was a nondescript painted white line:


Completely unphazed, Ian lined up just before 6.00am:



Then he was gone into the night:

In a stunning show of brotherly solidarity, the rest of us, as one, trooped back the the hotel for breakfast and/or a couple of hours kip.

Sorry, Ian.

Setting off

"So, you're serious about this, then?"

No turning back as a whole bunch of us left from work on a (mainly) sunny afternoon. Several hours, about three hundred miles, and a number of motorway service station meals later, we were to be found in Sennen, several miles from the End of the Land.

Not too sure if a few of these in the evening was a good idea...