Journal Part 3 & 4

Sunday 2nd August

Hot sunny and not much of a breeze. Heading off to Cheddar today. Will be a great day to see Cheddar Gorge, hope the weather stays good all day.

Later.....

It rained heavily during the day. Malcolm suffered yet another burst tyre and innner tube which delayed us by 45 minutes. We got to Cheddar around 6pm after a long day in the saddle. We were aching a bit from the previous day too so it was hard going. Going over the hills slowed us down to about 7 mph although we did manage to get up to 37 mph on the welcome down hill stretches. Luckily the hills flattened out a bit as we were approaching the next youth hostel. We have covered over 200 miles so far. Along the A30 the traffic was heavy on the dual carriageways and the "helpful" cycle lane was ruined by constant pot-holes, cats-eyes and drains which is probably how Macolm got his puncture. The roads are not as good as in Shetland. Later in the day we had a nasty incident with an ant nest. While Malcolm was changing the tyre I inadvertently stood on an ant nest and only noticed when my calves were black with ants. nasty little beasts to remove they were too.

Cheddar gorge was an interesting place to stay and we did have just enough energy in our legs to go for a walk around the town in search of food. Despite the mostly poor weather we have caught the sun. And we have found a use for the chafing cream my mum insisted we pack. Thanks mum! We had a good night at the Youth hostel.

Monday 3rd August

Hot sunny. We left Cheddar early this morning, heading to Leominster

Made a good start up to Bristol and managed to pick up new spare tyre at Halfords for just £1 in the sale. Sadly they only had one left. Let's hope Malcolm manages to get a bit furher without a tyre malfunction today. We also picked up a new pannier rack, which was more suited to the type of panniers Malcolm was using.

A big Warburton's truck nearly had me off the road today. I won't be buying my bread from them anymore!!! But all's well and we ended up in Leominster at tea time. Leominster is quite a posh place and nobody knew where the Youth Hostel was. We were glad to find it. Strangely enough I expected my legs and posterier to ache a bit, but in fact it is my wrists that ache the most from the constant gear changing with the new fangled gear levers on the brakes. Feeling tired tonight but delighted that we have travelled more than 25% of the way already.