Final Thoughts

This did turn out to be very different from one of my usual cycle tours. To my surprise I did get caught up in "the challenge" with greater daily distances than I expected, even after I decided to slow down at the half way point. It was still a very enjoyable tour, though, and I will now do more touring in the UK (I won't stop touring in France -- Pyrenees in July! -- but I'm planning a coast-to-coast in June). For all sorts of reasons it was much better than I expected: there are plenty of very quiet roads in the UK; campsites seem far better than when I last went camping some 40 years ago; there are some pretty good places to see; and the pubs aren't bad.

Part of my reason for thinking I had to slow down was my concern it was going to be over too quickly. Indeed it still would have been if I'd caught the train back at Wick. In fact, it would have been a real anticlimax and I wonder if that's why so many End-to-Enders are so disappointed with John O'Groats. Looking back, I wonder if I should have cycled to Lands End rather than get the train but I wouldn't even have contemplated that before I went. (I will probably cycle to/from each end if I do the coast-to-coast).

I've always liked to set off fairly early but I even surprised myself with the early starts I made this time. It only took a couple of (accidental) early starts to convince me of the benefits and so I started planning for them.

Preparation: The plans I had made well in advance seemed to work out pretty well. The train service was excellent. I stuck fairly closely to my planned route. My printed OS maps, with the Google Map inserts for town centres and the route profiles worked absolutely fine. Mapping out the route using Anquet was time-consuming particularly as it doesn't have a "follow road" facility (I've just discovered some eight months after the trip that I can plot routes on Bike Hike, save them as GPX files and upload them using Anquet!). Having said that it did get me very familiar with the landscape I'd be covering and forced me to spread the mapping over a fair period of time so I had time to cogitate. And I really enjoyed the whole route planning process. Nevertheless, I'm not sure how necessary it was: the return journey from John O'Groats to Haworth was unplanned using torn out pages from a road atlas by simply identifying towns (or other landmarks) in the right general direction and deciding on what seemed to be an interesting way to join them up. Even so, when I do similar journeys in future I will probably still plan the route in detail in advance (even though I might not necessarily follow it) because that is half the fun.

Camping and campsites: camping was definitely the right decision for me; a major contribution to the overall enjoyment. I particularly enjoyed cycling very early in the morning especially when there is no one about and it's unlikely I would have discovered that if I had not been camping. I didn't have a bad campsite in the 20 days of camping. A couple were more expensive than I would have liked but I felt that they could justify the prices with the quality of the facilities. On balance I preferred the ones mainly for tents (or at least without static caravans) but there were none I wouldn't go back to.

The bike: not an ideal tourer, perhaps, but it was very comfortable and performed very well. The only mechanical problem was due to me not tightening the lock ring when I fitted the replacement cassette. Two punctures, one a faulty valve, the other perished rim tape. A very stable bike and I was particularly impressed with the disc brakes. I didn't need the front suspension but it was of some benefit on the off-road sections. Just a pair of rear panniers worked fine although I did have a tendency to pile things on the rear rack in the string bag. Having said all that, I have now bought a purpose-built tourer (Ridgeback Panorama).

Camping equipment: the Terra Nova Laser Competition was superb. Very light, easy to erect and with plenty of room for one. Reasonable storage space in the porch and beside me in the tent. Mind, I normally left the panniers on the bike at night. The Karimat self inflating mat was very comfortable. The sleeping bag was occasionally at the limits of its performance but on colder nights I wore base layers (and the Merino wool top was excellent). The mosquito net came in handy, too.

Clothing: no problems but I probably took more spares than I needed because it was easier to wash clothes at campsites than I had anticipated. I did have to buy an extra micro-fleece as I headed north and on a couple of occasions I did wear both (and several other layers) although this was a comfort issue rather than survival!

Food and drink: I had three or four evening meals in restaurants and they were good but my favourite meals by far were those I cooked each evening. As I had anticipated supermarket in-store bakeries (or any other bakers for that matter) couldn't hold a candle to boulangeries. Just occasionally I might find half decent pastries for breakfast but certainly not everyday. I did have the occasional bacon butty which probably makes more sense in England and in the first six days had several full English breakfasts -- they were good but they probably weren't the best cycling food. The Cornish Pasties; Scottish Bridies and Fish and Chips were my favourite take aways for snacks during the day. One big disappointment was the absence of decent beer in Scotland; I don't know if I was just unlucky.

I seemed to be eating like a pig but I lost just over 3 kg (about half a stone) over the 21 days. According to my crude calculations a loss of that much fat means I was eating more than 1000 kcal too few each day (and I know over 60s are not supposed to be able to increase muscle mass but I think I probably did a little so that may be an underestimate). As a result of all the extra cycling (and probably better eating) even before the trip I'd lost probably 1.5 kg since I retired. I've put a little back on since I got back but overall I'm down to the same weight I was in my mid 20s! I lost fat from my face and several people said I looked 'gaunt' but I've put that back on. Fortunately it's staying off my tummy and I now have a genuine 32" waist.

The roads: wherever possible I used minor roads mainly because I like the quiet and generally the scenery is better but I did do fairly long stretches on A roads (especially through the Lancashire Mill towns, the A82 and the A9). These were much better than I expected. Of course, I was often on them before anyone else got up but even at other times they weren't a problem. I didn't experience any lack of patience from drivers and I only had cause to shout once. I shouldn't really be surprised because I don't experience many problems on my routine rides (okay most of them are on quiet moorland roads but I do cycle through Bradford and occasionally Leeds). In fact, come to think of it, I didn't meet anyone who was even mildly unfriendly whether on the road or off.

Blogging: I hadn't planned on doing this but it's been very enjoyable reliving the experience. As a result of this one cycle ride I've learnt about blogging, got to grips with Photoshop, and learnt a lot more about digital mapping, not to mention geography. The ride wasn't bad either.