Tim and Patrices Travel Blog
Tims amazing weblog, so you can see what he’s up to.Archive for April, 2008
Gold Hill assent
Patrice and I visited my dad down in Dorset over the weekend. We took the bikes for some training. On Sunday we visited Shaftsbury and a local landmark, Gold Hill.
I knew there was a tea shop at the top.
The hill is the location of an iconic TV advert for bread.
It was produced by a little known director at the time called Ridley Scott.
We approched the hill from the bottom and I soon realised the hill wasn’t for cycling. It was about 200 metres of 1:3 and 1:2 in places. It was cobbled and the cobbles were mossy.
As we approached I egged Patrice on, perhaps if we could get to the start of the cobbles at the bottom? At this she got off and began to push.
I then saw a couple of tourists with a camera. He raised it in my direction. Dear God surely he didn’t think…..?
‘Come on then, keep going !’ They shouted. Their raised voices attracted several other tourists who turned around to see this feat of endurance.
Setting myself up for the fall I dropped to the bottom gear and dug deep. Note to self – don’t cycle anywhere near iconic tourist spot hills.
I wasn’t about to get out of the saddle. I knew if I did I would only have about a minute of oxygen in my legs before they gave up, no, better to stay seated.
As I passed them I even manged to point out that the boy in the advert pushed. A man of wit and steel legs !
My lungs were bursting as I pushed harder and harder. The front wheel began to pull off the hill as I pulled down hard on the handlebars. I leant forward still determined to stay in the saddle.
As I approched the top the hill I needed to negotiate a rain gully and it steepened further. Finally I was there, my heart well over it maximum rate and probably around 200bpm.
I looked at the tea shop, I had more fans, Patrice cheered from half way up.
Bloody tourists.
Learning to tow Video
I’d forgoten about this one.And it’s good practice to remember how to embed video in a blog.
Mission Control
I made a recent visit to my sister and her two sons Thomas and Harry. Thomas could be a budding newspaper editor and he showed me a very well laid out ficticous newspaper he had created for his neighbourhood. He also shares his uncle’s fascination in all things cartographic.
With this in mind I asked if he would like to do some research on the places we visit. He could then publish them on the blog. He agreed. Thomas, with the help of Harry, can monitor our performance and offer advice on places to visit.
Brittany – The First Two Weeks
This is the approximate route for the first two weeks or so of our adventure. We sail into Le Harve and then will hug the Normandy coast. We will visit Bayeux. We will then cut across the Cotentin peninsular toward St Malo. We aim to visit Mont St Michel, St Malo and a meet up with my dad near Dinan. We then plan to hug the red granit coastline on the north of Brittany bfore heading south across the Armorique Regional Park. At Chateaulin we will pick up the famous Brest to Nante canal.This, I hope, willl be flat. There will be a two day diversion off the canal to have a look at Carnac before we find the canal again and on towards Nante.
