A New Chapter

Time to start a new chapter.
A third of the back up team have gone to Barcelona for the duration leaving only the four legged members who are less IT literate and tend to have other things on their mindsI fear you may see a few glitches in the blog until I learn all the niceties of inserting my posts. (editors note: actually it can all be done quite easily from Barcelona as you see here!)

With only eight weeks to go the training needs to step up a notch. The official fitness programme suggests three 25 mile rides and one 35 miler in the next two weeks and then 30 and 40 mile rides but it doesn't tell you how to find time each week to do the pedalling.
The weather is not helping. But full of determination I managed a rather soggy 40 miles today around Mousehole and St Buryanmaze-like lanes around Crean Bottoms and on to Lands End and Sennen, coming back through St Just to enjoy Lafrowda Day and a yummy cream tea in the church.

An Evening Ride

My current favourite evening ride takes me around the peninsula.
Starting off posting the day’s letters in my local box on past Penzance’s triffid and heading to Battery Rocks for a swim, it is good when the tide is right for diving Thanks to Carol and Patrick the buoys are a real treat this year, the first is painted with oyster catchers and waders, the second has a mermaid and seals and the third has star fish, after that they are plain orange.
On up Paul Hill which is always a bit of a chain snapper but worth the effort and past the gate post with it’s mysterious hole After St Buryan and Crows an Wra there is a wonderful down hill swoop to the airfieldmore hills and on to St Just, a rugged little town built around the square with its healthy mix of pubs, the Co-op, two branches of Warrens and more pubs all dwarfed by the solid church tower catching the evening sunDown Nancherrow Hill and up the other side to the north coast where foxgloves are at their best, pink campions everywhere each with its face tracking the sun like mini Goonhilly dishes The little clump of orchids that I watch out for each year is doing well Turning right at Gurnards Head takes me up the last hill to home.
It’s a fantastic ride which ought to be 30+ miles but is probably only about 26.

A never to be repeated experience

I am a stubborn old cuss so once I have said I will do something I tend to do it but as the house gradually filled up with boxes full of stuff I would have happily opted out of the car boot sale. all the stuff had to be sorted into 'put out on the table first' and 'leave till later' boxes, vaguely priced, china and glass wrapped in newspaper, snoozing cats removed from boxes which were then packed into carsun-packed, re-packed and generally shuffled about in a pretty inefficient manner.
Exactly as I had been warned the vultures descended on the car before I even had the table up let alone the banner tied along the front and the balloons blown up. But the gods smiled, the torrential rain that was forecast did not materialise and the ground did not turn into a Glastonbury porridge.
The stall got set up, people foraged most things sold even the hospice balloons flapping madly in the wind on their bamboo pole and we returned with only a few boxes.
Like true amateurs we couldn't wait to count the money which looks like about £175 plus what feels like about £10 but is probably only £5 in the collecting tin before retiring for a well earned cup of coffee at the poolside cafe I reckon there is enough material in a single car boot sale for a PhD in Anthropology.
Thank you to everyone who donated stuff and to my backup team (remember them?) who made sure I did not give way to my inclination to chicken out of the whole thing.
Money raised for Cornwall Hospice Care - £176

Another weekend off

I am getting lazy with another weekend off from serious cycling but no-one should miss Mazey Day with its fantastic parades and happy faces I have always maintained that Penzance is such a relaxed place you could wander about in your pyjamas without attracting comment and I proved it as a bucket lady this year collecting for GolowanThe Mid-Argyll Pipe Band was back in force drowning out the Acorn choir but they had flown down from Scotland just for Golowan and they gave it such welly you could forgive them anything.Sunday was Quay Day which begins the gentle wind down to normality with luggers moored in the harbour and my all time favourite fisherman in his oilers proudly showing off an enormous gold fishDr Who must have been visiting because the daleks rolled through the fair exterminating all in their sights, somewhere hidden in the harbour they gave up their secretsBut, as I said at the very beginning of this blog it's not a good day if I do not get on my bike so I ignored the gardening that should be done and got on my bike for a short but fast and hilly ride. Next week it's back to serious training.

A weekend half off

The weather was fantastic, the Cornishman was doing money-off vouchers and there was an early sailing so it was worth setting the alarm extra early and resisting that initial urge to go back to sleep. I love everything about the Scillonian from the cheerful faces in the little booking office along the quay to the view of the coast line slipping past, the chugging engines and the queue for coffee and the first jagged outline of the Scilly Isles appearing on the horizon. We took a boat trip to Annet and were rewarded by puffins doing everything puffins are meant to do: circling around looking as aerodynamic as Cornish pasties with wings, bobbing on the waves before upending to dive down, sitting under tufts of thrift guarding their nests. How do such vulnerable things survive the winter months in the cruel seas off Newfoundland?

Seals basked in the sun and shags hung their wings to dry
No cycling for a day but back in the saddle for 40 miles on Sunday. Going up Bone Valley I realised what is meant by 'dappled shade'