Life & Light blog part 14

An interesting day. Leaving my B&B with my host, who was kind enough to give me a lift with the bike back to Crediton I arrived reasonably early at the bike shop.

It seems that my rear wheel problem wasn’t just a broken spoke and a slight wobble; because I’d had strengthened spokes put into an old wheel rim, literally half the new spokes were actually pulling their way through the rim. If I’d gone much further there would have been the strange sensation of the rear wheel collapsing under me, probably as I went charging down some steep hill..

Now do you believe in the JOGLE fairy? I’m beginning to believe that, like in the pantomime when you’re told to clap and shout as loud as you can to get the fairy/fairy godmother to appear, all I have to do is swear loudly at my bike and threaten to throw it over the hedge and the JOGLE fairy will appear.

I’d just like to add at this point that the strain on the rear wheel was due to the power in my legs and the weight of the panniers. Any suggestions (like that of my friend Mark) that I’m just a fat knacker are probably actionable.

I’m just saying, OK?

Wheel repair done I moved off towards Okehampton, which I got to by about midday, mainly by virtue of it not being that far away. Had a lovely lamb tagine for lunch (no wonder I haven’t actually lost any fat on this trip – my colleague’s husband who did it reckoned he’d lost a stone and a half – bet his back wheel didn’t collapse under him. But then I bet he never got to go to the Severn and Wye Smokery, so what’s the point of that, then?).

I am a meat and beer powered bicycle collapser.

After Okehampton I suffered a general bodily decline in interest in the idea of cycling, which seems unfair since I took a lot of trouble in stuffing my body with the things it loves. I was on the A30 to Launceston, which I’d been warned against as being a nasty road to cycle on but which I found a lot better than some of the others I’d been down (A9, A442, you know I’m talking about you, don’t you?). The weather was lovely again although quite cool and I struggled a bit, spirits not even lifted that much when I came across the county sign for Cornwall, the final county before I fall into the Atlantic with a splash.

The road off the A30 towards Camelford went up onto the moors and seemed to be the ceiling of Cornwall; my already unhappy body began to deflate like it had a slow puncture and I had to stop for a coke and a crunchie in a desperate effort to get some kind of sugar rush going.

After Camelford there was a lot more downhill going on and I began to perk up, particularly as Wadebridge, my last stop-over for the whole trip and a mere 58 miles from Land’s End, was only 10 miles away.

I came down the hill to the B&B and the owners, who’d been sunning themselves with a glass of wine in the garden, got up and disappeared. I feel increasingly like the ancient mariner, who everyone runs away from in case he starts to tell them some incredibly boring story of his time at sea.

Only in my case, instead of an Albatross round my neck, I have a pair of my own underwear which I use to wipe away the sweat. Probably smell pretty similar, though.

Which was Crediton – Okehampton (17.2 miles), Okehampton – Launceston (19.7miles), Launceston – Camelford (16.6 miles) and Camelford – Wadebridge (11.0 miles), making a daily total of 64. 5 miles, 956.7 miles overall.

Land’s End tomorrow, JOGLE fairy willing.