CAPTAINS LOG DAY 1

After an all night drive down to Lands End and two hours sleep I was really raring to go ( first lie of this post!!)

Following the usual form filling and registering for the ride( you actually get a certificate for doing it) I went to have the obligatory picture taken at the famous Lands End signpost.

Took me quite a while to get the young lady to spell Y Bala properly(Glad I dont live in Dwygyfylchgi otherwise it would have been an extra day on my trip!!!

There was also a film crew there doing a documentary about dyslexia amongst the elderly!!!!!

Anyway cometh the man cometh the hour or in my case cometh the A30.

Having said my goodbyes and waved cheerfuly at the wife and camera I set off down the carpark only to find I had taken the wrong turning and ended up on a dead end. Had to go back and wave again and then set off on the A30.Up to penzance was a doddle. No traffic no blisters and the cream a la derrier seemed to be just the job.

The first hour was a joy and I thought this is going to be a piece of cake to get out of Cornwall in a day .Stupid boy Pike!!! It was then I hit the real A30 a hussling bussling dual carrigeway with thousands of cars full of tourists fed on cornish pasties and candy floss over the weekend trying to race home at the speed of the starship enterprise running away from a Vulcan warbird and all trying to take a fat welshman on a bike home stuck to their front bumper. My whole day was spent concentrating on a 2 foot wide piece of tarmac avoiding being taken by suprise up the rear ( this is a cycling term)

To pass the time I decided to count the number and variety of species of roadkill ( badgers smell the worst) and to see how many wheel trims I could identify.

The only highpoints of the day were the various feed stations set up by Nia from the camper van at various laybyes.These were like oasis in the middle of a mad dessert( not sure of the spelling here? I mean the place full of sand and not sherry trifle type things!!) of cars vans and

Finally got to the campsite at Okehampton at 20.00 hours .

On a serious note I did what I set out to do and get out of Cornwall in a day( nothing against the place it looked lovely). I would not recomend the A30 unless you were on a tight schedule like me.

Statistics for the day were

DISTANCE 105 miles

RIDE TIME 7 Hrs 55 Mins

AVERAGE 14 mph

PROBLEMS.. HEAT. TRAFFIC.

PUNCTURES 0