We awoke at 7am, keen to make up for yesterday's lost time at Calais. After loading up on our now daily tonic of goodness shakes, carb powders, berocca , hydro tablets and electrolytes, large breakfast and coffee, we finally set off by 9:30am
The sun was shining , we had the wind on our backs and everything was going swimmingly. For 9 miles. Then we had our second puncture of the tour, followed by the third immediately after due to a faulty valve. Then the heavens opened. I tucked in behind Alex to shield myself from the driving rain just before we cycled through a large quantity of horse manure on the road. Being in Alex's spray, I was pebble dashed. Yuk. Not pleasant, it lingers, for some reason Alex found it funny . :-)
The scenery was amazing today, rolling fields, cows , railway lines and canals. So much to take in, the rain didn't spoil it for a second. We even managed to find where my wife (Dominique) has been moonlighting recently.....
It rained on and off for the next two hours, so we eventually sought refuge in a McDonald's for a brief pit stop, it tasted so good though.....
Those trees lined the canal for all
After an aborted attempt to meet Pete in Lilles (too complicated, too many cathedrals to try and meet at) and another Big Mac, we opted to meet outside at a town called Roubaix which was 55 miles into the days ride.
We reloaded with new inner tubes from the support car, thanked Pete and headed off for our final destination just outside Ronse in Belgium.
The highlight of the day then came as we cycled about 8 miles along a tree lined canal where we crossed the border into Belgium. Here is a link to a video of us crossing rather excitedly. Pics are below. It was stunning & so peaceful there.
of the next 7 miles!
We finally reached our hotel just outside Ronse at 5:30 this evening after completing just over 90 miles. We are now back on schedule. We have completed 248 miles in three days, with a further 60 to do tomorrow to get to Brussels before I get my first rest day - I'm looking into hotels with Spa near Brussels already :)
We picked up our emails this evening and noticed that another £1,000 has been pledged in the last couple of days bringing the total near to £25k, which is well over £30k with gift aid, now a total of 157 separate donations. It's a great lift to Alex and I to see this total ticking up at the end of the day, it makes it that little extra special. There have been many messages of support also on email, text , Facebook and twitter too, thank you all again for the continuing support
Til tomorrow...Brett #spacedoutshattered
Great work fellas...looks and sounds like great fun but am not hearing enough drinking stories yet. Please sort this out when Mr Stokes arrives!
ReplyDeletePhotos of the pebble dashing would have been appreciated! But credit for the two lots of McDonalds - Clive would most definitely have approved!! Keep going chaps!
ReplyDelete