a trip of a lifetime

This is it.

The final Day riding.

I love Cornwall. This is partly the reason for doing this trip. It’s a shame we aren’t heading down the Atlantic Highway (My favourite road in the UK) but I’m not involved with the route planning and we are going the quickest way possible for the journey.

I love the west/north coast of Cornwall. I love knowing that if I could swim forever and not die you could swim all the way to the USA. I love the weather down here and the houses and the sea and the beach. I love the Cornish Palms and the fact that in Cornwall they can grow their own tea!

The plan is to congregate all the riders at a petrol-station about 2 miles from Land’s End so we can all arrive in Land’s End together. After the photos have been taken and the congratulatory drinks have been drunk I plan to sit at Land’s End and watch the sun set over the Atlantic coast. This will bring this trip to a close for me and mirroring the sun-rise seen at John O’Groats only 1 week earlier, I will continue the adventure that will be the rest of my life.

 1 Group.

1 Departure.

1 Distance.

1 Journey.

1 Arrival.

1 Life.

Live it.

Day 5 and a better day for me.

Although we are still in concrete country we manage to get away from the midlands and start heading proper south.

We go past Nottingham (and the friendly names ‘Arnold’), we then give Loughborough a wide berth before darting back inland to Coalville. An old university buddy of mine came from Coalville, I think he lives in Hull now – not much of an improvement! We continue south staying far away from Birmingham and Coventy (There is a really nice motor museum in Coventy) and we cross under/over the M40 while aiming west and driving through such great places as Shipton on Stour and Stow on Wold.

We end the journey not too far from Stroud. Travelling 135 miles is just 14% of our total for the trip. But now it really is downhill all the way. We are dangerously close to the welsh border but luckily we don’t head into bandit country.

Comedy Names

Raw Head

This is a big day. On our 3^rd day of riding we actual leave Scotland and make it to England. If we thought day 2 was going to be tough, day 3 sees us journeying 170 miles.

We make our way down through Scotland,  pass through Carlisle and then right into the heart of the Lake District.

As long as the weather holds off I think this could be a great ride in terms of scenery. The journey from Carlisle to Ambleside where we are hitching up for the night should take about 2 hours and with 1 stop gets us ever-closer to the final location. This trip is about 17% of the total distance travelled by the JOGLE4BRADS gang.

Comedy names noticed – 2

Cockermouth

Cumwhitton

What a great journey for the first day.

We’ll be up early in John O’Groats. Every day’s scootering begins at 8am so with any luck and some ‘nice’ weather we should all get the opportunity of enjoying sunrise at John O’Groats. I’m going to make sure I see it as I’ll have never watched the sun rise over the sea on the east coast. Looking ‘due east’ across the North Sea will probably just be the North Sea but if I had the inclination, skill, mental strength and swimming power, I could swim all the way to Norway. We are almost level with a place called Stavanger. This is going to be an important sun-rise for me and I hope to equally enjoy watching the sun-set on the last day when we arrive in Land’s End.

Day 1 Start Point - John O'Groats

Its nice that the first about 2 hours follows the east coastline very closely. I suppose this is a benefit of being on scooter/mopeds in that we have to keep off any motorways giving us the chance see a bit more of the UK while we do our trip.

We have a break planned at Helmsdale but before then we go through a place called Whaligoe & Lybster. To comedy place-names which creates images in my mind of strong-accent Scots trying to pronounce ‘Where – He – Go’ and ‘Lobster’. Perhaps I need to get out more?

Our first night of the trip looks to be camped on the outskirts of Inverness, near a place called ‘Loch Dun Seilcheig’. We would have covered the first 12% of our trip today – 138 miles. Hopefully breakdown free!