Middleton Century Ride

Well, not quite a century, just a token 50k through the beautiful Annapolis Valley on a beautiful sunny Sunday morning-hello to anyone we met and who was nice enough to graciously accept one of the cards I handed out. What a nice bunch of people - but then cyclists generally are. Anyways, I slogged along trying not to keep Simon hanging around, he was a very patient and congratulated me on my huffing and puffing red faced 10 miles an hour average. I now have a personal target to push that up to 12 miles an hour before Christmas and 15 miles an hour by spring. Gonna take some doing!

Busy planning for the Tea Party on Sunday, off to the printers today so I can whizz round the neighbourhood on my bike to spread the word. Anyone want to take bets on the final outcome? 100 sandwiches ans no guests? 100 guests and not enough sandwiches? Thunder storms and shivering in the barn? Watch this space :-)

Hello Nova Scotia

We fly out tomorrow for two whole fabulous weeks, plenty of time for some nice long bike rides and LOTS of relaxing in the sunshine. I have printed up some flyers and little cards to spread the word while we are out there, so hopefully after our trip we'll have a few more people checking out the blog and Facebook. And of course we have the Great British Tea Party to look forward to (or dread, depending on how enthusiastic and organised I am feeling at any particular point in time).

And - BIG news - I have booked the flights for the big bike ride next year - yay! 19th May to 9th June - after much debate on the route map to see if we could cram it all into 2 weeks, we decided that 3 weeks was more sensible to allow for any hiccups along the way. So the target will be to charge down the route and have a couple of days relaxation at the end... No slacking on the training plan now - we are committed!

Heeeeeere's Scottie!

Meet my beautiful new bike - isn't she pretty? She has lovely slender wheels, an elegant but rather uncomfortable saddle, and (here's the techie bit) disc brakes. Took her for a little spin up the road just to make her feel loved and now she's sat in the kitchen while my poor battered Specialized is sulking in the shed. Who'd have ever thought it - me with not one, but TWO bikes - in fact, I lie, I have another one in Nova Scotia - that's insane. Just shows what one can achieve with a bit of encouragement and dogged determination.

Went for a lovely ride on Sunday from Chepstow to Abergavenny with my buddy CJ - no she wasn't really looking at a house for sale sign like it was a roadsign ;-) she was just crossing the road to dutifully check the GPS her other half had kindly lent us for the occasion. Not that it did us much good, we were apparently in Iceland at one point... But it was a great ride, good company, a nice warm dry day and lots of pretty country lanes, luscious greenery and sun baked cornfields. Oh, and hills. Lots. But we made it up all of them bar one and, as CJ pointed out, we recovered pretty quickly after each one, so we must be getting fitter.

That's me done with cycling for this week, Thursday I'm off to Standon Calling, yay!

New bike!!

I am at this very moment sitting outside the bike shop waiting for my lovely husband to arrive and then we are picking up my new bike, which is, I believe going to be as light as a feather and whisk me effortlessly up those nasty hills. Or at least be a bit less of a killer weight than my trusty mountain bike, which is all good. And I will also be the proud owner of panniers, rack, bar bag and new waterproof trousers-weh hey! Pictures to follow...

The Great British Tea Party

Bad Blogger - not written anything for ages! Have of course been very busy, I can't quite remember doing what exactly... But I am very excited because a) 2 weeks today we will have just landed in Nova Scotia and b) I am planning our first proper fundraising event! Being Brits in a foreign land 'n'all I thought a Great British Tea Party would be just the ticket. I'm not sure if my lovely husband is entirely convinced, but hey - what's the worse that can happen? Left standing in the barn in the rain with 100 sandwiches and too many cakes to eat? A guest trips over in the egg and spoon race and sues us? I can live with the risk. A lot of planning to do in a rather short time but I think it will be a giggle. Haven't invited many people yet, just waiting to hear from Brigadoon if my plans are in order. Oh, and we are whizzing off to the Heart of the Valley Century Ride on the 15th August - my first ever proper long bike ride (although not sure we'll do the full whack) in the Annapolis Valley. I hope I like it, otherwise the entire length of Nova Scotia might seem a wee bit daunting...

Mmmmm, shopping...

I have at last, in spite of the best efforts of Tredz bike shop in Cardiff to studiously ignore me, almost managed to spend a cool £600 of bike-to-work vouchers on a spanking new light as a feather Scott bike with a lovely slender wheels to speed me along those endless Nova Scotian roads. I say almost, because they told me 3 times they couldn't order anything unless I had my vouchers with me, in spite of me waving them under their noses, (what-don't I look like a cyclist? Too old? Too glamorous..? Ha!) and after being deserted a couple of times by a lad who apparently had better things to do, managed to get them to place the order for bike, panniers, rack, bar bag and waterproof trousers - weh hey!

And the other good news is, today I managed a bike-to-work time of 49 minutes (down from 1 hour 5 minutes) and bike-back-home time of 59 minutes (down from 1 hour 15 minutes) - not bad eh?

I'm back! Didya miss me?

I have been horribly busy/lazy (being busy is an excuse for avoiding all forms of exercise don't you know) but I'm finally back on my bike this week - Monday was HARD work, my biking buddies streaked off up the hill and I puffed and panted and collapsed in a sorry sweaty heap, but yesterday was a tad easier, slightly less painful and getting a bit of a buzz from the effort. I have, at last, sketched out a 12 month training plan, starting off gently with a 30 mile ride next weekend.

And, most exciting, Canadian Affair have tickets available for May 2011, so now I just have to make a Very Important Decision - do I whine and flutter my eyelids and persuade my lovely husband to treat me gently and take 3 weeks for the trip, or do I man up and commit to a herculean 2 weeks? I can't resist the challenge - 2 weeks it is. Which means the final route map can be firmed up and little details like how the hell to get a) from Halifax airport to Cape Breton and b) from Cape Sable Island back to fly home.

So, (another) fresh start, celebrated with a nice new design for my blog. Onwards and upwards!