We started the day early - the first bad omen of the day was that we were on the go before breakfast was served and we took it on the road- delicious bacon sandwiches
Made it in fine time to Kendal, although the famous ole' northeasterly did slow us down. had a nice cuppa served by young ladies of the standard that we have become accustomed to. No mint cakes though. I got myself some new padded shorts as the old pair had worn through. I had noticed flocks of reindeer following us on the misconception that Rudolph was riding pillion - but alas it was my red butt showing through the fabric.
Onwards , upwards , winwards! The 14 mile climb to Shap followed. The climb was not steep but made almost impossible by the weather. The wind was so fierce that when stopping for nutrition we had to lean against the bikes to prevent us from blowing over! We could keep a speed of approx 5 mph till we reached Shap (the highest motorway in the UK). Here we had another cuppa of T and half a pint of delicious Hawkshead Bitter 3.7 %. Useful info - you can actually buy bitter in halves and it tastes just as good!!!! Amazing what you learn on such an educational trip. Tomorrow we may try to get half a cup of tea as an experiment.
The scenery was stunning and the weather dry and we continued to Penrith and Carlisle - but the last 17 miles (into the wind - from now on it is ITW to save time!) were b.... hard work and we decided to abstain from pursuing our goal of reaching Scotland today.
We have now had a good Indian meal and a couple of double-half pints of Kingfisher (no comments) and buttocks allowing the banks of Loch Lomond may be in site tomorrow evening.
"had a nice cuppa served by young ladies of the standard that we have become accustomed to"
ReplyDeleteAre you referring to the cuppa or the young ladies?
What a day Soren...reading about it brings a real sense of the difficulties you had with the wind and that Shap climb. Well done for persevering and making good progress. Hope the new pad helps the soreness. Ensure that your panniers are evenly balanced, as if unbalanced, your body ie back and butt are constantly working to keep the bike vertical which can only add to aches and pains. And as you have found out, the lighter the load the better. So Scotland it is then and on a Good Sunday too. Remember "The more it hurts, the farther ahead you are getting".........upwards and onwards.
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