Bitch on a bike

So... 3 and a half weeks to go. Knee still iffy and reminding me so every time I climb a (crunch) step, but I am going. As in: 'I am planning to begin the journey as planned via bicycle, everything that happens subsequently is as yet unknown'. Fact is, I don't care how I get there, even if that involves dumping the bike in a hedge a couple of miles outside Caen and hitching to Barcelona with a limp. The adventure is in the going.

I've put back on the 5 kg that I lost a few weeks ago. This also being to fault of Worthing (see last post). Since moving in with my beloved Keith I have turned into a hybrid of Hugh Fernley-Whittingstall, Nigella and a Stepford Wife. I am obsessed with making home-made ice cream (5 different flavours in my large silver fridge/freezer right now) and boiling hams. Worthing is like a comfort-eating Wicker Man.

Bought some new padded shorts, but sadly have acted under the delusion that my arse is a size 14. Turns out its not. Circulation in the bottom half of my legs is limited, but waist looks tiny. Bit above waist is spilling over like a chocolate fountain. I look like one of those men with tiny legs and giant, hard bellies. Like someone who really shouldn't be allowed to wear shorts.

Been out on my bike. Keith has been very encouraging, I have been a pain in the arse, concocting excuses not to go, offering sexual favours in lieu of cycling and generally moaning ('You said there'd be no more hills. What's that in front of me? A fucking hill. What's that behind me? A fucking bastard'). Yes, I said that. He is a truly wonderful and tolerant human being.

I had a practice putting my tent up in the garden. Thought it might be good to sleep in it for a night to try it out, but I'm too scared. Too scared to sleep 20 feet from my back door. Good grief, what hope do I have of sleeping in 19 different French and Spanish fields? It won't be the cycling that does me in, but my morbid fear of imaginary noises in the night. I figure that once I'm out there, I'll have no choice. Character building? Utter stupidity? Something like that.

Hey, wouldn't it be funny if I returned from a trip designed to beat my neuroses, more agoraphobic and anxious than when I went? Hilarious. At least I'll have a nice big house to hide myself away in for the next 12 years. Maybe Worthing has hidden benefits after all.

The Bike

The bike came from ebay. It has 10 gears with a tight span at a high gear ratio. This means the chance of me managing to cycle up a hill is even less than usual.

I hate hills. If I can't get somewhere without cycling along Brighton seafront and then walking when the road starts to tilt; I drive. I hate hills. More evidence to support that statement? My original plan was to cycle from Bilbao to Barcelona - a distance of around 500 miles, but then on perusing the map I spied not merely a hill, but a mountain range. Big Spanish fuckers. So, now I am cycling from the Channel to Barcelona which is around 800 miles. 300 more miles of cycling to avoid hills. I hate hills.

Keith (my beloved and a life-long cyclist) told me what to say to the person at the bike shop to get him to replace my gears for hill-friendly ones (that's an engine, right?). I rang the bike shop and said some words the like and meaning of which I know not. I don't know what's worse; having to admit you're an idiot or demonstrating that you are one whilst attempting not to be. I think that dropping into the conversation that I would be cycling 800 miles alone on this 30 year old virtually gearless bike with this 45 year old virtually stranger-to-exercise body either convinced him that a) I did in fact, despite what was coming out of my gob, know what I was talking about and was a seasoned cyclist, or b) I was not very well and should not be alarmed.

Apparently, I've got 24 and I'm getting 28, which will make it easier 'but not as easy as I'm sure you'd like it'. How dare he. 'Nah, I love hills', I enthused, 'more of a challenge'. I didn't say that. That would make me look like an idiot.