Cornish Delight!

The Lamb Inn was wonderful, I can't find any fault with it except it's too far from Pinner! It is what a pub should be.

As we were leaving Sarah and the kids arrived having left London very early. They saw us off and then had an excellent breakfast at the Lamb, some consolation for getting out of bed in the middle of the night!

We were straight into the hills and the first 20 miles or so was quite challenging. Steve K suddenly realised that today was going to be a bit different to the flatter ride the previous day! Still we were doing pretty well and the rain was keeping away. We kept passing Sarah, Sandra and the kids who were taking photos. Apparently we have lots of pictures of the empty road, I'm sure this was down to our speed and not any lack of photographic skills on their part!

We were going to have lunch just passed Launceston but the village we chose didn't have a pub and so it was another 5 miles before we could stop, all of which was uphill! This just built up the appetite! Fabulous views from there though, although it was getting colder and windier. It was a relatively flat last 20 miles but they were wet and cold miles! The rain had come although it was nothing compared to that encountered in Scotland!

So here we are in Cornwall, over 900 miles covered, with 57 to go. It was a sweet moment entering Cornwall and we are all feeling quite strong, which is remarkable. The big challenge tonight will be keeping out of the bar, Steve K leaves us in the morning and I can sense there may be some encouragement to imbibe more than usual!

More guests joined us, Pete and Jan friends of Mark and Roy and Betty. I worked with Roy many years ago. Lovely to see all of them. It's been great over the last eleven days to see so many friends and to have so many messages of encouragement. It has helped when the motivation to go mile after mile wavered.

Now for the facts:

Stats for the day - 65 miles covered at an average speed of 13 mph ,feet climbed close to 5,500.

Ale and Arse report - four beers on tap and only three sampled! Did well especially considering King was on a mission! The IPA, Tribute and Trelawney's. Tribute has to take the title for tonight. There is no doubt that whilst I have sampled some great beers from the north as we have moved south the quality and choice has improved, as has the consumption! Well I felt with the demise of Nature Watch and the Porridge Report that I had to make sure the Ale report was as full as possible! As for the Arse I have a feeling that I must have hard skin forming there now as it not longer hurts so much. Recently Emma ,my daughter, went to have the hard skin on her feet (not that she had any!) removed by having fish nibble at her toes. I am suspect the fish will go on strike if they see my bottom hovering above the bowl!

Forecast for tomorrow — it would be lovely to finish the ride in the sunshine. It looks like that could happen although there will be a brisk south westerly wind. Me thinks we are heading south west! We have actually been quite lucky with the weather considering how poor a month it has been. We've only had three really wet days although a strong headwind has been blowing on and off for the passed four days which has hindered us.

I remember on the first day at lunchtime, we were cold and tired after a battle with the wind,when we spoke with some people who only had 50 miles left to go and I thought how lucky they were. Well I do smile as I see the odd group battling away on the other side of the road, I wave ,wish them well and then think I'm very glad I don't have all those miles to look forward too! It has been a fantastic trip but there comes a time when it needs to finish and that time is tomorrow!