Dan's blog.

Prawngate is over. Today the energy came back and I completed 148km / 91 miles through to the start of the Scottish Highlands in a small town called Drymen. The journey has 336 miles left. Given the journey is 1176 miles long – that’s pretty close to the finish.

Just to add a challenge to this last part of the ride – the RMT rail union have announced that they will be striking from 21st June – The last trains will be on Sunday 20th. Ive therefore booked the sleeper back from Inverness to London Euston on the night of Sunday 20th. This means I’ve got to average over 85 miles a day over the next 4 days (including Sunday) and make sure the logistics from John O’Groats to Lands End are slick to get me the 2 or 3 hour taxi from JOG to Inverness to catch the 2030 sleeper train.

Suddenly my mindful meander along the cycle ways of Britain has taken a schedule driven turn. Ive been on excel and using the journey planning book to work out where I am aiming to get to and where looks OK to stay. The shiny new plan means that there is a very manageable 52 miles on the last day if I complete some bigger days over the next couple of days. It’s going to be a challenge because the term “highlands” is not given to this region because its flat.

Back to today. It was a lovely day on the bike. The weather was bright and started cold (12 degrees) but then rose to the heady heights of 23 degrees! The early parts of the ride was quite straight forward along minor roads into Glasgow. Rather than follow all the cycle network twists and turns, I just followed some smaller roads into Glasgow riverside. The cruise up the Clyde from Glasgow to Loch Lomond was lovely. Even more lovely was the first views of the highlands as I climbed to Drymen from Balloch. Some of these views were mesmeric – particularly in comparison to the to the suburbs that I went through from late morning.

Todays highlights included a quick stop at a distillery for cake and coffee and to order a bottle to be sent home. As seems to happen regularly at these stops – I ended up chatting with a really nice production manager from BBC Scotland. I then ended up talking free speech with a piano tuner! These encounters followed one at lunch with a really friendly biker who provided all sorts of navigation advice. Less conversation was had with a worse for wear older gentleman who said a few paragraphs to me at a red light in the Glasgow suburbs. I was unable to understand a word but I’m sure he meant well.

Today was a nice rhythm day. I finished at just after 1730 and felt fine. This is very good news because I haven’t told my legs yet about what’s planned for them on Thursday, Friday and Saturday!

Thanks again for your continued support everyone. The messages that you’ve sent are heart warming, great motivation and simply kind.