Day 10 Bonar Bridge to John O'Groats

Day 10 Bonar Bridge to John O’Groats

Firstly, we’d like to dedicate our ride to our good friend Roger who we hope will be able to read this very soon; our thoughts are very much with him at this time.

We set off from wee Bonar Bridge at the usual early o’ clock. This required the wonderful staff of the wee Dunroamin Hotel getting up early and making us all breakfast so we could get away on time: as you have probably already gathered we were not adverse to dragging random people in to our wee schedule (Which has been hitting hedges, trees and fields every 12 minutes on average since Lands End) whether they liked it or not! Anyway, cheers all the same.

Well, the start of the day was sadly overcast when we hoped that someone, somewhere, might have given us some sunshine instead of the prevailing, wee, multi-directional wind which was actually a Hurricane. This did not dampen the spirits of our top rider wee Dave ‘David’ Campbell who lead from the middle of the bunch (An energy saving tactic if ever I’ve seen one) hoping that there would be a wee sprint finish which did not materialise. As we progressed, the wee calf muscles of Dr Andrew Spence (PHD) began to show signs of wear as he imagined a wee incline to be an alpine stage of the Tour de France (A race which he has vowed to enter next year – if they have space in the wee team van).

Jim ‘My bike isn’t going to make it to the end’ Kennell suffered in silence as his wee undercarriage sent him ‘please stop now messages’ which he somehow ignored. Perhaps his wee extra curricular activities had kept him numb enough to allow him to carry on. Zac ‘please don’t do that anymore Jim’ Grief pounded on consistently, as always, and is a fantastic wind-breaker and all round good chap. Unfortunately some of us became more vocal than others as the pain began to bite in to the old legs. I am of course talking about wee Lynsey O’Neil whose unrepeatable language will have to dwell in your imaginations my dear blog watchers (Think Grimsby fishwife orYorkshire miners after hours drinking club and you won’t be far off). Lynsey, who is incredibly strong, kept on going and is a wee triumph.

Amanda led us down a road that was, like most of Scotland, very Canadian with Logging trucks and chainsaw wielding maniacs everywhere whose vehicles were restricted to run at no less that 100 mph – thankfully there was an abundance of Passing Places which we all used for passing in (Passing? Sorry, guys that might be dyslexia – you just had to be there – see photo). Anyway, hats off to Amanda who was very brave and strong on so many levels.

Bland roads led us away from our penultimate pub lunch stop at Betty Hill where locals, exasperated by the sheer amount of cyclists invading their grief hovel, gave us the look. However, the waitress was worth the trouble and we soldiered on our way to the mighty tourist trinket trap of John O’Groats – arriving after pushing through a head-wind which allowed us very little time to enjoy our final hours. Thankfully, we stopped in Thurso, in a civilised modern café, and had us some cake n’ that. At this time Ken received a message that Amanda had cashed in her chips and had to go off and collect her. Perhaps this was due in some part to DC not being there to push her along. Dave must feel like he has completed one and a half rides here as his pushing arm is now massive and his wife may have some suspicions as to what he has been doing whilst away (That’s the second one of the team who has developed a single bigger bicep, but enough of that).

Anyway, good news – we made it as a team (minus Carl ‘Its not a race but I’ll finish first anyway’ Jones)

After the finish we had the customary photos, hugs, gropes etc (see photo) we then pilled on the van (thanks to Peter Newton) back to the hotel in Wick.

A quick clean up (Jim!) and it was down to the bar for a wee bit of booze, at this point we opened the letter Lynz has been carrying around for the past week, hoping it would contain a get out of Milton Keynes free card for each of us. Thanks for the best wished and help Martin.

The hotel’s extortionate food prices led us out to look for an Indian restaurant which we could not find. Instead, we settled for a Chinese which later turned out to be next door but 1 from the Indian. With attention to detail like this will be all guaranteed a long and successful career with Network Rail.

Eatchy bike watch

We must apologise at this point for the late update of the Blog, but we were all battered like Loch Fyne Haddock without the tartar sauce last night - but we all deserved it didn’t we?

Please join us tomorrow for our final thoughts.