Barbara gave us some of her bread and tea for breakfast
and we set off early. The countryside was not particularly pretty, but there
were some very nice villages. I was feeling really tired and although my knees
and shoulders were OK and the cramp was under control I was finding the hills
harder and harder to get up. It was not until sometime afterwards that it
occurred to me that I had no eaten a proper meal for 24 hours and so was bound to
be short of energy.
We stopped in Shrewsbury for lunch and a passer by saw Pete’s tabard, which a friend had made and had information about what charities he was riding for, and gave him £20. We headed on off
towards Runcorn, and to our surprise went through a bit of Wales again.
We gave a cheer when the milometer went past 400.
The approach to Runcorn is horrible – all huge roads –
and the cycle paths are a bit forbidding. I was ahead of Pete and aimed towards where I thought
the hotel was but got to a massive dual carriageway roundabout which appeared
to enclose the hotel. I headed back and eventually found my way into the middle
of the road system and located the hotel. Pete called me several times saying he
was lost – he was asking people the way and they were directing him as though
he were in a car, which did not help much.
I got really despondent waiting for him and called Hilary
in some distress. Looking back I can now see that it was a combination of
tiredness, a very long day and not having eaten enough, but at the time felt
like I could not go on. Hilary was
wonderfully supportive and encouraging and I calmed down a bit and went and had
a shower.
Pete arrived about an hour after me and we ate
fish and chips and drank keg beer in the hotel restaurant. This was probably the lowest popint of the entire journey.
The Campanile Hotel was a bit odd – very basic, only one
step up from a back packing place – but it really did exactly what we wanted.
Comfortable beds, food, beer, showers. What more do tired cyclists need?
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