Such a rubbish summer here in the UK that there's now a group to Like on Facebook for that one sunny day in Blighty - today.
To be fair, it was a proper English summer day; slightly breezy, slightly overcast and temperatures in the low 20's centigrade. Perfect weather for cycling.
Only challenge on the way out, travelling west, was the wind blowing east. Total distance covered was 95km in just on 4 hours. You could fly to Iceland in this time, and I'm sure that your seat would still be comfortable at the end of the journey.
Today's journey was out to Uxbridge, then onto Gerrards Cross on the A40 and into High Wycombe. From there I went south towards Marlow, taking a detour towards Cookham, then Maidenhead to Slough, back to Uxbridge and then home.
High Wycombe was brilliant - 75 metre climb over 2km at an incline of 3.1%. Map My Ride were kind enough to rate this as a category 5 climb; I only have 4 of these on day 1 when we cycle to Dover. Average speed today was 24 km/h, and I'm able to maintain about 30 km/h on the flatter terrain. With just on two months until I spend four days in the saddle, I think I'm on track to be able to enjoy a day riding and not be totally knackered at the end of it.
I'd never heard of Cookham before, but it's a beautiful little town right on a section of the Thames where there's a chance of a billabong forming. Went past a pub called The Ferry, which has seating right by the river. Will book mark this for the next English Summer.
Even managed to get a little more tan-like color on my arms. Given that I'm quite pale and that my natural condition when exposed to the sun is to burn, I'm quite chuffed. May keep up this cycling lark after my charity ride, just so I can keep my arms from their natural pale state.
Capped the day off with a lovely grilled piece of lightly smoked salmon and a very Med style spread of sun dried tomatoes, artichokes and olives. Plus a very nice Cloudy Bay sauvingon blanc that I'd picked up at Waitrose. Perfect.
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