Why am I doing this?
Why indeed. Lejog has never been on my bucket list – partly because I don’t have one, but mainly because I felt it was something other people did – generally those with masochistic tendencies. My cycling ambitions were a bit more modest: short rides along the back roads of Hampshire and Surrey on weekends, for fresh air and exercise, and using bikes to explore further flung places at home and abroad on campervan holidays.
The idea for our first cycle tour came in the form of a fundraiser for the Lifeboat Fund in 2017. Initial doubts were swept aside over a bag of Nobby’s Nuts in a pub garden at the end of a weekend ride. A few weeks, and several wantonly sliced and sellotaped OS maps later, Jon and I set off from RNLI’s Tower Lifeboat station in Westminster. The sun shone, the expected punctures never materialised and the orange squash provided by the Wells-next-the-Sea lifeboat crew was the best I’d ever tasted.
After that, the only questions were where we would go next and when. The answers turned out to be the following year and Paris – during a heatwave and against a backdrop of the World Cup: Liberté, Egalité, Mbappe! We enjoyed it so much, we cycled all the way home too.
In 2019, we opted for a tour of Denmark, which was quieter and flatter, with excellent cycle paths and equally good pastries.
Then Covid came along, and thoughts of cycle tours, along with anything else that might happen outside the home, or at best a supermarket, literally became the stuff of dreams.
So on one level my motivation for doing this ride is pure escapism. But there are lots of other reasons: because I like going from A to B by bike; because I fancy a challenge and an adventure; because ‘Lejog’ is a known 'thing' that I can test myself against; because I’m lucky enough to have the opportunity; because if not now, when; because it’s the ultimate antithesis to a desk job; because Covid; because I'd like to achieve something concrete at the start of what I'm calling a sabbatical year; because I'd like to re-connect with friends I haven't seen for a while; because I'd like to explore the UK; because I'd like to meet fellow travellers - both literally and metaphorically; and obviously because I’m hopelessly optimistic about the British weather and my athletic abilities.
Or perhaps it's just because I'm a masochist after all.