The more astute amongst you will have noticed I’ve been gone for a couple of weeks again. That’s because I’ve been cycling from Lands End to John O Groats (LEJOG). Well I’m back, the bike’s all washed down, cleaned and lubricated ready for work again tomorrow and all the camping gear is aired and living back under the stairs so it must be time to write up my LEJOG adventure. Looking back on it there is a great sense of satisfaction at actually doing it, but if you were to ask would I do it again I’m afraid the answer would be no. Instead I would choose a route where the weather was more certain like through France down to the Mediterranean or something similar. To make this easier I’ve broken this down in to sections.
Bike and Equipment
I used a Specialised Tri-cross bike, which was as it came out of the factory in 2013. It had a triple on the front and what looks like a reasonable range of gears on the back sprocket. A slightly bigger range of gears might have helped on some hills and in the end I pushed it up 5 hills (4 in Cornwall, one in Scotland) simply because it was nigh on impossible to keep turning the pedals. I used a standard rear rack I already had in the shed and fitted it with two 20 litre Avenir Panniers from Go Outdoors. I also used a 7 litre Avenir Handlebar Bag from the same place. My tent, a Vango Banshee 200, sat on the rack between the two panniers and my Vango Standard self inflating mat sat across the two held on by two bungees. In addition I had a seat bag with a spare inner tube, puncture repair kit, spanners and allen keys to fit all the nuts and bolts on the bike and some cable ties. I didn’t have any lights and I kept a daily record of mileage with a £6 wireless odometer from Lidl. You don’t need lights in Wick in June where the dawn chorus woke me at 0255.
The Route
I followed a route up the west side of the UK and over the Isle of Arran, but faced with the prospect of bad weather I bolted up the A9 from Inverness to Wick in a single day on the penultimate day. I didn’t have any sat nav eqpt and simply highlighted the route on strip maps I printed at work from Ordnance Survey Maps using Bing Maps. Each one was cut in to a convenient size for the Handlebar bag map case. I deviated quite a bit from my original route, but not greatly just a few miles either side. Wherever practical I avoided main roads, but those I did follow were not that bad in my opinion and I never felt threatened or unsafe. In particular I followed the A49 through Warrington and right up to Preston and found it fine. Similarly I followed the A6 from Preston to Carlisle through Kendal and found that equally fine.
Camping and Food
I didn’t take any cooking equipment and each day had a cooked breakfast in either a café or a supermarket café. I had a meal deal type lunch with sandwiches, a bag of crisps and a drink and bread, olives, sun dried tomatoes etc for evening to eat whilst relaxing. No beer. The diet must have worked well because I was exactly the same weight on the day I got back as I was the day I set off.
Other Items
I took 3 cycling tops, two pairs of cycling shorts, one pair of cycling longs and waterproofs. In addition I had a fleece jacket, one pair of long walking trousers and three t-shirts plus hat and gloves and 4 pairs of socks. By the last day I had no clean clothes just less smelly ones. I also took a very small first aid kit along with sudocreme, sunblock and midge repellent. I didn’t need any of these because it was too cloudy for sun cream too cold for midges.
The Execution
The whole ride took 13 days and I covered roughly 950 miles, inclusive of a few miles lost on the outskirts of Bristol and trying to cross the wrong Severn Bridge. It took 13 days and I cycled roughly 75 miles per day with the lowest mileage being 55 miles and the most 96 miles. The day after 96 miles I only had to manage the 17 miles each way to JOG and back to Wick. My average speed was 10.3 mph.
I camped every night except on night one where I got a room in the Mess at RAF St Mawgan, night five where I stayed at my Brothers and night 9 where it rained that much in the night my tent would not dry so I got a room in the Onich Hotel for £35 B&B and had a short day, which I really benefitted from because I was refreshed the next day and raring to go again. To be honest I thought it would be easier to find campsites than it was because I just thought there were more in Britain than there actually is. I didn’t book any sites I just turned up and was always found a pitch. I wild camped two nights because I couldn’t find anywhere. Once near the Severn Bridge where I camped in the meadows running down to the River Severn only a mile or so from the bridge and once north of Oban on the loch side. Nobody troubled me at all. The most I paid for a pitch was £10 the least £6.
Fitness
I’m 48 years old and weigh 14 Stone. I’m reasonably fit; however, I did no specific training apart from I do cycle 12.5 miles each way to work roughly four times per week and occasionally go for a long ride at weekends of circa 50 miles. I didn’t feel sore or have any injuries apart from the odd achilles tendon twinge. It took 3 days for my body to get used to the fact that its new job was to cycle for 8 hours per day after which it felt quite pleasant.
Getting to the Start and Finish
I noticed there was always lots of discussion about the virtues of the various methods of getting from start to finish and they all seemed very expensive. Like £200 on the train type expensive. So I opted for an under utilised method, the one way hire car. I was able to hire a one way car from Enterprise Newark on Trent to Penzance for £45 and it cost me £49 in petrol for the 357 miles. Even better Enterprise have a policy of collecting and dropping customers off, so on arrival in Penzance I asked to be taken to the Lands End Hotel, which saved £25 in a taxi or an hour and a half ride only to come back the same route.
From JOG I could have taken a Europcar from Wick Airport; however that would have worked out at over £120 so I caught the train from Wick to Inverness for £12.40 (booked 2 days in advance) and again hired a one way car from Enterprise in Inverness to Newark, which cost £74 plus £54 in petrol for the 500 odd miles. Both hire cars were booked with just 2 days notice.
By using a hire car I found it was a lot cheaper than the train unless you book a long time in advance, you can set off when you like, you don’t have to worry that the bike isn’t booked on the connecting train, you don’t have to change train twice or even three times and you don’t have to sit by some idiot on the train.
The Total Cost
If I don’t add in the cost of food, because I have to eat whether I’m at home or away, the whole trip cost me £376.92 inclusive of car hire, fuel, campsites and ferry and train fares.
My Observations
Whilst cycling around Britain for two weeks these are the things I noticed:
- There are some stunning places in the UK; however, large parts of it all look similar. The hills in Cornwall and there are many of them, look like the ones in Shropshire or Lancashire. Lots of houses look the same too.
- There is a café, or supermarket with a café, in almost every average size town and indeed some villages too.
- Sustrans National Cycle routes are good if you’re not in a hurry to get anywhere and don’t mind opening gates or negotiating obstacles designed to stop motorcycles. They also lack good direction signs. By that I mean there are lots of arrows pointing the way with a number on them, but they don’t often have the destination on them; therefore its easy to be going the wrong way on the right route, if that makes sense.
- Cornwall is the hilliest county in Britain. It is a serious of steep down hills over a little hooky bridge and then a steep uphill followed by another steep downhill. This is repeated for approx 100 miles.
- Lots of cyclists claim to have done Lands End to John O Groats, but I didn’t see many when I was doing it.
- There is no substitute for decent equipment. If you buy anything from the pound store it will only last one pound worth of time and let you down when you need it. Anything bought from the pound store has the structural integrity of butter.
- There are less campsites in Britain than I thought there were.