Our Best Worst Idea

Day 72 - Yep, the hills are still there

Our plan from yesterday requires a lot of miles every day from now until Christmas, so it was the first of many early starts, especially as we knew we still had to actually plan and book things before we could leave. The hotel (a third of the price of the

Day 71 - Actually doing the admin

After another AWESOME breakfast we realised that we'd done all of the chilling yesterday, but none of the planning, so we decided on an (as yet unheard of on this tour) third night in the same place! We perhaps weren't as efficient as we could have

Day 70 - Ahhhhhh

[Strava not found!] We woke up late. We had an AMAzing buffet breakfast. We did a little bit of admin. We wandered out no further than 200m from our hotel for a bit of souvenir shopping. We had a gym session. We had a sauna and spa. We chatted in

Day 69 - Oh well hello there hills

After a refreshing four hours sleep we were up and ready to go by breakfast starting time at 7am, although it took ages to arrive so we weren't on the road until 8:25am. The motivation was we'd booked for two luxurious nights in a five

Day 68 - It's...no, wait...We're Grubby!

To our surprise the 8 euro guesthouse included breakfast delivered to the room - and very good breakfast to boot! That and the rest of the Swiggy haul from last night had us suitably caloried up for the day today, if a little later leaving than hoped. We had similar

Day 67 - Chasing Trucks

Jeremy left very early for his taxi and ultimately successfully made it home carrying 15kg of our combined gear! Feels awesome to be rid of it and back to the slick setup (plus two terracotta tea cups that wouldn't fit in the home bag). We decided it was

Day 66 - Touristing in Varanasi!

So today is the much awaited Varanasi day, as one of the most sacred hindu locations in India, everyone's been recommending it to us so this was the objective of Jeremy's last day before heading back to the UK. Started off with breakfast on the rooftop

Day 65 - Quick Commerce

I started the day with some trepidation about a 120km ride. Catching up with Em about the rest of the trip really emphasised that 160km was usual for these guys, and this was just reinforced by Ben making plans for a 300+ day surfing trucks, so I set out to

Day 64 - The Indian Cheat Code

I had another big day planned with the same idea that Emma and Jeremy would cycle a bit and then car to catch up. I got up early which was somewhat rough after the late night activities of my companions disturbed my early night plans, ate as much breakfast as

Day 63 - Pedal to the Metal

Jeremy wants to see Varanessi as his final destination, which is a lot of ks away, and I'm very keen to keep an unbroken cycling line, so the solution is to cycle some tourist and slower days all together and then for me to do a few bigger

Day 62 - A warning to consociate travellers

When you want sleep, there will be chatter. When you want cycling, there will be sand. When the road is smooth, there will be additional exercise. 0:00 /0:06 1× When you've reached the hotel, the cycling will continue. When you want a relaxed evening, a folk

Day 61 - The Taj Mahal

We were told that the Taj Mahal really does live up to the hype, and that earlier is better to avoid the crowds. That meant a 5:30am alarm for a 5:45am meeting of our guide at the hotel 🤢. Despite our yawning it was indeed very impressive and the

Day 60 - Bird Land and City Chaos!

So working it backwards....we want to be at the Taj comfortably before it closes (4pm), 1h to sort hotel etc (3pm), 3h cycling (12pm), 1h to lunch/pick up bags from old hotel (11am), 2h bird park (9am), therefore, alarm 7:30 to be packed/breakfast/on the road

Day 59 - It's Smoggy!

"Can we have two bottles of water actually please?" "Errrrr, no." Riiiight. The misunderstandings with the hotel receptionist from yesterday are still very much a thing then! To be fair he was very lovely, although I had to refuse when he rushed off to get someone

Day 58 - Tigers!

Our plan seemed rather ambitious given Emma's state last night, but after a good night she was a changed woman, so we set off early to cycle the 90km to Sariska Tiger Reserve in the morning with the goal of an afternoon safari. Neither of us was feeling

Day 57 - Delhi Belly

After wondering when it was going to get us, the infamous "Delhi Belly" (vomiting) finally caught-up with us when Emma spent the whole night vomiting. Clearly we weren't going to cycle 100km to the tiger reserve, but the hotel we were in was not nice and

Day 56 - The First Puncture

Knowing we had another hotel coming up, made it a lot quicker to leave than our previous nights going back to wild camping, so after a very restorative night's sleep we were off at 9am feeling much less ill than yesterday 🥳. The day was hot and flat and

Day 55 - Cycling again!

We had a nice breakfast with everyone and then waved them goodbye as they headed West to continue their travels and we continue our constant Easterly push. We spent a good couple of hours building the bikes, packing, and altering the setup from camping to hotel optimised. We both now

Day 54 - The Camel Festival

After a very comfortable night in our best hotel yet we had a nice breakfast with everyone and then set off to see the festival. If we were complaining that in Delhi we didn't get enough carnage or dirt then we certainly changed that today. For the final

Day 53 - Chauffered

By contrast to yesterday, today was quite a bit more relaxed. After another nice breakfast we went down to the lobby where our bikes were loaded onto the roof of the waiting car and we were whisked away in an air conditioned box through the noise. It was hard to

Day 52 - Delhi!!!

Having slept a brief hour the travel night on the plane and having very comfortable beds we slept long and we slept good! We even had the luxury of telling the alarm what to do and going back to sleep for another hour 😌. Much refreshed we tackled breakfast and revelled

Day 50 + 51 - India here we come!

Well. We are now in India!!! It's a bit of a different vibe from the clean, empty and colder steppe. Let me tell you a little more about how we got here... Today was the designated pre flying faff day, original todo listo was: fix Ben's

Day 49 - The Easiest Tour Repair of My Life

The lady running the hotel this morning (we saw her husband yesterday) was very curious and kept randomly walking into the room while we were waking up and getting ready! She came in to ask when we were leaving, came in with an English speaker on a call to ask

Day 48 - That Beyneu cafe pull again...

Today's weather forecast: headwind getting progressively stronger, developing into borderline unrideable from early afternoon. So today's plan was get riding early , stop as little as possible, and try make it to Dossor (120km) before we start getting pushed backwards. Got on the bikes at 8, I&

Day 47 - The Easiest Century of My Life

We had a very late night after finishing the planning and reset phaff, but the wind was a very strong motivator to get up early and get on the road as quickly as possible. It was forecast for a stonking tailwind today, and then a stonking headwind tomorrow, so despite