Prologue

Trains Booked...
So, I booked the train tickets today.  I set off from Birmingham on the 2nd June and should arrive in Penzance late that evening.  I will then have a quick half hour or so ride to the youth hostel at Lands End where I will hopefully get a good nights sleep before the first day of riding.

The return journey will be a long day and I have booked myself onto the train from Thurso on 16th June.  The journey back to Preston (where I will stay in my uni halls of residence) will be about 10h 45mins, assuming there are no delays.  Hopefully I will be very tired by then and will sleep for some of the way.

Booking the tickets was not easy and took the best part of half an hour for the operator at the station to convince the computer to book my bike onto the train.  At one point he asked me if I really needed the bike - yeah, kinda!

The total cost of the tickets was a little in excess of £30, which I was impressed with, given how expensive our train services usually are.

Training Going Well...
I've put in lots of miles on the bike so far this year.  At the time of writing I have logged 2177.15 miles this year so I feel confident that I can handle this ride.  Even so, it will still be really tough riding an average of 85 miles every day for 13 days but I am really looking forward to the challenge.

No Turning Back.
After so many years of wanting to do this ride it will finally happen.  Now that I have the train tickets in my possession it feels very real and there will be no backing out or putting off now.

I will be doing this ride in aid of Cancer Research UK and would really appreciate it if you would take the time to visit my sponsorship page and donate to this wonderful charity.  Thank you.

You can also visit my website to view more details about my ride.

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The Planned Route:
  -  Day 1:  Lands End - Perranporth (70 miles)
  -  Day 2:  Perranporth - Elmscott (76 miles)
  -  Day 3:  Elmscott - Klive (75 miles)
  -  Day 4:  Klive - St Briavels (82 miles)
  -  Day 5:  St Briavels - Bridges, Long Mynd (72 miles)
  -  Day 6:  Bridges - Preston (104 miles)
  -  Day 7:  Preston - Mosedale (76 miles)
  -  Day 8:  Mosedale - Edinburgh (114 miles)
  -  Day 9:  Edinburgh - Caputh (66 miles)
  -  Day 10: Caputh - Fort William (95 miles)
  -  Day 11: Fort William - Inverness (85 miles)
  -  Day 12: Inverness - Tongue (88 miles)
  -  Day 13: Tongue - John O' Groats (70 miles)