day 11: in words.

cornwall had been looming in my mind for months. we were never quite sure if the route we plotted would be ok. whether it was too far given the hills. whether our legs would cope after 10 days of pain.

i had miles on standby with tents and spare kit, to meet us where we passed out, so we could finish the next morning, if needed, and when i could barely walk up the stairs without my muscles screaming in fatigue yesterday morning i was very prepared to use that option.

but at 7.20 in the morning, our earliest start yet, we headed out for what turned out to be, for both of us, the best day's riding of the trip, by far.

maybe it was because we'd removed our bar bags and were riding light.

maybe it was because the sun was shining.

maybe it was because the route we ended up using turned out to have lovely tarmac and no cars for many bits, and just the right amount of shade.

maybe it was my newfound ability to plod on up hills/recover while pushing.

maybe it was because we were a bit happier to bimble along, sitting back and enjoying the views.

maybe it was just because we knew that at some point today we would get to cycle over that last hill and into lands end.

whatever it was, it was a genuinely beautiful ride and as we arrived at lands end, to a beautiful sunset over the sea, we were glad we took the route that was 'downhill all the way'

saturday's data: 

92.3 miles, with 7,664ft of ascent, in 8h 22m 04s at an average speed of 11mph.

overall, and i can't even believe how perfectly it adds up, and depending on how accurate you believe strava to be, we have ridden 1000.0 miles. 1,609.3 kilometres

which leaves me with one more plug for justgiving.com/embatt, lets get that total up to £1609.3, a pound for each and every kilometre we've travelled from one end of the country to the other.

and now i'm going to go back to the world of pain that my body has now realised it's allowed to acknowledge.