Day 6: Liverpool to Tenbury Wells, 95.4 miles (154ish km), 1000m of vert, several cubic tonnes of rain and several thousand miles of wind...
After an interesting evening of Shiraz and Nomination Whist in the bar on the Belfast to Liverpool overnight ferry (one of the lads got a little competitive, although I will not mention any names) ... (well unless you ply me with a couple of drinks tomorrow when we finish the ride), we retired to our 4 berth cabin for a few hours of kip before a rude awakening on the Tannoy at 5:15am (5:20am, 5:30am, 5:40am, 5:55am - ok we got it the first time!)
After eventually leaving the boat (they wouldn't let us ride out and sent us a special bus!) we grabbed a train under the Mersey to Liverpool city and headed for the Malmaison hotel and a liaison and (very reassuring) breakfast with cousie Helen. Lucky for us she's the GM at this quite wonderful hotel and managed to get us in the door, bikes stashed and sat down to Breakfast in a jiffy. Breakfast was lovely and catching up with Helen even better - the lads all realised they should be doing that a lot more often...
A meeting with a good friend John Swinney in Chester loomed and time was running short - unfortunately Kel (plonker) managed to get tickets for the pleasure cruise rather than the commuter ferry, but by the time they realised they were heading in the wrong direction down the Mersey.. All very amusing.
Faux pas... Oops etc.
40 mins later and on the road finally into a horrible Southerly wind and rain, the boys cracked on to meet John and after eventually doing so continued South...(swin was very good about the wait)
Ok, its getting late, so lets go with highlights of the day:
1) waking up on a ferry with 3 smelly blokes (highlight?)
2) descending the 1km long escalator on the ferry only to learn they wouldn't let us off!
3) metro ride with our bikes to the Malmaison hotel with Liverpool commuters..
4) Malmaison breakfast with the lads awesome cousin Helen (lovely lady!) which even included special potato bread cooked up by Chefs who had never heard of it! Emotional.
5) lovely scenic love boat cruise organised by Kel
6) traffic lights through the Wirral as boys raced down to meet Swinney - Kel went on ahead to reduce the waiting time...
7) John Swinney - what a legend taking a day off work to join the lads in the rain
8) amazing lunch at the Dickin Arms pub in some tiny Village - landlord and general reception amazing
9) great pub in Ludlow - middle Bruv apparently won a load of sign sprints (dubious to say the least)
10) going down a closed road which was covered in slurry. Not nice.
11) lots of silly sprints - all good fun
12) arrival at superb B&B run by Paul and Mary Drummond - they are looking after us big time - they handed us a beer when we arrived!
13) superb meal (possibly best of week) at the Pembroke Arms in Tenbury Wells - lamb was melt in your mouth...
Done for now - need sleep.
Wonderful week spent with a worthy bunch of lads - my hat is off to these very fine Tillin Gentlemen.
And a huge Thanks to everyone who donated and supported us for being such decent human beings ;-)
Final updates and pics to follow tomorrow - 100 miles to go!
No comments:
Post a Comment