So as I’m sitting on the floor of Amsterdam central station, up against the Fuji tucked away in the completely unwieldy bike bag, I thought it would be a good point to wrap up this blog with a final summary.

This truly has been a life changing experience for me. When I found out about this trip back in March, and started my training in April, I honestly had no conceivable idea of what I was letting myself in for. I said this in the last week before I left to many different friends, that I can’t practice cycling to Amsterdam, I can only do the training and hope that I trained hard enough. And I did train hard, I gave up almost all of the negative parts of my lifestyle (apart from booze, you’ve gotta have a vice…), I got up nearly every morning at 5:30 or 5:45. Pretty much every day I would be on my bike or in the gym. And even right up until the first day of leaving, I wasn’t sure if it was enough. Certainly the climbs out of Bath on Day 1 tested that. But that was it…it was just about putting in the miles, day after day. And now I’m here in Amsterdam waiting to come home, and the first stop at the YHA in Salisbury seems a lifetime ago.

So what have I learned from this? I’ve certainly learnt that there is no better feeling of the reward you get for not only achieving something that took a great amount of personal effort, but also doing that thing for a better cause. I’ve learnt that by far and away, Britain has some of the most beautiful countryside in Europe, every single mile, every single calf burning climb and welcomed flying decent brought something else incredible to look at that we’d normally take for granted or miss completely. I’ve learnt that all of Belgium is very flat and most of it is very dull. That Antwerp is better than Bruges. That the hostels in Europe cack all over hostels in the UK. That Europes commitment to making cycling a viable transport option cacks al over the UK (dedicated escalators and tunnels under rivers for bikes??!) That English breakfasts will always be better than breakfasts in Europe. That Garmin bike GPSs are a massive pile of balls and TomTom/google need to get in on that market. And finally, with enough determination and want, we can all achieve great things, and great things for other people. For anyone that’s bothered to read this blog, has sponsored me or supported me in any way, from the bottom of my heart I thank you.

Right…what to do next…!

The final day was here. Antwerp to Amsterdam. The last stretch. 55 miles on the flattest roads with the least climbing. After a night in the Stay Okay hostel, which was possibly the strangest angled bond-villain-esque building I’ve ever been in…we attempted an early start and got on our way for 9am. And the wind was already strong…and it didn’t let up. After a few backwards and forwards movements trying to find our way out of Rotterdam…we agreed on our route. Hammering forward, Rob sped ahead to go and get some food, and promptly disappeared out of sight. We had no way of getting hold of him so we had to carry on as a group. This is of course when the rain set in. And held in. 25mph blowing winds and driving rain. And it would stay like that for the rest of the day. This was now by far the hardest mental test of all. We were 35 miles away, it was coming down hard…we just wanted to get there…and the weather was trying it’s hardest to break us. But on we went as one (minus Rob). Through farmland, along rivers, through small towns, we creeped closer to Amsterdam, until finally we saw Amsterdam on the sign posts. 19k to go. 15k. 11k, 9k, then 18k. 18?? A very brief missed turn soon corrected this addition of distance and as we were correcting, low and behold Rob is waiting at the junction. A pure coincidence of luck. After 3 hours apart, a minute sooner or later we would of missed him. So finally we pressed on for the last time. And there it was. The sign for the edge of Amsterdam. We had made it. In the non stop driving rain, we had made it. As a group we finished together. Bristol to Amsterdam. Soaking wet we cycled through to the centre…certainly a hair raising experience after coming through quiet farmland for days and days, trams and bikes coming at you from all angles in the centre. But bang…the Stay Okay, Amsterdam Centrum. 535 miles in 7 days for Temwa. Job well done boys.

The sixth day of our journey started with a partially bleary eyed start, not from beer, but from the snoring emulating from Nick in the bed next to me. It had been a very entertaining night in Antwerp, with dinner at a Chinese restaurant with possibly the funniest waitress I’ve ever witnessed, followed by beer at a hells angels bar with it’s local transvestite “stan”. True story. Anyways, I digress. The ride itself was an interesting one today. Rather than a fast and slow group, once out of town, we separated into groups of faith of navigation. Ben went on his own as a fast rider following the garmin. Jeremy had his own loan wolf route planned in his head as direct and as fast as he could. Dan and Dave were a slower group following the other garmin, leaning myself, Paul, Young Nick, Old Nick and Rob, following a map and Robs iPhone. The ride itself was pretty straight forward…unfortunately we dropped Old Nick and he decided to make his own way at his own pace. We continued on and reached Holland in good time…stopping for a quick bite to eat before pressing on. It was a very pleasant yet incredibly windy ride up some very fast roads, crossing some incredibly large expanses of water before coming to another amazing, even bigger, but not as straight, bike escalator/tunnel into Rotterdam. We finally hit the hostel at around 4:30, and we were the first group in…a very smug feeling inside I can tell you now. Tomorrow is now the last day…its quite unbelievable we’re here already. The first stop in Salisbury seems an eternity ago. Amsterdam is 40 miles away. Nearly there…!

With slightly sore heads from what turned out to be a pretty late finish from a boozy night in Bruges, we were presented with an incredibly bland breakfast at the hostel. Everything seemed to be different shades of yellow. Once it had been forced down we set off on the journey to Antwerp. The plan today, what with various aches and pains, was to stick together as one group up until lunch. We travelled out along an incredibly long stretch of canal, which was strewn with branches and debris from the massive storm we had the night before. This turned into even more boring Belgian farm land. This was mostly uneventful, apart from when a group of middle aged Belgium women came past us on a very narrow path, stopped next to us, and then promptly fell into both us and a ditch next to us. We continued on to try and find a lunch stop and stumbled across what felt like a very surreal scene indeed. A tiny Belgian town…that was having a truck festival. But no one was around. But all the trucks, about 40, were lined up, and horrific cheap Belgian pop music was being piped out of speakers that were in the lampposts. Really really weird. But there was an amazing restaurant at the end of the street and we ate massive amazing steaks. We planned to press on after lunch hard and we broke out to the fast group…this seemed to be working well until the GPS was having a laugh with us again and we soon found ourselves deep in Belgian forest…mud, water and more mud. Suddenly getting the slicks put back on the Fuji seemed less of a great idea. The detour was lightened by a troop of 15 beautifully decorated horse and carts coming through the forest trail past us out of no where…only in Belgium. Once out of the forest and now covered in thoroughly more mud…we really tried to press on. This was going well until I suddenly looked up ahead one of the unbelievably long cycle paths and noticed the unmistakable sight of the HiViz Temwa bibs in the distance. Some how…somewhere…the slow group had got in front of us…and apparently they hadn’t even been cycling hard. The joy of the GPS taking us miles off route. Anyways…onwards to Antwerp. We were nearly there when we came across an amazing art deco piece of engineering. A huge escalator that leads down to the longest and straightest public footway tunnel in the world, that goes under the main river in the town. It had to be seen to be believed. And that was it…we hit Antwerp Centrum. And its beautiful. I’ve only seen a small part but I would highly recommend it to anyone who hasn’t been. So tomorrow is Rotterdam. My knee started to twinge today which is worrying, but we’ve covered 410 miles so far…Amsterdam is upon us

The trip to Europe began here. So the “short” 12 mile trip from Folkestone to Dover would include the longest and biggest climb of the whole trip so far. After and early start and cycling 94 miles the day previous, this wasn’t the nicest experience, but was rewarded with 5 miles of 30mph downhill. The ferry trip landed us in Calais, and this was it. The start of Europe. And boy. It’s flat. We stayed as a group to get our bearings, before myself, Ben, Paul (with his homemade inner tube ankle strap) and now young Nick (he’s not really young, there is an old Nick) broke away. We hit a heavy hour of solid 25 mph cycling before I got hungry and we had to stop in Dunkerque at a patisserie. There is nothing like stumbling through GCSE French to order some cake to make you feel alive. In all fairness, my romantic vision of cycling up the coast of France and Belgium was not exacty as i imagined. Basically its just oil refineries, ports and powerstations. We pushed on through and were soon in Belgium, where the roads where even flatter. And straighter. It started to get a little monotonous until we got the the coast of Belgium. The coast got much prettier, though a little bit like Benidorm, with built up hotels, lots of tourists and miles and miles of beach. Navigating through this seriously took some concentration and myself and Nick very nearly watched Ben ride over a dog. This hurt us for time and was feeling frustrating until we got to the end of the beach and a surreal gig with “The Soul Brothers” playing live medleys of chart favourites to a large adorning beach crowd…a brief pause watching this before we tackled the last 17 miles. Paula ankle was hurting bad so we wanted to get back as soon as we could. The last 17 miles were along the single most straightest, flattest, most boring roads I’ve ever road. Monotonus farm land and the same road as far as the eye could see for 40 minutes. Which doesn’t sound a great deal, but seriously, stare at one thing for 4 minutes. The same thing that isn’t a book or the TV or a painting or a loved one or out of the window. Then times how bored you are by 10. Then imagine you have cycled 85 miles. Its hard work. Finally we made it into Bruges and I sit as I type with a pint of Bruges Zot and a big pile of pasta on the way with my fellow velopodists. We’re going to get drunk tonight. We’re in Bruges.

So this was the dreaded day 3. The longest days riding with the most climbing and I won’t lie..I was nervous. Having ridden 82 miles the previous day I’d made sure I had stocked up hard on the carb loading drinks. And by jingo it worked. We set off at around 9:20 and after a few sharp little climbs, I really felt like I’d got in my stride. It was a misty morning but felt properly muggy. We pushed hard and made amazing time and the weather cleared for glorious sunshine. The first stint was big before lunch. 50 miles or so. Even the climbs felt good. Incredibly the GPS didn’t arse up either. After a brief stop in Sainsburys for haribo…we pressed on to the lunch point about 10 miles out of Tunbridge Wells. Which is where my early cockiness came and bit me in the bum. Or hip. And elbow. After a particularly steep final climb through a small but beautiful Market town (it’s late and I’m tired and writing this in bed and can’t remember what it’s called…) I was the last in our group of 3 to come to what we thought was our lunch stop. Ben at the front, then Paul, then me. I had over shot the turn. I slowly go to turn round. My front wheel slips out from beneath me in gravel and i fall to my side, my entire weight landing on my elbow in the gravel and my hip on the Tarmac. Much blood ensued. There was a pre wedding do at the pub. We couldn’t go in. It was also the wrong pub. The right pub was another 6 miles away. We had also just got a phone call from Maz the mechanic in the van to say that the right pub had just stopped doing food. My only choice was to wash down my arm with water from my water bottle, and go back into the aforementioned Market town for food and to clean up proper. After a ludicrously expensive baguette from a very nice pub, with me bandaged up, we pressed on. Hip killing me. By this time, the sun was out hard, and it was very sweaty work, but we pushed hard and rode for an hour and a half solid. A couple more very painful climbs, and a stop to buy new tyre for Paul…finally saw us ride into Folkestone at 6pm. An amazing morning. A hard afternoon, but the dreaded day 3 was beat, and beat well. Now, a short stint to Dover tomorrow morning…and then it’s to Europe, where the roads are as flat as they are straight. Huzzah!

Well well. So unsurprisingly the 2nd day of this ride was going to be a curious one. Just how much harder was today would be would be the sign of how well the training had gone. And this morning certainly had proved well felt much better than at the start of Day 1. After a massive hugenormous breakfast courtesy of the YHA, the first 10 miles out of Salisbury were possibly the most beautiful 10 miles of road I’ve ever cycled. More thatched roof cottages, beautiful churches, incredible wildlife and fantastic road surface than i’ve ever encountered in one go. The weather wad amazing all day too. There were a few hicups on route before lunch with the GPS…but nothing too drastic…yet. Lunch was incredibly disappointing but in a beautiful pub by the water. A 3.95 bowl of chips should not be essentially a large portion of fries that you would get from Burger King. Cracking on however, things took a slightly rough turn. The NCN route turned into something that was only really suited for mountain bikes, big roots, lots of mud, rocks, which we had to ride for 2 miles, not fun on a road bike with 700-23c wheels on. After this the GPS then wouldn’t take us in the right direction which felt like a very low point. Blindly following this useless gadget. So we stopped at Farnham, took a proper look at the listed directions, looked at the iPhone map and worked it properly out. A few harsh climbs felt hard from the stopping and starting…legs cooling down then warming up, making for very stiff pins. The last 10 miles through the Surrey hills was both annoying (solely from IDIOTIC Surrey drivers) and fast (trying to keep up with Paul, who after demanding some sugar, stopped at a garage, ate a whole bag of jelly beans, then proceeded to cycle faster than id seen him cycle for the last 2 days). Incredibly cruelly, the 500 yard drive to the hostel, was the steepest climb of the day, but once we got here…man. It’s beautiful. Right in the middle of a forest, up a hill. Its still decorated as it was when it was built in 1938 with even some games here that must be as old (every loves that famous board game “The Cottage of Content”). But tomorrow is the real deal. 10 miles longer with 500 feet more climbing. Not nervous at all. Honest.

And they’re off! And that’s the first day down, and what a day it was. Very much full of it’s own events. So the troop of 9 rolled out from the Clifton Suspension Bridge at 9:30am. It was expected that the group would split into a fast and slow group which seemed to happen pretty quickly. Myself and Ben broke away after around 3 miles and started up the Bristol bike path to Bath. A beautiful ride indeed. Slightly marred by ben successfully running clean over a suicidal squirrel who was catapulted into the side of my wheels…thankfully no one was hurt…the squirrel…he at least made it back into the bushes. We’re awaiting to hear from him. A quick coffee stop and regroup in Bath then gave way to the first stint to out lunch stop just out of Longleat, a beautiful Safari park and stately grounds for those who don’t know…saw giraffes and everything. There were a couple of very hefty climbs which did very much hurt my lungs to begin with…got through them well enough though. The lunch stop was wonderful and the rest of the group caught up around 50 minutes after we were there, bit by bit. Paul then joined myself and Ben for the second stint…(he would of been there for the first but he got a little lost…) where we pushed much harder. Not as many climbs and we got a fair chunk of speed up. Hit Salisbury at just after 4, with the others coming in around 5. A great first day, but tomorrow will be the real show of how good the trainings worked…with day 3 being the biggest of them all…not that I’m worried….much. Honest. The men are now all showered and are off to the town centre to see what fare we can find. Huzzah!

So that’s it…this morning was my last big training ride before the off. Granted it wasn’t as glorious as the 70 miles planned…but 50 miles is still worthwhile work. This is largely down to a) being hungover b) getting bored of my own company c) getting back for the F1. So that is it. I’ll do a little session of interval training tomorrow on the Turbo…but that’s it. After a final service tomorrow, the Fuji is getting packed up into his bike bag. The Lycra has been cleaned and dried. Now to actually do this thing!

A very quick one on today’s training as work is going to be insane today. I reattempted the route I was going to do Wednesday. Down Herne Hill to Stockwell, all the way along the CS7 to Southwark Bridge, across to Westminster, back through Vauxhall, back on the CS7 in the other direction, all the way to Colliers Wood, round the BDN Loop, back along the CS7 into town and into work. 27miles in 1h31m. And also, my last ever training ride into work. I shall not miss getting up at 5:30am