Cycling

‘Twas The Week Before Christmas…

Well, it was the week before the week before Christmas but that makes less of a catchy title. I’ve just returned home after a week on the road; a mixture of business and pleasure. This was the main event of the week:

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That’s the Britannia Royal Navy College in Dartmouth, Devon and one of those newly commissioned officers is my niece. Congratulations to her! (See the full patriotic video by following this link.) The rest of the week was ‘business’ although equally as pleasurable…

Many years ago – about 5 I think – a man called Richard Moore contacted me about my cycle from Reading to Brindisi. I can’t remember how he contacted me or indeed why, but it resulted in him writing the very first review of Crossing Europe on a Bike Called Reggie. I’ve been in touch with him ever since although I have never met him face-to-face. Until last week. He lives in Cornwall and, knowing that I would be travelling down to Devon, I asked if we could meet up. Last Tuesday, we did just that…

…and very nice it was too. I even took the opportunity of giving a talk about the 2015 cycle from Tarifa to Nordkapp to his cycling group. The ‘business’ end of the week had started with a similar event back in my old stomping ground of Reading where itย was good to see former colleagues as well as many others who were sufficiently interested in my travels to drive into the depths of the Berkshire countryside to hear me speak. Thanks to the rather wonderful VeloLife Cafe for hosting the event.

More talks are planned for 2017 in Yorkshire, Lancashire, Derbyshire, Bristol, Edinburgh and Ireland to coincide with the publication of Spain to Norway on a Bike Called Reggie. More details on the ‘speaking’ page of apsykes.com. If you’d like me to speak at event in your corner of the country (or indeed the world…), I’m open to invitations.

On the subject of the new book, I will be locking myself away for the next two weeks to go through the edits and rewrites that arrived back from the publishers last week. If I don’t get the chance to do so before then, ‘Happy Christmas’ to one and all.

What do you think?