We set the alarm for 6am and were on the road by 7.30am. This was our plan to avoid cycling in the heat of the day. Must remember the tent was packed away wet!
We had a bit of a stop/start to the morning. Some terrible chafing had developed on the inside of my left leg and was agony. Mike adjusted my handlebars so i was sitting more upright in the hope that it would chafe in a different area.
We also had to stop at a bike shop and get Mikes front pannier adjusted as he didn’t have a spanner that fitted.
We rode into a town called leper. There were a lot of war museums and a big memorial arch for those who died in world war one. We stopped for a bit of a break here. As Mike was reading the plaque about the memorial realised we were at the Menin gate in Ypres. On 12 October 1917 in just two hours, more than 2,800 New Zealand soldiers were killed, wounded or listed as missing in the battle of Passchendaele, around Ieper – the most disastrous day in New Zealand’s military history. Every night at 8.00pm (20:00 hours) the ‘Last Post’ ceremony takes place under the Menin Gate and has done so since 1928.
A storm looked imminent. We had done 70 kms and were trying to decide whether to stop for the night. We wanted to get as close to the ferry in dunkerque as possible. There were a few more towns about 15km on in the town of Poperinge so we pushed it to there. I wanted to ride further but Mike said we should stop as it looked like rain and we had done over 83 kms.
We had just checked into our room when the storm came. Good call Mike!
It was only 4.30pm, but we were both so shattered we just collapsed in our room. My leg was in such pain I could hardly walk. I have doubts whether I will be able to ride all the way back to bournemouth, but I would really like to. Otherwise the alternative would be to catch the train, but we don’t want to do that if we can help it. As well as that, it goes via London, and London will be heaving with the Olympics on.
We had a nice dinner sitting outside at the hotel watching the rain. Only 51 kms to go to reach the Ferry. We want to get back to bournemouth by the 31st and its about 300 kms from Dover. Let’s see if we can do it!