****************

RIDE UPDATE

Scroll to the end to get an update

*****************

The Challenge!

On Sunday 25th April, Dan Hancock and Paul Duggan will be setting off on their biggest challenge to date – to cycle the length of the United Kingdom from Lands End to John O’Groats. Unlike the celebrities who recently completed this challenge for Sports Relief, they will be doing it the proper hard way! Carrying their own gear, each cycling the whole distance with no support team and no masseurs (although volunteers are more than welcome!) – they will cycle over 1,000 miles! To add to the challenge, they will also divert on route to Lizard Point and Dunnets Head – the southern and northern most tip of the UK mainland. In training, they have already covered an impressive 1,000 miles although Dan is now struggling to sit down for more than 1 hour on a bike and Paul has shaved off all his hair to give him that extra edge on Dan!

The Charity:
Dan and Paul have chosen a small local charity to raise money for during this challenge: the SPA Peggy Dodd Centre Charity. The Peggy Dodd Centre helps people suffering from Alzheimer’s Disease and dementia and supports the people caring for them. Their Day Centre and Home Sitting Service provide great stimulation and care for those affected and offers support and respite to their Carers.

Any donations you give will help make the pain Dan and Paul face that much more bearable and will help the numerous people using the Peggy Dodd Charity. Dan and Paul are self funding the entire trip, so all donations will go direct to the charity. 

Donating through JustGiving is simple, fast and totally secure. Your details are safe with JustGiving – they’ll never sell them on or send unwanted emails. Once you donate, they’ll send your money directly to the charity and make sure Gift Aid is reclaimed on every eligible donation by a UK taxpayer. 

A big thank you from Dan and Paul. We will try and update this page whilst on the ride - keeping you up-to-date with our progress.

RIDE UPDATE - Day One

Dan and Duggsy are now on their epic ride. We left Lands End at 11am on Sunday with the music from Rocky blaring on Dan's MP3 player to help motivate us! After a small downpour in Penzance, the sun came out when we reached Lizards Point - the Southern most point in the UK. Locals clearly thought we were crazy! Seeing our panniers they would ask if we had come far, when we told them "just" from Lands End - they were amazed at how far we had come. You should have seen their faces when we told them what our final destination was! The GPS is holding out well despite taking us on a shortcut across a golf course which led to us ducking to avoid flying golf balls! After 63 miles both of us were glad to arrive at the B&B and visit a local watering hole to find a nice cushy seat to sit on and a good pint of Cornish ale to celebrate our successful day. Day two awaits us....! Keep the sponsors coming - they are helping to motivate us :) We've uploaded 2 photos from the day - enjoy.

Day Two

Who ever thinks the Cotswolds are hilly - should visit Cornwall! We spent so much time going up and down that we nicknamed this leg the Yo-Yo stage! That said the scenery was stunning - particularly on the Camel trail (although no camels were seen and nor unfortunately was the Bodmin beast) and up in the highlands where Dan and Paul fantasied about a derelict airfield they had found in a forest and a nearby strange factory being secret military installations only to find out from the B&B later on that it was infact the local Dairy Crest plant! During the day it soon become clear that the fallout from the Icelandic volcano had reached Cornwall (see photo), but thankfully the boys made it through it - despite subliminal messages from local road signs (see the other photo!) In total 70 miles was done today and 6,500 ft was ascended. Thankfully the local Cornish ale is giving them the rocket fuel to get up these ever rolling hills! Roll on Day 3.

Day Three & Four

We may have spoken too soon about the hills in Cornwall...neighbouring Devon certainly did not miss out when the ice age dealt out all the hills and valleys! We had heard stories of cyclists burning through their brake pads in this part of the country and we can see why - with gradients of 25% we were amazed our brakes did not turn the same colour as our faces - bright red! Thankfully the bikes and the knees held out. We had hoped to recharge ourselves with a scrumptious Devonshire cream tea but incredibly after 68 miles we could not find one. In Cornwall there had been a cream tea shop almost every mile - but as tempting as it was - we weren't going to retrace our footsteps! Day four saw us leave the hills of Devon behind us and the plains of Somerset greet us. A refreshing change after the previous two days. Our route took us through Taunton and near Dan's favourite cider farm and so a minor diversion was taken to give Paul a taste of Somerset's finest.1 hour later and we were back on our way with a little glow in our cheeks! We arrived in Bath on a high & back in known territory. 270 miles completed to date and about a quarter of the way there.

Day Five (Bath - Newnham)

The day started with a small diversion to the Peggy Dodd Centre where we had a warm reception from both the staff and the people who use the Centre. They were thrilled with what we were doing and how much money had been raised to date. We then went onto the local primary school where Dan gave a quick talk to a classroom on what we were doing and challenged the kids to pick up one of our bikes (after several boys failed - all the boys in the classroom were dismayed when a girl managed to pick it up!). As we left Bath the skies opened for the first time (tears for our departure?) and we had our first test of the all-weather gear. We took a much welcome break at Dan's work in Bristol where we were greeted by Dan's team and given tea and cakes and chocolate - much appreciated! From there it was onto Paul's territory - the Forest of Dean. Unfortunately the weather did little to improve but at least we got to solve the mystery of the whipper and its knickers at a pub we had visited during our training runs! On route we also added a second country to our achievements - dipping into and out of Wales.

Day Six (Newnham - Bridgnorth)

Today we entered tudor house country with black & white houses a plenty. We also bumped into a man who was walking from Lands End to John O Groats with his dog - reassuring us that we are not the only crazy ones out there! Despite being the last day of April, we were not able to avoid the traditional April showers - making the going tough particularly for Dan who was feeling under the weather from the moment he woke up. A break at "The best pub in miles" gave us just enough energy to get to our destination in Bridgnorth where we were greeted by EKT's famous Big Will and his family. Their support that night was just what we needed and when Dan woke up the next day he was feeling much better.

Day Seven (Bridgnorth - Middlewich)

Paul decided to test the GPS to the extreme today - taking us on bridleways and dirt tracks. One of the tracks was meant to carry straight on but some inconsiderate person had built a motorway in the way so we had to divert along the edge of crop fields! Thankfully we only had to lift the bikes over one stile! Along the way one of the screws attaching Dan's pannier rack to his bike fell-out which meant you could hear him coming as his pannier bag banged against the side. It was time for a bit of quick thinking and thankfully a spare screw for one of the shoe cleats sorted the problem out. For lunch we stopped at Norbury Junction where we admired all the narrow boats including one which came past with hoards of pirates on it! Fancy dress became the theme of the day. When we arrived at the B&B we were greeted by staff in outfits from the 1900s! The B&B had a 1902 themed restaurant so for once we were not the only ones who were looking different as we sat at the bar in our lycra! Conversations with some of the diners led to donations for the charity. It was wonderful to receive such support from complete strangers. We have also had owners of the B&Bs that we have stayed at donate money - thank you to one and all.

Day Eight (Middlewich - Clitheroe)

Paul and Dan would like to apologise to the people of Middlewich for the power cut the town experienced on Sunday 2nd May. Whilst not confirmed, our demand on the local grid whilst recharging all our electrical gear may have been the cause! Shortly after Paul put the camera on charge the power went off in the whole district! Our route today took us up into the Pennine Hills which have countless false summits. Every time we thought we had got to the top - another summit would loom infront of us. It was tough going particularly with the cold headwind. Even some local bikers we met at a pub on route were feeling the cold so it wasn't just us Southerners being soft! Thankfully as we got past Bolton we had the support of the Antman who met up with us and ensured we were stocked up on lucozade, chocolate bars and motivation! The support was just what we needed to get to Clitheroe and we celebrated the end of a very hard day with a chinese takeaway and some tea and cakes courtesy of Teresa and the Girl Guides who we met up with in the evening. Teresa was in the area on a Girl Guide Leaders Conference and was good enough to spread the word on what we were doing, resulting in more donations for the charity. Again it was touching to see people we have never met before sponsoring us on the ride, it makes it all so worthwhile.
 

Day Nine (Clitheroe - Shap)

Today we went through the Yorkshire Dales. Despite providing breathtaking scenery we also encountered it's more sinister side - its ability to destroy bikes! As we were going up one of the hills, Paul's chain snapped - our first major bike incident. Thankfully it was a simple one to repair which was a big relief as houses were few and far between. In Ingleton we finally managed to get our first cream tea - with clotted cream imported from Cornwall - the irony of it all! The scrumptious scones were just what we needed to tackle Kingsdale. The ride down from it's summit through the valley of Deepdale was breathtaking. In total we climbed 9,000 feet today. The effects must have been visible as the owner of the B&B in Shap offered to carry our pannier bags from the moment we arrived! Tomorrow we arrive in Scotland!

Day Ten (Shap - Lockerbie) - SCOTLAND!

Scotland - at last! We entered Scotland at Gretna, 660 miles after leaving Lands End. We were greeted with the smell of onions and then that infamous countryside smell courtesy of the farmers who were spraying their fields! Still it did not dampen our spirits. We had cycled all the way to Scotland, surely John O'Groats could not be that far away. Incredibly though ... it is ... with over 400 miles still to go.

Day Eleven (Lockerbie - Walston)
Being the international traveller that he is, Dan decided to immerse himself in the local culture and have haggis for breakfast whilst Paul tucked into his Cornflakes. According to Dan, Paul didn't know what he was missing! Today turned out to be the day of LEJOG-ers. Just outside Lockerbie we bumped into Simon, another cyclist who was going to Lands End. As we chatted another cyclist stopped and offered to take our photo - it turned out he was going to John O' Groats too! We were a mini gathering of crazy cyclists! We ended up cycling with the other cyclist (Paul) to Moffat. At Moffat, he carried on using the normal route whilst we took a "Duggsy diversion" to see a loch! The extra miles and climbs however was well worth it. We were rewarded with amazing scenery (see photo) and we met some interesting people at the tea house by the loch where we were also treated to some traditional Scottish ice cream (which includes whisky as part of its ingredients - yum yum!).

Day Twelve (Walston - Callander)

Election Day. Paul went into a polling station to "Vote for No Hills" but sadly could not find a candidate who was standing for such principals! Whilst having a belated lunch at a pub outside Glasgow we spied a picture which summed up all the election hype perfectly (see photo!) It is nice to be away from all the media hype that must be going on at this time. We saw our first red squirrel today. For a number of days now we had seen signs warning people of the red squirrels - we weren't sure what these little red furry things do to warrant such warnings - so decided not to hang around to find out!

*** UPDATE ***

WE HAVE DONE IT!

After 17 days and over 1,100 miles we arrived at John O'Groats - tired, but well, and ecstatic at reaching our goal. We have travelled through 3 countries, climbed the equivalent of 3 Everests, passed through lots of amazing scenery and met some great people. Thank you to all those who have sponsored us and gave us support on the way - it has all been much appreciated. We are now going to spend a few days relaxing in Scotland before returning back to our homes and planning our next crazy challenge.... ;)