'Late-onset cycling mania' is a common complaint in the twenty-first century. It strikes down men (mostly) who are either too old or too fainthearted to buy a motorcycle and take on a nineteen year old mistress.  I am a sufferer and suffer to such an extent that I am currently planning to cycle the length of the Danube, some 1700 miles in total. At an average of fifty miles a day that is 34 days on the road, with days off for blisters and tourism that makes six weeks away. My wife can't do without me for that long so I have decided to make the journey in two hits, the source (at Donaueschingen) to Budapest  in the spring and from Budapest to the Black Sea in the autumn.

I am starting the first 900 mile leg on May 15th aiming to arrive in Budapest, with a very sore arse on June 3rd. A contribution of 1p per mile would only cost you  £9. I will be blogging all the way on 'Sex, the Danube & Railway Modelling' at http://tedirwin.blogspot.co.uk/2013_05_01_archive.html