After arriving back home in England on the 24 November 2012, I was home for less than 48hrs before flying off to Cyprus for a week’s holiday, I’d originally planned on being back a bit earlier and Julie who I went with couldn’t change her holiday dates.
It was a really nice week and completely different to what I’d been doing for the past year, staying in a hotel with all drinks and food included (think they regretted that one, I certainly made sure I got my monies worth!) and loads of elderly British tourists getting some winter sun, who were all lovely and friendly. We did manage to hire some bikes from the hotel, whilst we were there, just so I felt a bit more at home!
December seemed to be spent catching up with family and friends. As I rode around the village (usually on the way to the pub) people would stop me and congratulate me on my achievement, which I found really humbling.
Christmas came and went with the normal festivities, Christmas day was spent at my daughters new house, with family, she’d moved into a new home whilst I was away, thinking about it, quite a few people had moved in the year I’d been away, several of my neighbours, that had been neighbours for over 20 years, my sister who’d been in the same place since the 80’s and my children, think they all thought it was a good time to try and escape from me, but they couldn’t hide for long, I soon managed to track them down!
January, I decided it was time to unpack some of my furniture and finally admit that my world tour was over and I was now home!
Went away for the weekend to Stratford-upon-Avon, the home of William Shakespeare, just for a weekend away, turned into a bit of a battle to get there, there was heavy snow and a lot of roads were closed and impassable, the UK always grinds to a halt at the first sight of snow!
February, started off more or less as January finished, spending too much time down the pub! Started to look at where to go on future cycle rides, got plenty of ideas, but never sorted out anything definite.
On the work front, it’s been fairly quiet, a mixture of the time of year, (winter) people not having much money, being away for over a year and out of the work scene and a bad attitude towards work from myself! Things have picked up in the last month or so, not too sure for how long though, as I’m hoping to go away on another tour at Easter!
Started to try and write a book of my travels last year, mainly for myself, but that’s not going that well, my attention span doesn’t last very long! It’s a work in progress!
The local bank where my daughter works had the Trophy from the Premier football league on display (they sponsor it) and they turned it into a charity event for Cancer Research and St Wilfred’s Hospice, two charities that are very close to my heart, raising about £500 which the bank will match and double to make about £1000.
Follow Garry on his travels
