March 2019 Update

Excellent start to the month, with my first camping trip of the year!

Grange Farm on the Isle of Wight, one of my favourite campsites opened up on the 1^st March, and I was their first customer!

I would have liked to have camped for more than the one night I stayed, but the weather forecast for the following days really wasn’t good, and as it turned out they were right! I also had to get home for more hospital appointments!

It was still good to be back camping on the Isle of Wight even if it was only one night, and it was good to see the owners and animals at Grange Farm.

Isle of Wight Videos

Health

As I said I had another appointment at the hospital, this was to see my consultant about my hip and sepsis. That was all good news! She said it was hard to believe, just how ill I was, looking at me now! And to go away, enjoy the summer, build up more strength and we’ll operate in 4 to 6 months!

Sure enough that bad weather that I mentioned earlier lasted for nearly 2 weeks with gale force winds and heavy rain, really not good weather for cycling! In fact not even for walking, it was that bad!

Because the weather was so bad, I decided to drive up to Cambridge, to look at a camping shop that I’d found online. Upon arrival or rather on the way, I just couldn’t remember anything about the place at all, despite spending a few days there back in the summer of 2016! But thankfully when I arrived it, all started to come back, and I had a lovely day, mostly spent trying out different tents and talking to the people in the shop!

Time To Go Away

Finally, the weather broke, and I managed to get a ride to France in, which I’d been trying to do for the best part of last year, but was just in too much pain, and never made it!

There was a bit of a rush to get away on my part as my Vicky and Paul were off on holiday to Spain, and Julie was off to Australia to see her daughter, so I had to be around to look after their cats! Which meant I wouldn’t be able to go away for the next 3 weeks! Thankfully I’ve done one week, so only two more to do!

France was excellent, and it felt like a great achievement for me! I was only there for 4 days, as that was all the time I had, but I managed to reach Paris, which was my goal and in the process had some brilliant days cycling. It felt really good to be back on the road travelling!

I must admit that I may have overdone it a bit, especially as my last day in France was a 12 hour, 100-mile cycle ride! I was in a lot of pain when I got home, and it took me a week to recover! But it was worth it!

Despite the suffering afterwards, I’m still hopeful, that I’ll get a few more trips in before my next operation!