Does It Get Any Better Than This?...

And so into Greece.....
Ioanninian street Greece

My Brazilian friend, Ana, who I met on the train to Rome

Fishing boats at Igoumenitsa -Greece

Brindisi harbour Italy. Next stop - Greece

The long and winding road. I had cycled from beyond the mountains in the distance. And this was only 23 miles into a total of 57 miles that I eventually and very slowly cycled that day from Igoumenitsa to Ioannina.

The columns marking the end of the Appia Antica in Brindisi harbour , Italy

Ruins of a monastry in Ioannina Greece

Byzantine church in Ioaninna with the mighty Pindos Mountains behind

my favourite combination, a gorgeous Greek, (Constantinos), a camera shop and a fellow cyclist.

Ioaninna Greece

The long and winding road: top of the mountain from Igoumenitsa onward to Ioaninna

Greece

Well, I had to transport the inflatable somehow by bike to the beach!

I thought that cycling the Appia Antica, the original Roman road leading from Rome to Brindisi was the highlight of my tour. The history of the road was all encompassing with the cobbled surface, the ruins of elaborate Roman tombs lining the road, this, the Queen of Roads, that the Romans built to travel south east to Brindisi on the coast. The Via Appia Antica was also the scene, now marked by a small church, St Peters, where the apostle was escaping from Rome

Does it get any better than this?

along the Appia, when he saw a vision of Christ and uttered those imortal words, 'quo vardis domine' (where are you going Lord?) The road was full of history but even this has been surpassed by other sights as I travel further on my journey. Every day there are new

Left to Right: Connie, Hollie, me, Peggy Rose the Pickler : my lively and wonderful American dinner companions

experiences and everytime I think to myself, 'it can't get better than this' : it does!

But this journey is a cycle ride and its not always easy. Sometimes, as in Tarranto where the temperature hit 37 degrees, I wondered why I chose to cycle. However, that feeling doesn't last long especially when, as yesterday, I cycled over the mountains up from the Greek port of Iougmenitsa, savouring the spectacular views. It was a very slow journey yesterday, as out of the 57 miles I cycled, 47 of those were uphill, with some very steep hair pin bends in oppressive heat in the afternoon. But I am a much fitter and stronger cyclist now and although tired by 7pm when I reached Ioaninna, I loved the ride, stopping to look at the mountain scenery, and having lots of refreshment breaks to give myself a breather and cool down.

When the cycling does get hard, I just cheer myself up with thoughts of all the great people I have met on the trip so far. When I hit a particularly long uphill section yesterday, I just thought back to when I stopped in Brindisi in Italy before catching the ferry over to Greece. On my last afternoon, I went to my favourite ' Betty's Cafe', a lovely harbour side restaurat and was invited over by three lively American ladies, Connie, Hollie and 'Peggy Rose, 'the Pickler' . We all had such a good laugh and I really enjoyed their company for a couple of hours.

I eventually arrived in the Greek port of Igoumenitsa at 3 am in the morning, so I spent a couple of hours chatting to the bar man in the terminal cafe until dawn and decided to catch the ferry over to Corfu. Just a day trip but needed more time and I had to get back to Igoumenitsa to book a hotel. Then I decided I needed a day off and found a lovely little sandy beach just a mile away from the hotel. So I spent the day on the beach (very unusual for me - I am not a beach person) and had the most wonderful day. While I floated and bobbed around on the clear aquamarine sea on my newly aquired inflatable,letting the sun coat me in its warmth,and then drying off on the beach, I just kept thinking to myself , 'does it really get any better than this?'.
I had probably one of the most relaxing days I've had in a very long time that day, finished off with a long cold beer and a club sandwich at the beach side bar.

Then arriving in Ioannina - a bustling charming town with a beautiful lake nestled beneath the mighty Pindos mountains- my next challenge -I am having a few days rest here, enjoing the lakeside cafes, the shops and the Byzantine churches.

So I'm resting up in preparation for my crossing the Pindos Mountains tomorrow. It will be 35 miles uphill with some steep hair pin bends: the roads cutting through the sides of the mountains. A hard day ahead. I'm hoping to leave just after dawn to get to Mestevo by early afternoon. Looking forward to the spectacular views. I'm really enjoying Greece and yet again, the people are so friendly and helpful. I bought a small camera here today and met the lovely Constantinos, the shop assistant who sold me the camera. Tell me somebody - does it get any better than this?!

Deborah

(paintsandpedals and all photographs copyright Deborah Anne Brady; all rights reserved)

Some latest photographs...

Some early photographs

A funny thing happened on the way to the Forum...

No, it did, it really did!

To save yet more money, I took the train from Florence to Rome(I've cycled every other part of Italy - those are the only two trains I've taken) and when I was on the train, a young Brazilian girl, Ana, was desperate to find a loo on the four hour journey. After eventually finding one several carriages down, we struck up a conversation and it turned out she was working in Milan and travelling around Italy and was staying for a few days in Rome. She was staying in a hostel very close to the station and very central, so I asked if I could go with her to find a room in the same hostel. It turned out they were full but just on the landing next door, another hostel had a spare room and I managed to get booked in there. All be it when I say hostel, it was a Polish man's apartment in which he lets out the rooms to young backpackers and he and his wife sleep on the sofa. However to get to the shower you had to go through his tiny front room and then I had to share the room with two others on a very uncomfortable camp bed with a matress that dipped in the middle. Ahh! the joys of budget travel! Luckily the two girls I shared with were Mexican, living in America and we struck up a good conversation and got on well. I also met Igor - the polish man's dog! A really sweet, brown, smooth haired terrier type, who greeted you at the door with wagging tail when you came in. He was the ugliest dog I have ever seen!

Ana and I met up for dinner the next evening as we both had our different sight seeing routes to do. I spent a lovely day going from sight to sight that included the Vatican, the Trevi fountain, the vast Emanuelle 11 monument that seems to take up much of Rome and then finally on to the Colosseo. So you see, through a chance encounter on a train with someone desperate for the loo (sorry Ana - hope you don't mind me mentioning this!) I managed to find accommodation without any effort while on my way to the Forum.

Talking of dogs and the wonderfully ugly Igor, I experienced the Dogs of Pompei. I stayed for a few days r&r in Pompei in a campsite right next to the entrance to the ruins. But Pompeii ruins are renowned for the stray dogs that roam the site - very friendly, and well fed but they do latch on to visitors and follow you around the site, expecting food. Then they just lie around sleeping until the next victim comes along. But these dogs are very welcome in Pompeii and there are signs up asking visitors to 'adopt a dog' - a bit like 'adopt an elephant' you don't take it home you just pay so much towards its keep every month. I have a wonderful photograph of one of these dogs sleeping on its back,legs in mid air, in the middle of the railway platform of the Pompeii railway station (which is also opposite the ruins entrance) . Nobody minded -let sleeping dogs lay, I say.

One of the Pompeii highlights was a trip up to the Vesuvious crater's edge - 1,400 m up. Its a huge and very deep crater. And still active! Unlike, thank goodness, the previous day, when I camped in a campsite -actually in the volcano crater! It was Volcano Solfater and I didnt need to climb up into it. It was a crater just off the main road. Half of the crater was wooded, where the camp site was sited and just a few steps away, there was the barren crater enclosed by its steep wall of rock. It took me a long time to realise that the bad egg smell wasn't because I hadnt had a shower in a couple of days, it was due to the still active sulphur jets coming up from the depths of the crater. Although by the time I scraped my, by now, very sweaty clothes off, I don't think I could tell the difference!Ahh! the joys of budget travel!

But oh! the sights that Ive seen since I started this trip. They get better and better every day. The camp site at Pompeii was in the middle of an orange grove - most of the trees widowed of their fruit but a few still had one or two stubborn, hangers on, dangling precariously from the boughs - just waiting to crash down on an unspecting camper van - or worse - a tent!

Then there were the Apennines. I have just arrived in Matera after spending the last five days crossing the delightful and stunning scenery of the mountains. Mostly peddaling up hill every day but being the Appian way, the Romans built these roads with horses and carts in mind and therefore while steep, the gradients were gradual and I had climbed surprisingly high without realisingit until I looked back at where I had just come from.

And the mountain people that I met were truly wonderful. Yesterday, two events happened that confirmed my view that 99% of people in the world are kind and generous and that those with least give the most. Yesterday this ideal came true. I was crawling up the mountain and stopped for a breather when this woman came out of her hill side house and beckoned me over. Then her husband came out, then the grandmother. All chatting outside the gates and swopping e mails and taking pictures.(The grandmother, a very diminutive little lady - concerned that I wasn't married yet)And just before I was about to go, the mother rushed into the house and brought out some savoury bread with the most delicious ham, cheese and blackpepper filling and a carton of orange juice. All I could offer was my by now, very squashed and rather warm bag of cherries! They politely declined and wished me well on my journey and insisted I send them e mails and the photographs. But what generousity! The father who was a train driver, even gave me a business card about his son. I think there was a slight hint of a possible arranged marriage there somewhere!

And then in the afternoon after a long and steep 3 mile crawl up the hill side round steep hair pin bends to Grassano, I stopped at the first bar in the narrow little streets that I came across and was informed by the bar man that there was no hotel. Enza, the manageress came in and spoke good English, as her mother lives in New York, and after a lot of lovely bantering and chat, she disappeard and on her return told me of a local chap just a few hundred yards away who would put me up in his spare apartment for 30 euros. She and her husband then got in their car and insisted I follow them on the bike to the flat. It was only walking distance but they inisted on taking me there. Then I nearly fell over laughing as the owner was a man of a certain age, who was a body builder blonde hair in a pony tail,and dressed in pink top and very short pink shorts! But the apartment was wonderful. Very modern and clean and hard to beat for 30 euros.

The evening was spent having the best meal that I have had in Italy. Enza fussed clucked over me like a mother hen making sure the bottle of Chardonnay arrived in a cooler bucket of ice and that I had every thing I wanted. The spagetti was fabulous and this was the food that I had been waiting for since arriving in Italy.This was not your tourist, 'warm it up in the oven' type, as is has been in places like Florence and Rome, but real home cooked and utterly delicious. After the meal, we sat outside her house by the front door with her daughter, and two other local villagers, all chatting and taking pictures, with Enza working hard as the go between translator. To top it all, as I left to go back for a relatively early night at the apartment, Enza insisted that I was escorted back with another of the village women who happened to be going that way. It was only a few hundred yards but that wasnt the point! Such generosity and kindness from complete strangers to a weary and bedraggled traveller. The only thing I regretted afterwards, was drinking that whole bottle of Chardonnay - not good for the cycling the next morning!

And then there is my bike, Vincent, my reliable companion, who hasn't let me down yet. He never moans, never gets tired, never complains when going up the hills and here, where I am staying for a day, in the fascinating town of Matera, he even has his very own balcony to sleep in outside my room.

I guess the only time Vincent wasn't happy was when I cycled from Bay of Naples to Pompeii. Naples and the coast road around it has the worst roads in Italy! I only did 25 miles that day but the concentration levels were immense. Not only did I have the Naples traffic to deal with but also I cycled for 20 of those miles on cobbled streets. But these were large slabs of cobbles and very pitted and potholed which made it twice as bad. It was a very slow journey. It was the most bone jarring, teeth rattling cycleride I have ever done. And on top of that the piles of rubbish sacks left at the roadside was appalling. It was like having a continuous smell of rotting debris lining your route for miles and miles. These rubbish tips were piled high too.I've since learned that it wasn't due, as I at first thought, to a bin man's strike, it was because of the Napoles Mafia! - the Comorra.

Aparently The Comorra have a monopoly on the Naples and surrounding towns garbage collection and because of the corruption, they dump the rubbish anywhere, especially in illegal places. Hence the ordinary house rubbish piles up in the streets because there arn't enough landfill sites and the Mafia arn't interested unless they can dump toxic waste in innapropriate areas. Well, ordinary rubbish is no fun is it!

This was a prioity issue when Berlusconi was elected in 1980's but all he did was arrest a few of the top Comorra and promised more landfill. But judging by what I saw (and on the Italian news programme the other day) nothing much is being done. It really will be an enourmous health hazard if nothing is done about it soon. Italy - it really is like being in the middle of a real life Godfather movie.

Well now I'm having a few days rest and exploration of the 'town of stones' in Matera, where the old quarter has its buildings and churches built into the rocks, each area linked by steep steps and the whole town clinging to the top of a ravine.

I'm still trying to get some of my photos on this blog but for some reason having difficulty with this - so bear with me.

Also, if Hedi and Franz are reading this - COULD YOU E MAIL ME ON MY EMAIL. deborahannebrady@hotmail.co.uk as I seem to have deleted your e mail address from my contacts.I have been trying to text your phone but I don't think that is working either. But please do get in touch. Thanks.

Well, after leaving Matera where I am writing this blog from, there are only two more towns, Taranto and and the port of Brindisi left in Italy before I depart for my fifth country, Greece. I have had blue sky days for the last month and here in southern Italy for the past few days the temperature has been hitting 32 degrees. It is hot! But I am aclimatised to it now as I have been travelling slowly so I'm hopeful I can handle the heat of Greece in July! But rather the heat of Greece than the monsoons in Asia, which if I time it correctly, I shall avoid.

catch up with you all again soon
Deborah

(copyright and photographs: Deborah Anne Brady: all rights reserved)








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JUNE UPDATE 2011

Anybody who travels, especially on a budget, understands that nothing will be as comfortable after you leave home. Once you understand that, then you accept it and start to enjoy the journey for what it is. Anne Mustoe who inspired my trip wrote about this aspect in not so many words in her book. But although I have accepted that nothing is or will be the same as being in your own environment at home, I did have my first real low point of my journey so far, a short while ago. Every long journey has its high and its low points but this particular low point stuck with me for some time and I found it difficult to let go. To anyone of you it may seem sad but a bit trivial but maybe when you are on the road, things become amplified and probably become out of proportion than if you were at home.

I was heading out on deserted main road after a wonderful restful day from cycling in Montreaux. I cycled from the campsite along the lake shore and spent the day exploring Chatau Chillon made famous by Byron's poem - The Prisoner of Chillon -and spent a gorgous evening having a picnic meal by the lakes edge watching the sun set over the lake with the mountains and the Dents du Midi range as a backdrop. Setting out early the next morning - a Sunday - on the deserted road towards the Alps, I noticed an abandoned fox cub huddled in the grass by the roadside. It must have only been about a cuple of months old and as I approached it was obviously abandoned and half starving as it was thinner than it should have been for its age. I wasn't sure what to do as there was nobody to flag down and the ones I did, sped past. As I approached it got to is feet and shivering with fear and weakness it eventually managed to scamper away into the long grass away from the road. I felt awfull and helpless as there was nothing I could do for it. For days after I felt very low and couldn't get this little fox cub out of my mind. It really did effect my mood for 2 or three days afterwards. I wish I could have done more but what I don't know. I often wonder how it fared. Did it make it? Somehow I doubt it. Nature can be so cruel.

That was the low point so far. And unfortunately, I am sure there will be others. But there have also been some major highlights. Almost too many to mention even though I have only been cycling for one month and 4 days. But I will be honest. I took a bus over the Col in the Alps. I don't know whether I was still affected by the fox cub but I just didnt have it in me to do it that day. The bus followed the same route all but the actuall col itself but this is a trip that I will do as I see fit and that wasn't to be my day. Maybe when I get time I will go back - luggage free and attempt it again.

Then of course the hightlights have been so many. That day in Montreux, visiting Italy, and Parma and Piacenza where I had a private viewing of the Botticelli Virgin - wow! what a moment that was! And I have seen the opulence and wealth of Monet's gardens at his house in Giverny France to the picturesque village where Renoir lived and the sites around the village that he painted, to Gustave Courbets riverside and comfortable house and village to the abject poverty and desolation of Vincent Van Gogh's lonely little attic room in Auvers Sur Oise, kept exactly as it was in his day without any renovation - a heart wrenching scene as his room was only 7ft x 11ft with a tiny attic window. Ironically, now the society that look after the room and museum are trying to get the money to buy one of his original paintings to hang in his room. They need at least 35 million pounds to buy one!! Doesn't that say something. He and his brother Theo lie together, their simple paupers gravestones lie side by side in the cemetry at the top of the town.

And then there is Florence! I am spending a couple of days rest and relaxation in Florence as it really is the Mecca for my artistic theme. So many sights. One day I shall return to Florence but with more money! I had to cherry pick the sights I wanted to see to save money but I managed some of the most important including, Michelangelo's Bacchus, and Donnatello's absolutely stunning and vibrant wooden sculpture of Magdalen. Not to mention the Cathedral of course.

People often want to know how my day works out. Well, since solo travelling, I have edged myself into a routine that really works for me. I have camped every night since being on my own which has kept the cost down and been really enjoyable considering I wasnt too keen at first. I now though look for YHA or cheap rooms as I find the campsites are too far out for me to really explore the towns and villages that I pass. So camping or not, my routine is that I rise at 6am ready to pack and cycle by 7am. That means I am cycling in the cool and quiet of the morning and by quite early in the morning I have already done the first 10 or 15 miles. If i am doing about 45 - 50 miles a day, that makes it easier to have rest stops for coffee and allows time to explore a city for a few hours before having plenty of time to cycle on and arrive at my destination in plenty of time to get to the tourist office and seek accommodation or a camp site. Then after sorting that out, I shower and change and have time to go out for a meal and sit in the town square with a good meal and watch the world go by. I prefer this routine now even though it is more expensive as I am getting to see the towns as I go without rushing. It suits me anyway and unless a camp site is needed, I shall stick to this routine.

Then when I get back to my rooms, I have my diary to write, look at the photos for the day, write the postcards, etc.. My days and evenings are very busy.

Then I must of course mention the people I have met so far. In Bologna I met a German couple who were spending a few weeks cycling Italy. Hedi and Franz sat and had a drink with me in Bologna square and because they were cycling a different route, we promised we would all meet up in Florence. We did just that and had a wonderful fun evening meal in Florence the previous night and have become good friends in a very short time. They want me to visit them in Germany - which I will certainly do when I have finished this trip. Hedi was very keen (and I am very flattered)to come to one of my talks in England about this trip when I get back. Meantime we shall definately keep in touch. Then there was Luca and his American friend, Antonia who gave me a great deal of local knowledge about the surrounding countryside.

Then there are the funnies: the time at Champlitte sitting outside a cafe where they were having some decking made. The French builder had only half finished it and his drills, hammers and nails were strewn everywhere. He kept picking up a hammer, only to knock in a nail or two, then rest again and sit down and chat to the other French customers. Great! Then he would pick up his hammer again after another drink and hammer another nail in before sitting down once again to chat. Wonderful! Can't help thinking that in Britain we would all be moaning about how the work never gets done. In France, its the socialising that is the most important bit. The manageress knew it would eventually get done so she didn't care one jot!!

Then finally, the moment when I saw a deer about 20 yds from me, dart out from a bush and jump in the river, swim to the other side and disappear into the woods on the bank on the other side. What a moment! Mind you, if anyone saw me emerge from a tent at 5.30am in the morning, they would want to run a mile as well!

Only my fourth country so far and only a month and 4 days of cycling. And what a month it has been. I am sure it will continue.

Catch up with you next month.

Deborah
(copyright Deborah Anne Brady.)

'Tout droit, tout doit, tout doit...'

'Tout doit, tout doit, tout doit'.. (straight on, straight on, straight on)





I can't mention how many times I have heard this phrase since being in France! My cycling companion, Astrid and I have spent the best part of two weeks asking for directions - especially out of big towns. The French have this appealing way of saying ''straight on'' three times in a rythmic, sing song way and seems to come with every answer. Mind you, it makes sense when you realise the distances and how spread out everything is in France. Everything seems to point to straight on, with the odd, a droit (on the right) alors, a gauche (then left) alors.. tout doit, tout doit, tout doit''.






Which really is appropriate for me as I am continuing my journey of and carrying straight on towards SE France and on to Italy. And what a three weeks it has been!





Since leaving the Royal Academy of Arts in London on 1st May, where my friends gave Astrid and myself a great, fun packed send off, it hasn't rained once. It has been 21 days of hot and sunny weather. I'm one of the lucky ones that goes straight to brown in colour so I am very brown even this early on in the trip. We've packed a lot in aswell. Sarting in Belgium and having a lovely weekend with my friends Jorg and Melanie and seeing the sights there. On to Paris through stunning Champagne country, the vineyards and the little champagne villages. Then Astrid and I went our separate ways in Paris, as she was due to go home, while my friend Sue came out to spend a few days with me in that City of the Arts. That was a packed two days. A train ride to Giverny, (Monet's house and gardens)with a sight seeing tour the day after and then on the Thursday, I pedalled out of Paris on my own for the first time.





I'm heading SE and am writing this from Troyes and tomorrow on to Estoyes where Renoir lived for many years. Then on to Langres to pick up the route taken by the person who inspired me to do this trip, Anne Mustoe who 30 years ago took to cycling around the world.





I've had a wonderful start to the trip, and Astrid helped me with her experience to get my cycling touring legs in and I learnt a lot of useful tips and hints about getting about and getting accommodation. We've mainly camped (cheaper) but also stayed in Chambres d'hotes ( b & b's) She was very patient with me too, as having such a heavy bike, it sometimes came to almost walking pace up the hills. However, now, I can easily do about 45 - 50 miles a day without too much effort as my legs and stamina improve by the day. So it was great fun to cycle with her for the first two weeks and great to see as many friends as I did at the beginning of my journey. And we have had a fun time. But the hightlights for me so far have been the visit to Auvers Sur Oise, north of Paris , where we visited Vincent Van Goghs attic room (left exactly as it was in his day)and he and his brother's Theo's, grave. Vincents room is only 7ft x 7ft with the single chair so familiar in the famous painting but you have to be there to see just how small that room is. And this is also the room he died in -very very moving - with a single skylight in the roof.





When you are on a trip like this, the day is made up of little events. One of which I was quite proud of. Yesterday in Provins, a picturesque medieval town where I stopped for morning coffee, I gave directions to the tourist office. in French! to a French woman! And guess what, I said to her, ..'''a gauche, alors a droit a l'arc, alors, tout doit, tout doit, tout doit.'' She thanked me and walked in the right direction, so I must have said something right!





But there are so many tales to tell, that I will only be able to do that in the book I shall be writing when I get back. All I can do here is keep you up to date with my adventures and hope you enjoy sharing it with me.





So, so far - Really enjoying it and used to solo cycling now. I'm feeling a great deal more confident than when I started out and feel settled into the journey now. There is a saying that says .. ''its the people you meet that you'll enjoy, the museums - less likely'' Never a truer word. I have met some fantastic people so far, who have shown nothing but kindness, from the little old man in his garden who came out with a large bottle of Evian water to fill our drinks bottles up and have a chat, to Daniel, the propietor of La Maison du Papidon, who brought us a small bottle of champagne to eat with our dinner, to the manager of a full B&b in Ypres who, late in evening, used his own phone to ring round and get us a Chambres D'hotes nearby. And when we got there we were greeted by our wonderful hosts at Da Poteze, Paul and Mimi who when we were too tired to cycle into town to eat, brought us up a slice of pizza each and greeted us with a glass of his best wine.





I am having a relaxing day on a tranquil camp site today to catch up with things and then tomorrow, its...'tout doit, tout doit, tout doit' And more of the stunning French countyside and villages. Ah! La vie en roads!





catch up with you again next month -


Deborah





(copyright Deborah Anne Brady)

Blank Canvas

''Just dash something down when you see a blank canvas staring at you in the face. It says, 'you can't do anything'. Many are afraid of the blank canvas, but the blank canvas is afraid of the really passionate painter who is daring - and who has once and for all broken that spell of, 'you cannot'.''
(Vincent Van Gogh)

Trawling through my diary recently, I suddenly sat up with a jolt! For the first time in my working life the pages of my diary were completely bare. There was no work; there were no meetings; no 'to do' lists; no jottings or social outings -nothing - just empty blank spaces. It was as though my life had - and as suddenly as I had turned the page from one month to the next - just stopped! And the contrast was stark. It had suddenly changed from my usual chaotic, manic and - to anyone else - undecipherable scribbled entries, to - absolutely nothing. Gazing into this blank nothingness, made me feel a little weird and strangely disconnected from my surroundings and at first I wasn't comfortable with this new emotion. I stared into the void of those unmarked pages; each crisp, white, pristine, white-as-snow sheet glaring back at me. It was like peering into a wintery white-out, and I shivered with doubt at the thought of what was about to happen to me over the coming year. The reality of my imminent journey jumped out at me in a Magwich-induced fright and there was no looking over my shoulder now. I had reached the point of no return; it had its grip on me and there was no going back. My life was about to dramatically change and I felt a little unhinged at the commitment I had made.

But of course, those diary pages were not blank at all. Very soon, those same empty pages will, as yet unseen, be crammed from margin to edge with days of excitement and drama and transform those flat, horizontal, blue, spacer lines into a three dimensional vision of colours, landscapes, images and senses that would soon fill every minute of my days. Those pages will soon be blanketed in stories and adventures of intoxicating tales to come, already fuelling my over fertile mind, as I mentally traced my proposed route and filled my head with imaginings of future delights and experiences of each country I would be travelling through and especially, the characters and people I will meet along the way. With my imagination in overdrive and brimming with excitement, I turned my attention, once again to more practical matters.

In preparation for the trip, my bike had been given a full service. So, with his shiny new components as well as his deep, metallic blue colour and with the added blaze of a dazzling, yellow sunflower decorating my handlebar bag, I decided to give him a new name. This burst of blue and yellow reminded me of the vibrant, intense hues used by one of my favourite artists, and so I re-named him - Vincent - after the Dutch expressionist painter, Vincent van Gogh. An appropriate name considering the theme of my trip and one which suits him perfectly!

Another new feature is that I have also bought myself a mini notebook computer. (not bad for someone who vowed not to take any technology with me! ) and I am looking forward to being able to Skype some of my friends and family (for free!) in the coming months while I am abroad. (I am desperately trying to persuade those of my friends who haven't got Skype to buy (a cheap) camera and speakers, so I can contact them as well!)

So, the check list is finally complete; only the last minute items to catch up on just before I go. I have spent the last few days, packing and repacking and then packing again - in fact I've lost count of the number of times I have packed and upacked - just to get everything exactly balanced and how I want it. I have put everything that I (hopefully) won't need at the bottom of one pannier and the more commonly used items nearer the top for easier access. Then I had to evenly distribute the weight in each pannier to get an even balance, which makes for a more stable ride. I then had to decide which items to pack in the top pannier - nothing too heavy,so that it didn't top load the bike. But for those of you who are interested, the weight is as such: Each side pannier = 30lbs each, one tent = 15lbs, one sailing roll top pannier across the back = 25lbs, handlebar bag =10lbs making the total weight = 110lbs. (sorry, I still use lbs - blame it on my age!)

But it's a bit heavier than when I was initially testing the bike. but even though the bike is heavier, with an evenly balanced load, it doesn't feel that much different. Some have wondered why I am not using front wheel panniers. Well, there are three reasons; firstly, I am not cooking when I camp, so I don't need the extra space; secondly, I didn't want seven pieces of separate luggage to load and unload from my bike, especially when getting on trains or on a bus; and thirdly, I am a firm believer that the more baggage you have the more you want to fill them!. And hopefully as I progress on my journey, I can discard such things as maps or items that I no longer need, so it should get lighter - but only slightly!

So, its up to London this Sunday - May 1st - where between 9.30am and 11am, in the courtyard of the Royal Academy of Arts in Piccadilly, a group of my friends and family, will, over a glass or two of the sparkly stuff, (only a sip in my case) send me on my way into the wildly exciting unknown.
I intend to keep this blog going during my travels, so I hope you will follow my adventures each month.

And so, as I make the last entry, I've closed my half filled diary and with mounting excitement, I am about to go upstairs and pack for the final time.

Deborah

My special thanks go to Bull-it Recruitment - part sponsors of my round the world trip.

Also, huge love and thanks to all my friends and family who have put me up - and put up with me! - and thanks to everyone for their encouragement, support, advice and love, without which, I could never have got this trip off the ground.

''Listen ...... there's a hell of a good universe next door;

let's go! ''

(E.E.Cummings: from Anne Mustoe's; A Bike Ride)

(copyright: Deborah Anne Brady)