DAY 6- Friday, Isle of Wight

I don’t know what possessed us to hire the bikes but we spent Friday of our so-called relaxing holiday cycling a 23km circuit on the island starting at Sandown and ending in Shanklin. I was filled with dread as soon as we wheeled out of the bike shop as I remembered that the last time I had ridden a bike was 8 years ago at a school camp (didn’t go that well back then either). But after a bit of a shaky start on my part we settled into the riding and I began to enjoy the trail. The track we were following was called the ‘Sunshine Trail’ as it gets the most hours of sunlight of any place in the UK.

One of the highlights for me was meeting Pierce Brosnan who was also cycling on the trail (he even said ‘hello’ to me) and I think I did well not to turn around and cycle after him. All I need now is to meet Colin Firth, Hugh Grant, Ralph Fiennes and a couple of the Harry Potter kids (any will do I’m not fussy) before we head home and I’ll be a happy woman. We also did a little detour into a small town called Godshill, which could only be described as ‘cute’. It was full of (more) gorgeous thatched cottages and we also visited a 10th century church which is still being used today. The trail changed from fairly flat road to steep off road terrain and we cycled through mud, long grass, thistles and cowpats.

I think one of the most incredible things about England is all public walking tracks they have and even more amazing are that the tracks go through private property. As you’re walking through one property to another and as you reach the gate there will be a very polite sign saying ‘close the gate behind you so the stock doesn’t escape’. If you just went trolloping through someone’s farm in Australia they’d be after you with a big shotgun.

Although I must admit that we had a couple of issues on the trail- right at the end we managed to get lost and the public WALKING tracks ended up being violated with two stupid Australians on mountain bikes. Mark had to lift our bikes over numerous fences and carry them down steep stairs (I kept wondering where the farmer was with his shotgun) but other than that I think we did well and most importantly we had a really great time. Tour de France here we come!

Quick! Run! The farmer's coming