When my friend said she was going to cycle to Somerset I was enthusiastic and told her that was a great idea... for her.

Then when a few days later she began telling other friends that we were going to do it together I became less enthusiastic.

But here we are on a sunny Saturday and I'm more nervous than you can ever imagine, and about to cycle 200+ miles to Somerset over the next week.

I was beginning to feel confident over the last few days, trying my new bike out for hours, but actually putting everything on (very padded shorts, helmet etc) and weighing my bike down with my panniers full of clothes, toiletries etc for the week I'm starting to feel distinctly less confident.
Especially as I literally only discovered the main storage comportments of my panniers as my friends were on their way to collect me. If I can't figure that out without help am I safe to be let loose on the roads and what else that's vitally important don't I know or have forgotten?!?!?

Our plan is to cycle 35+ miles today, heading out past Reading, and that seems just physically impossible. I genuinely have no idea if my body can do it, but reassure myself that at no point will I ever really be that far away from home, always with friends, often within phone contact, and if it gets really bad I'll just get Mr Jean Power to the rescue and come straight back home... but I really don't want to do that so I'm determined to try my best.

Sadly since I got MS my muscles seize up, cramp, and get exhausted at the first sign of stress & worry, taking hours to relax and calm down, so I know it's going to be quite a few miles before I can relax and see if I can do it. But there's only one way to find out...

So before I know it we're heading off for the first mile. Our plan is to head to a nearby train station, lug our bikes and possessions up the stairs, jump on a train to Uxbridge and begin our long journey away from quite such busy roads as there are around home. So with a stomach full of trepidation, and muscles full of terror, off we set.

The first mile is ok, but by the time we get on the train, and it's all becoming a reality, my nerves are shot through causing all kinds of physical sensations and spasms but I'm optimistic that they'll die down soonish.

Our first task, once arriving at Uxbridge, is figuring out the map and getting going. My one concession to doing the ride was that I get out of navigating so leave it to my lovely companions and soon we're headed down the first of many canal paths...

3 hours in and we're worn out and stressed from the nightmare that is cycle paths with barriers every few hundred feet where we have to stop, get off our bikes and basically lift them over the gates to continue. I guess they're designed to stop motorbikes but they're exhausting and very heavy work. In 2 1/2 hours we've only managed to go 12 miles due to the constant stopping and helping each other.

But all of a sudden we go up a bridge, get an amazing view of Windsor, and the Castle, and relish the sunshine and it all seems better (we were so exhilarated not to be fighting a gate we didn't even think to take a photo) and we plough on.

Soon we hit Bray, home of many good restaurants, and 16+ miles and 3 1/2 hours in it's time for lunch so we find the nearest pub garden, which happens to belong to Heston Blumenthal's Crown who are having a a barbecue, and we eat and toast our progress so far... knowing that we have 20+ miles to go until we can stop for the day...

Once fuelled up we head off again towards Theale with a stop at the lovely Sonning to watch the locks and indulge in some tea and cake.

Just 4 hours on we travel the other 20 miles to take today's total to 38+ and can relax with a pub dinner, a view of a beautiful lake and a very sound night's sleep.