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Day 5: La Grande Arrivée

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 Day 5.  What looked like a 32 mile cruise was anything but.  We began with a leg-sapping descent in the Parisian rush hour, at the bottom of which was a traffic accident, bin men, gendarmes and cobbles to negotiate. That was the warm up.   Our route took us on to what seemed to be part of the Parisian motorway system. Further along we encountered incredibly narrow and overgrown roadside paths, although no match for the pith helmets. We also rode up long climbs in beautiful parks and one of 13 percent which almost destroyed us. Meanwhile Dave was battling with technology which couldn’t apparently distinguish bike tracks from motorways from cul-de-sacs, as he valiantly managed our rendezvouses. We stopped for lunch in Parc de Saint-Cloud with a six-mile glory leg to go, only to be told by the manager that the exit from the park we were due to take was closed due to subsidence. Thus, operation Escape from Saint-Cloud commenced. Bill took on one switchback descent too many and without a h
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Why To Paris? A Bit Of History

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The world's first organised bicycle race was won by an Englishman on 31 May 1868 in Paris. It was part of an event held at Parc de Saint Cloud sponsored by cycle manufacturer Michaux et Compagnie. Public interest in the new "velocipede" was riding high and eager spectators were treated to races for those using machines with wheels of less than a metre, another for those with larger wheels and even a comical "slow" race, the winner of which was the last to cross the line while remaining upright.  There is dispute among historians about the opening statement above but most accounts name a 19 year-old Englishman, James Moore, as the winner of the race for those with larger wheels. In any event, there is no doubt that Moore was the world's first cycling star. A year later he won the first road race: from Paris to Rouen, beating over three hundred competitors and finishing the eighty mile course in ten hours and twenty five minutes. Moore rode a velocipede or &qu
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When You're Going Through Hell, Keep Going

For a long time, I haven't known what to say but now my thoughts are becoming clearer. Hopefully, they may help someone and, perhaps, you.  I haven't kept a diary of the events since my cancer diagnosis in late 2022, perhaps because I was in denial about it. Even writing that sentence is hard, because it's confirming and accepting the most traumatising event of my life. Of course, I didn't want it to be the case. I haven't wanted to chronicle my experience during treatment or my continuing recovery from it, perhaps because I've felt that to do so would jeopardise it. Recovery is not guaranteed and the truth is that the treatment was so brutal, I am now more susceptible to illness than ever. I'm in a precarious position and you don't look down and take stock when you're walking a tightrope, you focus only on the next step. You don't look back and you don't look beyond the step in progress. For some reason, the influence of that fear is now out
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