The bike ride for nutters! 200km from London to Dunwich on the Suffolk coast. It was invented by a handful of bike couriers a few years ago as a trip to the seaside, to get away from London. For full story google Dunwich Dynamo all the history is there. I did the ride with son Stuart last Sunday 20th July, which happened to be the anniversary of me carrying the Olympic Flame- but that was another story! Oh, forgot to say that the DD is only partially organised, a bit of a free for all for some 2000 bike riders and it starts at around 8.00pm at a pub near St Pancras in London and finishes in our case, at about 7.30 am on Dunwich beach. Yes, that’s right, it goes through the night and the roads are thick with all sorts of cyclists. We did it as part of the COSMIC team and Stuart summarised it perfectly in an Email to the charity. The names have been removed to protect the not so innocent!
8 Cosmic riders (started) :
-Estimated over 2000 bikes at the start – huge amount of riders of all shapes/sizes and 2 dogs in a bike basket
-10 postmen rode the event on their big red Royal Mail bikes, with that red bit on the front
-X used a £50 note to buy a £1 route map
-X gave his cosmic t-shirt to a girl who promised to join our team, then he never saw her again.
-We lost A,B & C almost immediately after the start – hope they arrived at Dunwich OK?
-X bought us all ice-creams in Epping Forest (a cosmic tradition started in Dover – on L2P June 2008)
-A’s rear light was so bright many riders behind were blinded & nearly fell off.
-Lots of kids along the route high-fiving all the riders and cheering them on “allez allez!”
-At 3am every single rider had to dismount and push bikes in single-file over a railbridge closed for repairs.
-X remembered he had a lunch appointment in Oxford next morning so had to ride ahead to catch a taxi at 7am
-X did a video diary – so that would be good for website
-X found someones wallet on the roadside at 4am (can you remind him to contact them/organisers somehow?)
-No major mechanicals to report although Clive’s big ring got jammed – painful!
-Y ran short on food, drink & batteries
-Y, Clive and Stuart stuck together & rolled onto Dunwich beach at 0730.
-We bottled-out of the sea swim (too cold and windy – just did some paddling instead for a quick photo!)
All in all, a great experience but not one for the faint-hearted (or those that cherish their sleep! eg me )
Sue was magnificent, she drove us over 500miles in total, stayed overnight in a B&B in Lowestoft (nice!) and was in Dunwich to drive us home at the end. She also took a couple of pics.
Stuart, me and Y at Dunwich
Tradition has it that you jump in the sea, we paddled for 5 seconds!