So, yes, it was raining as we set off. The bright sunshine of yesterday, when it was hardly necessary, had gone and we headed towards Dartmoor getting mildly wet as we went. First stop was Buckfastleigh, home of the abbey as shown in the photo below:
We stopped for a peak around, had a bit to eat then began the long march up over Dartmoor. Much more of a concern than the drizzling rain was the wind, and as the rain cleared the wind became more prominent. On the B3357 now heading West we were being hit full in the face by it and mental fatigue was beginning to show. It was in this state we met up with Mick, a man I had spoken to via the CTC forum and who had agreed to meat us on our last leg and do a little bit of the journey with us. Unfortunately Mick's arrival coincided with my first puncture of the entire journey, about 8 miles before Tavistock. My tyres had been inpenetrable for 2600 miles but finally the roads got the better of them.
I could find no sign of anything sharp and I wonder if the puncture may have been caused by wheel buckling. This was starting to become a little bit more apparent now, spokes needed tightening before we reached Land's End so we headed into Tavistock with a visit to a bike shop in mind. The woman at the bike shop however believed she was a comedian and I was in no mood for anything other than straight-forward bike fixing so after a spot of lunch we headed on regardless. The back wheel wasn't that bad, but the next chance we found to get it fixed would have to be taken. It was too late by the time we reached Liskeard so St Austell or Truro the next day were the options.
This is the view from the top of Dartmoor:
We didn't have a great deal of options bar main roads today, the A390 into Liskeard and then on the same road to Lostwithiel. It had ceased to rain for some time now, the sun poking it's head out at times but it never became particularly warm and we spent most of the day in a very average mood. Mick said later that we looked tired and I think he was right, although it was much more mental than physical - mostly we were bored of plodding through dismal landscapes, often in places we had seen in better weather and enjoyed.
Mick left us a little before Liskeard as he had to get home, and it would later turn out he had been feeling a little ill on the day. It was a welcome break from the norm to have someone different along, although I think he could have caught us on a better day. We just wanted to get through today, it was basically an irrelevance with nothing to achieve other than to get further along.
As we rolled into Lostwithiel, trying to formulate a plan as it was now about 6pm, the heavens opened. Great. We took shelter in a pub and had a meal while we waited for the rain to stop, but it didn't stop and we were forced back out to get wet with darkness coming and nowhere to rest our heads for the night.
We trawled up into the hills and found a campsite near Luxylan that seemed to be doubling up as a swimming pool. We found a pitch, put up a damp tent, which became damper, and headed to the shower block. This required a key-code to get into and as we arrived late we had no such thing so I hung around the door waiting for someone to come out and popped in. Once inside the showers were pretty good so at least we didn't end up angry like we had in some sites - one of the most annoying thing on this trip was to walk into a shower block and find crap showers. A small piece of grass on which to put a tent and a half-decent shower was all we would want so paying money and not getting one of these things never went down that well.
And that was it for the day - spectacularly uneventful as it was. We lay in the tent listening to rain hammering down and hoped that it would cease by morning...............
Day 36 review
Mileage - 80ish
Pints drunk - couple each
Nice chaps called Mick met - 1
Weather rating - 4/10 - it wasn't all bad, just frustrating for the most part but getting soaked at the end was a real pain.
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