deeofdulwich

Hi How many days are looking to take to complete the journey? If you are an experienced cyclist, you can cover more ground more quickly and therefore require less bookings/money. And do you have a group to ride with already? If you do, then I also recommend arranging your own trip if you want to keep costs down, as it really does not need to cost anywhere near ?1500! A lady I know called Charlie Watson who writes "therunnersbeans" blog did this earlier this year and wrote a couple of good blog entries on it. If you google her website, it should come up. And if you get in touch with her, I'm sure she'd be happy to let you know what they did in terms of accommodation (as don't think all details on that front are covered in her blog). And, if you're up for an even tougher challenge, someone I know runs a London 2 Paris in 24 hours ride in May - PM if you'd like further details! D

There are a couple of patterns I like in a book called Natural Baby Knits. I think they are both made as single pieces so no sewing required afterwards. If I can find the book I'd be happy to lend it to you for her to have a look at. And, whilst we're on the subject of knitting: I'm trying to free up some space at home and have a bag of toy wool in all sorts of different colours if anyone would like to take it. Also, a bag of toy stuffing. All for free. If anyone would like it, please let me know.

This year my brother has very kindly offered to hire a car and drive me and my bike there (back seat likely to have to go down so, sorry, most likely no room for additionals, otherwise would offer as I know from experience it's a tricky figuring out what to do from here). That might sound a bit elaborate but I rode over to the start last year and found that quite stressful so it's not for me(though it might just be me and the way I am!) They might have figured it out differently this year but to get into the olympic park coming from this direction last year you had to ride on the path for a while along the same stretch of road that riders were heading out on already on their way and I just didn't enjoy that, or having to navigate myself there whilst riding. And I did not need those extra miles in me either as I don't routinely ride quite that sort of distance. If you want to take advantage of the bag drop then bear that in mind, that would be extra stuff to lug on your bike with you on the way there. That all makes me sound like a bit of a misery guts, I'm sure loads of people suck it up and just do it and they're fine! Another tip: get as far forward in your starting bunch as you can, especially if you have one of the later start waves. They put another bunch of toilets next to the start pens...:-) Good luck everyone.