Well the end of an era and what a four years it has been for me and what a lovely ride to end it all. A lovely clear and cold night with fantastic moonlight and a great route, that I had not done before, including my first bike crossing of the Rotherhithe tunnel for many years. This time was far more enjoyable than the last, it being during the day and caused much inconvenience to the long line of cars behind me, most of whom where keen to let me know that as they came past!
The ride went as smoothly as they all have, the organisation as always impeccable. After a well needed breakfast I rode home to make up my November century and managed to keep up a decent 15mph on that leg and actually felt pretty good about that as I did about the whole night.
It was actually my good fortune that I am a Guardian reader and read that article about the night rides. It caught my imagination and though I could not do one of them at the time, being in the process of recovery from back surgery, I committed it to memory and knew that it was something that I wanted to come back to when I could.
It has taken me to places that I could never have imagined back then and I was already a cyclist, but one who had maybe thought that they had done their best work in their youth! One thing has lead to another though. Overnight rides have lead to rides home the next day, to century a month challenges and what I like most the chance to ride off to places I have not been before, or at least not for a very long time and along the way I have seen and experienced some great things whilst riding with some really great people. I have learnt to challenge myself on the bike again, like I used to do when I was younger and I have reminded myself how much I still enjoy doing that.
Anyway the adventure goes on and new challenges await. Time never stands still at the end of the day. Just time to say a last thank you to Simon for giving me the chance to do this and for all the fun both last night and on all the other rides. Thanks to everyone else as well for making them all such enjoyable rides. I hope to see you all on the road again soon.
