Christmas Week

Hello Bloggers. Well, I am back home from Stoke. Overall, we had a good Christmas. Watching my daughters falling about whilst playing on the new Wii was most amusing! The mood was upbeat, despite Ron, Julie's Dad going into hospital a couple of days before Christmas for Chemotherapy. He is doing ok and has finished his first bout of the treatment. However, the worst bit is the body's reaction to the very powerful drugs and he has started to feel rough today. Julie has come home with me but will return to Stoke on Sunday to help raise her Dad's spirits.

I managed to get some training in whilst away; the highlight was a long ride with Jase Walkley. He took me on a very well known route across the peak District National Park and the famous Cat and Fiddle climb (named after the pub at the summit). There are numerous other climbs on the route, which is a shade under 60 miles I think. However, the Cat and Fiddle is by far the longest at 6 miles. It is steep in places but not outrageously so - BUT! the wind was blowing a hooly and it was smack in our faces for most of the climb. It made progress very slow and Jase registered that we hit 5mph at one point! I still enjoyed the ride immensely and so want to go and ride some big alpine routes now! After the first hour or so I felt quite strong. This is normal for me as it takes a while to get the aging legs working well!

The Tea Shop near the summit is REALLY nice! Turbo Man would just love it! I even sampled the home made cake (Turbo man will tell you that that is not like me!). Here are some pics of the lovely scenery and a smiley Jase (still smiling even grinding away on his 39/23 whilst I tootled along on my granny ring):

I have not managed much swimming as the pool here is closed for Christmas. But I had an excellent Swim Shack session on the 22 Dec. Boy, am I excited about swimming faster in 2009!

Must dash. More news soon!