Day 7 - Preston to Carlisle

My favourite day of the trip so far....  At the morning tea stop we introduced our Dutch colleague to the local delicacy of Chorley cake on his discovery of Britain tour.  Some steep country lanes tested the legs first thing this morning but these gave way to undulating roads which led to Kendal, where we prepared ourselves for the climb over the Lakes. My legs felt the best they had all day I can honestly say I really enjoyed the climb. The gradient wasn’t too steep but it was long (about 6-7miles), the rain shower at the top cooled us down.  Unfortunately it developed into torrential rain during the well earned long descent into Shap, but it didn’t wipe the grin off my face from the ascent.  After that it was plain sailing along the A6 to Carlisle where we could keep the speed up, our highest average speed so far of over 15mph. Stats: 101 miles, 8 ½ hours total (with stops). For most our first ever Century ride was certainly one to remember.

Tommo & Chris at the summit of the Lakes climb.