Cycle ride

Brittany to Bilbao

July 2007

Following the death of his father in 2006, Ben Robinson decided on a cycle trip with his friend Joe Shute, from Brittany to Bordeaux to raise money for PCRF. In telling us of their plans, Ben wrote "This is a trip my Dad would have loved. We spent all of our holidays in France and he was a keen cyclist. We plan to complete the trip in four weeks". Joe confessed that the trip was going to be a challenge in more ways than one, as Ben was riding his Dad's old touring bike and he was going to be on "a third-hand rusty Dalesman, better suited to trips to the pub than scaling Alps".

The pair reached their original destination in Bordeaux a week early, so decided to step up the challenge and aim for Biarritz. Once there, they decided they would go for broke and have their grand finale in Bilbao, undeterred by the mountains that they would have to negotiate on the way. Having completed the 840 mile journey, Ben wrote in his blog, "This trip has been an amazing experience for me. I have accomplished a huge challenge, seen some great places, met some interesting and bizarre characters and I have got quite a bit fitter. Most importantly for me, I think it has brought me closer again to my Dad. I am sure he has been watching down on the trip as we have gone along, laughing at all the pickles I have been in and holding his head in despair at my attempts to wriggle out of them. I will certainly never forget this trip; it has been an incredible experience. I am still getting used to staying in the same place without packing a tent and moving. I am proud of the amount of money we have raised so far and I want to say a big thanks to everybody. The response has been amazing".

You can read more about their trip in Ben's blog and in Joe's blog.