406/5/12 LEJOG taste..

Met up with the group on the summit of Hope Valley on friday afternoon. Michiel cycling with Irish Jim and Phillip who lives 6m of the year in America.
We descended into Shrewsbury taking in a pint at the Cock Inn, much as we did in 2009.
An excellent meal was had. there are 44 in this group and quite a range of abilities & finishing times!
Saturday was the 90 miles to Preston, this time into a little bit of a Headwind. The roads of North Shropshire are rolling & picturesque, and the nightmare through Waarrington/Wigan retail wilderness was as awful as I'd remembered...Still it was a relief to get to the Ibis. Phillip had peeled off 800yds from the finsih believing in his Garmin. This took him tro a Premier Inn and an extra 8 miles! Today he said he should've continued arounfd the block a few times to get his 'century'. An excellent meal was eaten & a few pints of EPA as we watched scumbag Terry lift the FA Cup.
We set out this morning in a gentle but favourable tail wind and the early miles to Kendal were a fantasic & relaved 40 miles at >17mph...no effort! In the SPHERE cafe we managed to meet up with Simon \9from Lejog 2009) who was pout training with heavy panniers - felt like 6 bricks in each!
I then tackled Shap Fell for the second time - I'm not a fan of Hills but this one is special. And the lunch was most welcome.
The next section was fast & furious with iron man Simon powering on until he split off in search of more hills to climb.
After the waterstop Phillip suggested a 'warm down' into Carlisle so we all calmed down a bit & rolled in in good shape.
Well that's it for me - after Gretna I shall reluctantly wave the guys off and head for home.
Looks like it's wet in the morning..never mind