Tonight I felt like a freak. At women’s self defence we are doing pushing and hand grabbing and apparently I am a big strong girl so no one wanted to push or grab me. So I bicycled home and cried. Nah, just kidding. But it was very cold and wet bicycling [...]

It just dawned on me that I am leaving to start the second part of my trip exactly two years after I was originally going to go at the end of November 2006 to ride from Argentina up to Alaska. Instead I took five weeks and went back to NZ and rode from Christchurch [...]

I just got an email from my mother this morning and they have just discovered that my recently born nephew in NZ has two holes in his heart and has been scheduled for open heart surgery. So I promised my mother that I would do a postal vote in NZ’s upcoming elections as I [...]

Is the title of this post swearing? Sorry if it is. But on last day of riding from the Corbin factory near San Fransisco to Los Angeles I just about died from the heat. It was 107 degrees fahrenheit (42 celsius) and it was easier to ride with my visor down as the [...]

For the rest of our time in St. Petersburg we took a ferry to one of the summer residence of the Royal family Peterhof’s which is famous for it’s fountains that are all gravity fed (rather than using pumps). A museum about the 900 day siege of St. Petersburg when they were surrounded by [...]

On our first day in St. Petersburg we had a guided tour around the city stopping at Saint Issac’s Cathedral the resting place of the royal imperial family including Anastasia, Peter and Paul Fortress, Trinity Square and the Church of the Saviour on Blood.
It is funny as someone at work was saying that their friends [...]

The State Hermitage Museum in Saint Petersburg is one of the largest museums and oldest art galleries in the world. The collection is displayed in six buildings, the main one being the Winter Palace which used to be the official residence of the Russian Tsars. You are allowed to take pictures of the [...]

The great thing about living in London is that it is relatively easy to go to Europe. So every year for my birthday I go on holiday. This year I was lucky enough to go St. Petersburg in Russia. St. Petersburg was founded 305 years ago by Tsar Peter the Great and at its [...]

It’s my birthday tomorrow so I have added a bit of whimsy. This is a poem my friend wrote me.
Sunflower Smile
Golden Aura
Shadows Shine
Stems Steer Skywards
Among The Daisies
Of Daytime
You Nod
In The Gust
You Must
Grow On
by Julia Miller-Surridge
Also a friend once said that this poem reminded him of me.
The Lion and the Blue By Robert Vavra
My lonely [...]

When I travelled up and down New Zealand I managed to leave something at every place that I stayed. Which wasn’t too bad as I was going the other way and picked it all up on the way back through.
I was congratulating myself in San Francisco that so far I was doing all right [...]

When I was sorting out my bike I tried to order a Corbin seat but unfortunately there wasn’t enough time to have one made before I flew to Anchorage. Then when I was staying in Port Angeles Greg said that he had stopped at the Corbin and loved his Corbin seat so I couldn’t [...]

I was welcomed with homemade pizza and beer by Allyndreth (sister of friends in the UK) and David when I arrived in San Francisco.
I caught the ferry into San Francisco for a day of sightseeing passing San Quentin the big prison on the way (there were actually prisoners in the yard the first time I [...]