Finding Freedom...World Wide Ride

Steve took us around the city to run all of our errands. He then toured us around the city of Plymouth including an exclusive tour of the Citadel. He is a retired 29 th Commando.

plymouth 59 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr

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The Mayflower left from these steps on its historic journey to the new world.

plymouth 44 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr

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We also sampled scrumpie at the village pub the Oak and came back for the Morris dancing that evening.

plymouth 26 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr

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Riding your bike on “the wrong side of the road” is actually not as easy as it looks. Your instincts are all wrong here. The worst are the multilane round abouts or when you turn right onto a divided road. If you glance down at your map or GPS the car that appears to be oncoming can freak you out. The narrow lanes are also an issue since you have to stay so far left all the time.

DSC00406 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr

From Plymouth we took the Tor point ferry and then rode south on the east coast to the end of the road and then up the west coast to Redruth. We had been told that bikes are free westbound on the ferry, but no that is eastbound. We had no pounds on us and so the ferry crew chipped in the 80 p fare for each of us.



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The most southern point in the “continental” UK is at Lizard Point or “the Lizard”.


cornwall 3 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr

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From here we rode to “Lands End”, which is the western most point in mailand England.

cornwall 11 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr

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The weather has continued to be wet, cold, and windy. That however has not diminished the beauty of Cornwall. There are castles everywhere. Riding thru the tiny villages connected by one-lane tracks thru tall hedgerows is amazing.

cornwall 7 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr


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Continuing north we finally found a traditional old school British hotel in Redruth (think Fawlty Towers).


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Today it is raining again as we continue north and east to Torquay.

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We made for Newquay and then to Bude by trying to stick to the small roads along the coast.

torquay 1 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr


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From there we cut cross-country thru the Dartmoor National Park. Here on the high moor it was very cold and very wet. The conditions improved quite a bit by the time we arrived to Torquay.



We took along walk along the seashore and then had a pub dinner. We had to watch a few episodes of Faulty Towers here in Torquay.

torquay 6 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr

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The weather is still dreary here in the UK, but we did finally get some sun today for our ride northwest to see Salisbury and Stonehenge.

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We rode north along the coast. Leaving the main rode we explored some of the small narrow hedgerow lanes.

stonehenge 1 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr

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Leaving the coast we arrived to the city of Salisbury where there is the stunning Salisbury Cathedral. Pilgrims have been coming here since it was completed in 1258. It has the world’s oldest working clock from 1386 and the best-preserved copy of the Magna Carta.

stonehenge 9 by Sara & Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr

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From here we headed further back in time to check out Stonehenge. We were not going to pay 17.50 pounds (35$ ) each to see the rocks that can be seen fairly well from the road.

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Stonehenge



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This is just 5 miles from the town of Amesbury where we had booked into an inn. There is a very nice walking circle route from the town that takes about 45 minutes and goes past fields full of sheep and the river.

stonehenge 31 by Sara &amp; Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr

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We are on our way to Cardiff Wales today, but we made a stop in the famous city of Bath and to the castle at Caerphilly on the way.

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We just loved the hedgerow tracks

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Bath is where the rich and famous have come to relax for hundreds of years, but the Romans first built baths here in 60 AD. The landmarks include the Royal cresent, the Circus (a ring of houses), and the Pulteney Bridge. After a couple of hours walking around we needed to get a move on to get to Wales.

cardiff 3 by Sara &amp; Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr

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The route took us thru the national park, which is a network of single tracks and several passes.


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England has a network of 1000 miles of canals. They were used for 40 years to build the railway and then abandoned. Now they have been restored for leisure craft. These 20 locks span a 2 km stretch and it takes all day oneway.



cardiff 23 by Sara &amp; Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr

cardiff 24 by Sara &amp; Daniel Pedersen, on Flickr

We were again on our way to Cardiff, but made a second stop in Caerphilly to see the amazing castle there. It was built in 1268 and because of its unique design of multiple layers of defense it was never captured.

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