First of all thank you for your comments, some get through to the page but others just disappear? (WordPress is good but not sure it all works on a phone) So in response, Jez obviously Croatia look good especially after last night and your updates must take as long as this, and Jo, if I take a rest I might not get going again!

The other thing – these seem to be getting longer (must be lacking human contact), and the amount of battery it uses up, mean that I don’t really have time to read through again and correct the auto corrections, or see if the ramblings make any sense. Sorry, but on with the blog – this is a good-un.

Today started wet, I waited on the tent hoping it would get better and it didn’t. I was trying to charge battery packs without success, but the look of the weather had me charging lights instead as the road conditions didn’t look too clever. Eventually I gave in, got packed up and got started. The campsite had become rather boggy, and especially around my tent. My boss Andy, who is a very keen cyclist advised me not to wear socks as it saves drying two things out, with my new shoes (did I mention that I bought some new cycling shoes in Shrewsbury) I thought I would give it ago. I only mention this as a precursor to a rather horrible story later on – remember the boggy conditions!

I headed into Berkeley to get some supplies and see if anything was visible of the castle. I’m still not sure how much remains, or whether it is a modern construction – you can rent it out. With the poor weather, I didn’t want to keep getting lost, so I put the AndOsm app on straight away with a headphone. It was very good, and I got pretty much on route all the time, where it fails is, if you go wrong it tries to reroute you, while as you are on a bike it would be easier just to say – you’ve missed a turning. So it pays to check the screen if you are not sure. The NCN3 towards the Severn Bridge was really nice, very quiet lanes with hedgerows high enough to protect from the headwind blowing straight up the Bristol Channel. A little village of Hill had an innovative use of its old phone box, by turning it into a mini library (or rather book exchange), together with a nice bus shelter for my first dry stop if the day.

It passed Thornbury, which I think is an early nuclear power station, but not alarming like Dounereay. The route took me under the second Severn Crossing, to Severn Beach. If you ever look out of your left hand window as you go over the new bridge, Severn Beach is a sad windswept place almost under the bridge.

My route carried on past another large power station, through a series of complex urban cycle paths, including burnt out cars, fire damaged tunnels (I suspect connected) until I reached the Avonmouth Bridge. The cycle path shares the motorway bridge, and it was a really hard climb against quite a headwind to get to the top, the headwind meant a pedal down as well. The cycle way is shared with mopeds which came as a bit of a shock when the first one came by. The bridge almost goes over a lot of houses and gardens, and would prove an excellent vantage point to scope out some radical garden design, unfortunately none of them seemed to have bothered. Down the other side and back onto some lovely quiet and usually sheltered lanes. The M5 is high on stilts for some of this, very reminiscent of the French autoroutes in the Alps.

The weather had dried up a lot as I reached Clevedon, a nice little town with lots of facilities. Remember, that I wasn’t wearing any socks (I don’t know why I’m even telling this story – I’ve only just got over it myself), but the rain had stopped and the shoes were chafing a bit, so I thought I’d put some socks on. First of all I nipped into the co-op for some lunch, and as I started walking there was a wet squelch in one shoe between my toes – I thought the lining had moved or something. Anyway I ate my lunch on a park bench, and then thought about putting socks on, pulled my foot out of the shoe (look away now) there was a massive slug between my toes!!!!! I freaked out a bit (with out causing too much of a disturbance – the slug was kicked about 50 metres). The chain oiling rag was used for a clean up, and I’ll be wearing and drying socks in the future! It was a short ride to Yatton, where I thought a disused railway line might start, and it did – the Strawberry Line all the way to Cheddar, really good the whole way and even included a tunnel.

Chatted to an Irish guy cycling the other way, sounds like he had been everywhere, returning from Spain, France and Holland, and was cycling from Dover to Fishguard to return to Ireland. He was loving the trail, and hadn’t had much quiet cycling from Dover. We compared maps and he was pleased to hear that he could get over the Avonmouth on the motorway bridge as his map wasn’t clear. The line passes through quite a lot of orchards, I know Somerset reasonably well, but have not been aware of many orchards – obviously the source of the Cider – but in this area there were lots of Apple trees. From the end of the disused railway I jumped in the A38 heading towards Highbridge (about 10 miles) which was my planned campsite. The head wind was quite bad, but the traffic was light, as I was getting closer I decided to push on as crossing the Somerset Levels in stronger wind, rain or more traffic was not appealing. It’s the longest day so plenty of day light. I stuck to the road, but did use a cycle path if it looked like a long one with a good surface, on one particular one around Highbridge it just came to an abrupt stop – obviously a work in progress. I’d found a potential site in North Petherton and was able to shop before getting there. The site was a bit strange, pretty much a static caravan site lived on by contractors and people away from home. The guy wasn’t keen on campers, but took pity on me as I was on a bike and it was late, he let me stay for £5 which was reasonable for a pitch between two stored caravans. I an now ahead of schedule for the first time, by about 20 miles!