Time to realize we are getting very close to the ride 2013! I had a lovely ride last night out to the Flamborough light house with my friend Karen. It’s such an unexpected pleasure to have Karen joining us on Nightrider. We have known each other from being about 3 years old… But went to different secondary schools,both moved away from Bridlington and lost touch. She came back to bring her boys up here and when I bought my flat here, we reconnected and we got to know her husband Phil too, which has been such a lovely part of my times now in Bridlington. So we are cycling together and determined to cross the 25 mile casual rides we have been doing, so Sunday we’ ll go for a longer ride! Reka will be back soon and somehow we’ll connect before we leave! We have to get funding applications in to the World Cancer Fund and Healthy Hull soon now, for post production of our film, so lots to do……I still haven’t got myself together for hotels between Dieppe and Paris…..where do the hours go??!! But we’ll get there…. We will….x x x x

I’ve just realised that we haven’t really told you what ‘theride2013’ involves! No, not around UK cities this time and the bits inbetween but this year we will cycle from Hull down to cross the channel at Newhaven, then from Dieppe to Paris, where we will join ‘Nightriders’ around Paris by night…. so  the last 100 k of this year’s ride will be with hundreds of other people around Paris ! We’re not sure just yet how many of us there will be,  or for how long some people can join the 2013 ride… but all will be worked out within the next few weeks…

Again, we want to make sure that any of our friends who want to join us to raise money aren’t prevented from doing so by lack of funds, which is why we’re shamelessly asking for accomodation and even the odd dinner! Funding, is for editing and post production of the film of last year’s epic ride, so that we can have it as broadcast quality, so that people will take it seriously and even distribute it.

Our aim as lasat year is to say to people that we are in no way elite athletes or even very serious amateur cyclists… we do these rides and all the little ones in between, because Reka and I both passionately believe that sustained exercise, like cycling, is helping us to keep well.

It’s keeping our immune system strong and our mental state (to be argued by some close to us!) balanced, strong and positive… through the film and the exhibition and the rides, we just want to say to other people having cancer treatment ‘give it a go, it just might help!’ Reka and I have been dealing with cancer in our lives for years rather than months and this is one of the ways we not just cope but have brilliant and amazing quality of lives!

So hope that explains a bit… we’ll start on Friday 13th September (but of course friday 13th!!) and the Paris night bit will be on 21st September..

Reka and I want to do a ride next Spring for young people in the middle of cancer treatments, so we’ll keep you informed but for now… any help lovely friends and sponsors….will get us to Paris!!

Penny xxxxx

hello everyone
Penny here in Bridlington starting to prepare for ‘the ride’ …. 24 miles there and back to Filey through Flamborough has been my best for the last few weeks, which is a bit pathetic, so from friday, it’s serious training!!! I have very sweet grandsons staying this week, but that means no cycling… so stretching and digging sand castles on the beach, sand caves and running up and down, well… walking really, to the sea to get water to put in the sand cave! I keep kidding myself that bending up and down to pick up adornements, like feathers, pebbles and shells is good for the stomach muscles and waistline (who am I kidding?) and I know its not serious enough to get me through a couple of hundred kilometres again!
As last year, we have been immediately overwhelmed with peoples’ kindness. UK clothes companies, gorgeous hotels…. people are starting to respond to help us get to Paris and around it! Without this help, I don’t think we could do these rides…. so it’s amazing that people want to help. There are so many cancer stories out there, all of them inspiring, so ours is one of many.. but it is our story and the way we deal with cancer and the treatments around it.
So September 21st isn’t so far away and with Reka in Hungary and me in Yorkshire, it will probably be early September before we really start to co-ordinate…
Any tiny bit of help is so appreciated….. Thank you at this stage and specially to ‘Whistles,’ the gorgeous clothing company, that Reka and I dreamt of wearing before chemo and will dream of wearing when we have finished our ‘nothing but loads of green juice for 10 days’… to have a personal reply and offer of support from their lovely CEO makes you do a big ‘hooray for great people!’ Thank you to the fantastic ‘Malmaison’ chain of hotels, who are even prepared to have our sweaty selves and our dirty bikes to stay! and to Goretex, to Kraft…. and the next mail will thank more of you!
So…. sun is calling… yoga and stretching on the beach, to the amusement of little grandsons… and plans for a long weekend ride!
We are hoping to put in applications to get the film finished to Healthy Hull and to the World Cancer Research fund… we just know and believe so passionately in the power of exercise!
Speak soon
Penny xxxxxxxxx

We are in Hungary at my parents and all’s well, getting over the long drive by lounging around in the garden and going to the local lido. Yesterday I went to the last day of the Sziget Fest, the biggest music / art festival in Budapest, with my cousin. It is such a great venue –  an island on the Danube . It was great, we saw loads of great music from contemporary French sanzon (chanson?)to Franz Ferdinanad through Balkan Folk music, but the best for me was undoubtedly a young modern Hungarian circus company’s performance which I absolutely loved … I still have a bit of a regret not having run away with a circus!

I went with my bike, but it was a bit of a curse in the end as I had to conquer the steepest hill you have ever seen … And the bottom of it at two am in the morning  didn’t look really funny, not even the hedge of hilariousness… i kind of new what was ahead of me. I pushed and panted a lot. I  had also forgotten to take proper lights and the public lighting was a bit “gappy” there soooo… after a good 20 minutes hard pushing and sweating and getting scared of my own shadow at the top of the steepest hill in history I got back on the bike on the dark road with a small torch in my hand, still feeling the bubbly (I hardly ever drink so my head was hurting) and muttering to all divinity who can hear me to not to fly off my bike because of the potholes or simply missing the road … Luckily for me I did it with such a grace (yehh right)

I still feel the bubbly … Such a lightweight! 

I am conquering the hills again tomorrow  to see if my rusty steed and I will manage a corner or even a lamp post more on the steepest hill in history.I will let you know … I am so glad The Ride starts in East Anglia …

many of you asked us to put some pictures of the exhibition so here are some …