Changing Seasons

Yesterday om my long bike ride I could see and also feel that Winter is almost gone and one of these days Summer will be here. The August winds are always a sign that summer is coming and did I feel it on the bike. The usual easterly wind made way for a strong wind from the Northwest.

With all the veld fires going the land is one big black field but it is amazing how the new greens appears, without any rain. I also saw the first snake on the road since summer has gone. Don't know if his is just a bit pro-active or because of the veld fires which chased him out of the veld.

Getting back to the notorious August winds. I cycled for three and a half hours into the wind and had to work really hard before turning around and heading back home. Because of this I drank more fluids that usual and then the big OH NO, I ran out of fluids. I asked Kim to bring my replacement bottles after four hours but with me going further than last week she only arrived after four and a half hours. I should have taken into consideration that she will not meet me at the same spot that last week.

When I got my bottles I was without liquid for almost an hour. This is the first time in a very long time that I bonked, and boy did I forget how bad it can be. I drank more than usual to try and recover but it was to late. For the next hour I was down and out on the bicycle. My speed dropped from 30+ to 20km/h and that was with a tail wind. After struggling for a hour my energy eventually came back but I could not push as hard as usual during the last hour.


A picture above of the notorious red cool bag that arrived late.

On more than one occasion I wanted to phone Kim to turn around and come pick me up. Luckily I pushed through and survived the 7 hour bike ride. I was aiming for 220km but could only manage 197km.

On today's long run my energy was back but I was still dehydrated as I had to refill my fuel belt twice at the joggers tap, usually I only refill once on a two hour run and I kept being thirsty. Although very thirsty I could manage to keep my pace and did 27.5km in 2h10 with my average heart rate at 140bpm.

The picture right at the top is Dejone busy baking a chocolate cake. She is really becoming good at baking. There is so many different cakes and tarts that she can bake. My mother is her "baking" teacher and she even made DJ her own recipe book. She is even giving DJ awards for every milestone she achieve, apparently she is close to getting her own mixing spoon if she can make a peppermint tart all by herself this coming weekend.

Only bad thing is all the cakes and tarts are not good for my weight, but I try to control myself but it is not easy.

With my mother being a teacher before she retired and then had two home industries before she sold them and now baking from home, DJ has an excellent tutor.
It is such an advantage having my mother living in her flat on our premises and helping DJ with her school work and baking lessons.

I need to take Dejone back to the British embassy tomorrow as they could not verify her fingerprints for her UK visa. Don't know why a 10 year old's fingerprints are so important, as for the US visa they didn't even take her fingerprints. Applying for our UK visas are way more difficult than the US ones? We are only traveling via the UK because of the no bike charge on Virgin Atlantic, but taking into consideration the visa application fees, traveling to Pretoria twice and all the hassle with the visas, flying direct to the US and paying for my bike is now working out almost the same as flying via the UK????