Portsmouth, United Kingdom

Hostel breakfasts - if included at all - are usually meagre, often manky affairs, but the YHA at Salisbury excelled itself with a selection of English cooked stuff and continental choices. I was thoroughly satisfied as I waddled in the direction of the train station. As I entered, I heard the Worst Late Western female robot voice announcing the very same train I once used to take to work. I could be back home in Keynsham by lunchtime if I wanted.

I grinned, and headed for the train to Portsmouth.

Just as we were pulling out of Salisbury I received a call that kickstarted the second phase of my Lack of Plan. It was Halfrauds in Portsmouth ringing to tell me the bicycle I had ordered was ready to pick up. What perfect timing!

The idea I had been mulling over for several months now was to tackle the continent on two wheels, sweeping an anti-clockwise arc through France, Switzerland and Germany. Having run the concept past a number of friends, the responses had ranged from polite humouring to downright dismissal as a ludicrous thing to do in winter. This, of course, made me want to do it even more. I am nothing if not stubborn.

However, even I realised the scale of the task. In the last eighteen years of my life I had spent no more than half a dozen hours on a bicycle, and all of that in Thailand on my last Round the World trip. I had done no training apart from my seven days of walking. I had never fixed a puncture, and didn’t even know how to.

It was going to be somewhat of a challenge.

Chugging into Portsmouth & Southsea, I suddenly had a ton of things to do. I set out on foot to the ferry terminal and picked up a ticket to my next destination of Saint Malo, France. It was a bargaineous £45 for me and my bike-to-be - not bad at all for a ten-hour overnight crossing.

I then picked up a whole load of bike stuff I needed: pump, spare inner tubes, puncture repair kit, allen keys, helmet. Tesco came up trumps with everything, and so I turned and headed for Halfrauds to pick up The Steed.

A Carrera Vulcan Mountain Bike. 22″ Frame. Front Suspension. Disc Brakes. And A Bell.

As far back as I can remember I have been giving names to inanimate objects. The Steed needed a name. And being my trusty travelling companion for the next couple of months, there was only one I could think to give it. Meet  Ron (Jnr).

Little Ron Jnr seemed a worthy successor indeed to Big Ron, the  (T)rusty 1986 Nissan Bluebird that had taken me the length and breadth of New Zealand on my last trip. My first ride was the exhilarating side of terrifying, wobbling into the rush hour traffic of Portsmouth at dusk and out to the ferry terminal.

Being a cyclist on a ferry gives you a VIP pass in some respects. You can go to straight of the front of the queue of cars, and as a result I was one of the first to board and check out what was on offer. The boat was immense, packed with restaurants, shops and bars. I clocked the important things - the main bar, the cinema, and where I would be crashing - and retired to the former for some “entertainment” offered up by a dodgy Aussie Celine Dion crooner. Luckily, the excellent Bourne Ultimatum was soon to start in the cinema, so I headed along there to kill a few hours during which I pretty much forgot I was on a boat.

A quick look back at the bar saw it was heavily depleted in numbers, possibly due to the X-Factor rejects now occupying the stage, so I decided to call it a night and sought out the seat I had booked to crash in as we chugged ever nearer to France.

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