Today was to prove the most challenging yet satisfying day of our tour. After a slight delay to the start of our ride, due to our driver taking us to Prestwick airport (idiot!) rather than back to our original hotel to collect our bikes, it became rapidly apparent that Jon was in serious trouble with his knees. Later, Jon said that the pain was so bad that he was close to tears at one point. Anyway, we pressed on at a very steady pace with Corrine acting as Jon’s chief Lieutenant to try to keep him ticking along. Eventually we reached a small town which mercifully had a pharmacy (despite not much else) so Jon could get some pain killers. The uncertainty regarding Jon’s condition was difficult for all of us as the events of the previous days had helped to develop a real ‘team’ feel about our little group and the prospect of losing a member was difficult to comprehend. At the time, Jon said that he would continue as far as Ayr and then get the train home. However, as luck would have it (in hindsight) our route turned left 8 miles short of Ayr so Jon decided to press on for a while. At around midday, with the painkillers starting to have some effect, Jon discovered that cycling in his biggest gear eased the pain somewhat (and also increased our pace) and we picked up the pace towards our lunch stop in an old mining town called Dalmellington which, was as close to a ghost town as you could probably get. To illustrate, it was Easter Saturday and almost nothing was open (not even a cafe). Moreover, many of the shops had bars on the windows. Fortunately, a local pointed us towards the only pub in town that appeared to be open and we were greeted by a nice lady who appeared to be trying in vain (given the local clientele) to make a success of the business. In fact, she seemed so pleased to have customers that she moved (very politely) one of the locals from the table next to the window so that we could keep an eye on our bikes while we ate. After enjoying a tasty panini (once again, Cozza’s choice of Scotch Broth winning the tasty grub prize), we headed out of the very surreal town of Dalmellington to continue on or way. At this point it was 2:00 pm and we’d only covered 26 of the 110 miles we had to cover. Still, Jon’s knee pain had eased considerably, which cheered us all up, and we decided that the best plan of attack was to break the remainder of the day into four 20 mile chunks with a short snack and drink break at each stopping point. Buoyed by some lovely sunshine, scenery, and Jon’s much improved mood, we made the big climb of the day and sped to our first little break. After refuelling on nuts, flapjacks, and coke (the latter being for me), we sped off, pausing only momentarily to laugh at Jon’s abberation of leaving his rucksack behind. ‘I thought it felt too good to be true’ he said. We also paused briefly at the top of a particularly sharp climb to say hello to a couple out for a ride on a tandem (I was oblivious to the fact that it was a tandem until several days later), before pressing on with the slight change in direction giving us something of a tailwind for a change. Our third mini-stop (apart from the ones to pick up Tom’s sweets which kept bouncing out of his rucksack) was by a war memorial in Cargenbridge where my attempt to pat the little dog outside the local shop nearly cost me a finger (much to Tom’s amusement). Finally, with our renewed vigour, a good tailwind, and the lovely weather, we tapped along at a good pace with Jon in the lead for our final two 20 mile chunks to finally arrive in Carlisle (Travelodge) at around 7:45 pm. In the evening we dined at a lovely Italian restaurant where the owner provided ice for Jon’s knees and an extra chair so that he could keep his legs elevated. We weren’t sure how we’d managed it, but we had!