Just a few pics from a couple of days out on my bike with John.

Over in a field near Burnhope

 This will be a really short blog...I promise. Why well my heads a bit done in what with all this NVQ Malarky. Everyone keeps saying "Oh you have a year to do it, you will get it done no probs" however I'm not as confident as everyone so in order to just get it done I've been spending every moment I'm either not working,cycling or swimming doing my course work. Just put in another 7 1/2 hour stint today...well I did have one break to polish off some chicken steaks and chips, then it was back to reading,trawling the internet and typing. I think I'll feel a lot better when I get my first few assignments marked off. 

Mid Week Ride, with Pals

Geocaching,,, Thompa doesn't like his photo taken lol

  A quick txt around when I got in from work on Wednesday and John, Lee and David (Thompa) where all up for a ride out. A day or so earlier I had been chatting to Lee about Geocaching, something I had never heard of until a few weeks ago when I had called up to see my friend (and cameraman) Ade. When I had arrived at Ade's house as per the norm on a Friday evening around 7:30pm, his wife Amanda made me a lovely cuppa (bit disappointed no KitKat this week,come on Amanda get your act together, didn't even get a Nutella and Jam sandwich) anyhoo Ade was on messing around with his iPad trying to remember this app he had come across and was interested in getting, but had forgotten what it was. So the whole evening was spent chatting whilst Ade kept saying "bloody hell I've been through every category of the apps and can't remember where,what or which one it was". then all of a sudden as we were talking "Ahh Haa I know what it was" and he proceeded to purchase the app, install it and go on to tell me all about what it was about.
I found the geocaching very interesting, thinking "mmmm could incorporate that in a bike riding adventure".

So after mentioning this to Lee he proceed to find a geocaching website, download some map co-ordinates to his Garmin and get us some clues, so that when we went out we could go on a kind of treasure seeking outing.

Party of Five

My cycling adventures started sometime ago now. Around oh about January 2008 or there about's. I had the aboveknee amputation of my right leg on September 11th 2007 and then had to undergo a good few weeks of rehabilitation, which took place at Shotley Bridge Hospital. I waited for my wound site to heal and after around 6 to 8 weeks I was fitted and received my first prosthesis which I hated with a passion. It felt heavy,looked naff and I had to hold the dam thing on with a Tes belt. This was a neoprene, belt which was elasticated and went around my waist and secured tightly. This was the worst part initially, as I was constantly uncomfortable and I couldn't enjoy a meal whilst wearing it as it was like wearing some medieval corset. Those days seem so far away, yet are still fresh in my memory it's good to look back on them, not because they were pleasant,but because they act as a reminder just how far I have come. 

What a Motley Crew

In the early days I would head off out on my bike all alone. I had no one to ride with. I would fall off lots and I mean LOTS! This was because I was so used to having my own 2 legs,even if one of them was pretty knackered,after having surgery known as limb salvage. A huge internal prosthesis,called a Kotz prosthesis was placed inside my leg to replace my diseased bone. This procedure never really worked and I would just hobble around on it as best as I could, suffering lots of infections and really bad pain. So when I went back to riding it was after something like 11 or 12 years. It's amazing how your brain is programmed and mapped from an early age to remember how to do things and then again it's also how amazing hard it is to convince your brain "I'm Missing a Leg" When you lose a limb,it takes your brain a while to adapt and when you go to put that foot down that no longer exists, well it's not there. As my right leg was my strongest, (if you imagine it's like which hand you write with, or which leg you would kick a ball with) well I used to go to put this one down and time and again it was "oh crap" as I fell in what felt like slow motion to me.