This is All Getting a Bit Tough.

This is all getting a bit tough this getting out of bed and cycling business.  The knees are aching and my legs don't seem to recover from each day to the next.  My good old bike is starting to have quite a few problems also.  The gears are getting very limited in number and don't always run smoothly, my bike rack keeps coming off and the back wheel has a wobble.  The tyre I bought here has already lost most if it's tread so we will see how long that lasts.  Today was a 90km run along the Nation Highway 5 from SRIKAKULUM to KASIBUGGA.  More than a little wet but no wind.  Punctuated by a Dhosa breakfast, rain stop in a bus shelter with a crooner and 2 near misses for the Hero Honda drivers.  The dhosa was really great and set me up for the morning.  I have a theory about fat cooks - their food must be good, so eat where they eat.  Or it could just be that they are rotten cooks but eat all the un-solds.  Well my dhosa chef was well on the large side, his misses was even bigger and the food was great.  Later it started to rain very hard and for a very long time.  I hid in a bus stop with a bloke who crooned along to the doubtful musical contents of his phone.  We were also visited by goats at one time who wanted to join us but the crooner shooed them away.  The first near miss was between me and 2 idiots on a Hero Honda.  They tried to ride along side me, on my inside thus I was in the traffic.  I accelerated to get past them but the just kept pace with me, so I braked and tucked in behind them.  They now also braked which resulted in the near miss.  At this point I threw my teddies out the pram.  Next time it was 2 men with a child between them.  We exchanged some words along the lines of the 5 standard questions and I had my picture taken with the child.  They then continued to dog me for the next ten minutes until they had a close one with another HH trying to join in.  Sometimes competition for position is fierce.
Tomorrow should see me in Gopalpur with its seaside delights.  I'll keep you posted....

Early morning.