Day 6

The omens weren't good this morning. We awoke to the sight of wall to wall black clouds and driving rain. By our slightly later than normal departure time of 9.30 the rain had eased off to a downpour and we tentatively made our way towards the Severn Bridge. We got away slightly later than usual because it took us quite a while to compose ourselves after seeing how we looked with our elf-like overshoes. Dad in particular was reduced to fits of laughter as the normally sartorially elegant road racers were reduced to Smurf lookalikes.

But we were lucky. Within an hour or so the rain had disappeared and was replaced by showers, heavy at times, south south west backing south, 3 to 4, good, occasionally poor. After 20 miles we reached the Severn Bridge and turned northwards and into Wales. We were hoping to get some cheese on toast in Chepstow to continue the local food theme, but had to settle for banana cake.

The ride up the Wye Valley through Coleford, Symond's Yat and Ross-on-Wye was beautiful at times with wide sweeping bends in the river and dramatic cliffs. We stopped at Symond's Yat for a while to admire the view and were rewarded with a sighting of a peregrine falcon - did you know its the fastest animal on earth?

Arriving at our campsite just south of Hereford we had completed 57 miles in the day, and counted ourselves lucky to have somehow dodged most of the showers during the day (especially lucky because we could keep the elf boots out of sight in the pannier).