Day 41 - Eastbourne to Elmer - ride total 3,172 k, 19,747 m

We had a small climb on our way out of Eastbourne up through the suburbs and I began to wonder if we were going to come across somewhere for breakfast - We past a "Subway" however our coffee drinker deemed that unsatisfactory and rode further out in to the outer residential suburbs where we saw a dairy that was open and right next door the dairy was a closed Cafe - the nice young fellow froom the dairy told us the Cafe opens at 8:00 which was only ten minutes away so we decided to wait. It turned out that both the dairy and Cafe were owned by the same people.

They opened before 8:00 and took our order for their "Small English Breakfast" (only one sausage and egg with baked beans, bacon and mushrooms). They were delightful people along with their local regulars who all chatted away to us. I had no problem telling them when I left that, that was the best breakfast I've had in England on this holiday!

The wind from yesterday and the day before was back with us right from the beginning today - only much stronger! and once again a fair chunk of the route had us out on the trail alongside the beach heading South to West. The exact, almost, direction that the wind was coming from - head on. We managed to get along at somwhere between 11 - 13 kph,

Talking of the speed we get along at brings me to a little story I omitted to mention from yeterday. As we were cycling along the promenade a young fellow - probably 18-19 or thereabouts rode past me and shortly after looked back over his shoulder to check where I was. Now, those who know me know I'm not a competitive person (probably coz there was no way I was ever going to win any races or things sporting at school). However, yesterday with this look I got and his youthfull burst of speed made me think - Okay, buddy, I'm up for it. So I changed gear and upped the speed to now begin to close in on him. A wee while later he looks back and saw that I was gaining on him. With this he upped the speed once again and I could tell he was pushing himself. So, what did I do, I upped my speed to match his plus a little just to let him know he's going to have to try harder. Again he looks back and once again upped his speed to really pull away from me - so I matched him once again and let him carry on. The next time when he looked around I sensed he wasn't going to be able to repeat his earlier attempts and that's when I made my move to pull up alongside him and begin a conversation, at which time he realised that he wasn't going to win this race (not that it was a race mind you). He was only out for a 15 km ride and somehow I just managed to drop in the the conversation (I think it might have been after I said "is this the usual afternoon breeze") that we're on our last leg of a ride from Rome! After having kept the pace up a few notches while we chatted - I then wished him well for the rest of his ride and said "I'll pull up here and wait for my mates who must have stopped to take some pictures"...

I love fishing boats, proper fishing boats that is (not the big aluminum, multi crewed things) -Over here there is still an inshore local coastal fishing industry and these small (sometimes wooden) traditional fishing boats are amazing little vessels - okay today they all have motors otherwise I'm picking they are the same design as the current Fisher's Grandfather used and his grandfather before him. Some are well apinted and immaculate and a lot are true workhorses that have had a life of being well used while others have weathered many storms and are lying on the shingle beach where they have lain for quite sometime. All of them make great photographic subjects and I could spend a lot more time trying to get that perfect shot - but that sort of time is something I don't have on a biking trip - maybe I need to make the time to come back with my proper camera and make that another holiday.

Then of course there are the Seaside Carnival and Amusement attractions that are equally as photogenic - there is so much over here that is so different and that's even before you consider going back a few hundred years and start considering castles and the like

Earlier on I mentioned in one of my blogs how we will book tomorrow night's accommodation tonight and never had a problem doing so. Well we haven't had a problem but we have found it a lot more difficult using that approach here in England. Many of the places are not avaiable and my go to first port of call the Youth Hostels we haven't yet scored a night in here in the UK. This caused us to adopt the sit and pre-book as much of the accommodation as we can ahead of time - it does however remove the element of spontenaity from the mix. On our short day out of Dover we put the effort in and have managed to get all but two nights now booked and those two nights are not a major as we have options as to where we go however we will probably lock them down in the next couple of days.

Wayne is the publican here and a man who is cut out to be so - very welcoming and hospitable. He warned us that the pub would be busy tonight as it was Bingo night so we made sure we were down before 6:00 for dinner and then Peter and me decided to stay on and play some Bingo with the locals. It was ten pound a line and sixty pound a house - well would you believe that I called out line on that very first game - How good was that?

Not very really, coz when the numbers were checked off (publicly) it appears I was very good at foretelling the future as one of the numbers I had crossed off hadn't yet been called out yet but it was called out a bit later! So my enthusiasm meant I didn't get the tener and everyone had another chance.

In the last game of the series I did manage to get it correct and collected the ten pound!

 They were about to sell cards for the second half of the evening and as I had won the ten pound cost of the card and still had my blog to finish I called it quits at that point.

And that was my night's entertainment with the locals.