The Hardest Two Miles Of The Entire Trip

On this day, about a week ago, we’d booked accommodation 58 miles away.

We knew there was a steep, steep climb, but it was within the first four miles, and over in two, so how hard could it be.

Well, it turns out, very bloody hard.

For the first time of the entire trip Stew pushed his bike. I started pushing long before him.

The climb was ~330m in two miles. We’d done this before, up and over Bulli pass. I walked but Stew cycled that.

In Brazil, though, we had the climb and the heat, and it was a struggle.

Pushing our bikes alone was too much. With the grade of the hill and the weight of the bikes it felt like an injury waiting to happen.

Calves were burning and shoulders were struggling pushing 30-45kg.

I suggested we push together, leapfrogging the bikes.

The sweat absolutely poured from us. I lent my bike against the barrier and got behind Stew, he pushed from the front and I pushed from the back.

We took his bike 100 to 400 metres, then went back for mine, pushed it for 100 to 400 metres, passing Stew’s bike.

We did this several times.

We felt fully exerted, shaky, and a little nauseated, to be honest

Every hill after that was nowhere near as long but some were not far off as steep.

We travelled slowly, too slowly.

It took us two hours to do four miles. Our average, in two hours we’d do TWENTY.

At five hours, we’d done only nine miles.

Before we set off, I’d found us a perfect brunch place for a late breakfast, but we didn’t get there until gone 3pm.

We had to cancel our hotel and lost the money. We’d never get there.

If that wasn’t enough, thirty minutes before arriving at our second hotel we got caught in a storm and TORRENTIAL rain ⛈

To make the day even harder, we didn’t sleep until gone midnight the night before. We got to a hotel at 9.30pm, got into bed by 11pm.

It took us about 20 minutes to realise we were sharing a bed with…

BED BUGS!

As a result, it was gone midnight before we got to sleep after a room change etc. I might write about the bed bugs another day. It was a drama.

Brazil, you’ve been blimmin’ tough.