I have just received the all clear from the specialist and we are good to go!!! I am so relieved and grateful and can finally get excited about our trip. We leave tomorrow, 26th June, at 7am!!!

We have a busy afternoon ahead of us now with a number of final things to do, including and without forgetting to return the hire car. Anything we don’t get to do before tonight will simply have to be dealt with on the road now. At least there are no more show stoppers.

Thank you to all our blog followers, family and friends for your support, especially this past month.

Our next post will be sent on the road somewhere 😊

– Anne

I was not looking forward to these last few days, knowing that I was about to say goodbye to my immediate family, until our return next year. I can’t even watch total strangers saying goodbye to each other without being emotional, so how were these last couple of days going to be?!

I was very grateful to everyone for being very brave and positive and helping me through this. Luckily we’d beeing saying many goodbyes over the last few months that we made this one just like any other. Next will be Anthony’s family goodbyes.

Right now we’re keeping fingers crossed that I will be given the all clear on Wednesday and we should be off Thursday morning at the crack of dawn… Stay tuned for an update then!!

– Anne

We have been making the most of the forced rest and relaxation period prior to our delayed departure. By the time we leave later this month hopefully, we will be fit and refreshed – tooth and abscess fixed, colds come and gone, the final show stoppers like the additional electrics on the bikes sorted with the added bonus of additional family visits. Keeping fingers crossed that Anne gets a clean bill of health from the specialist on the 25th – and we should be off on the 26th!!

We headed west, with no idea where we were going to go or stop for the night and discovered the gorgeous Cornish fishing village of Polperro. We found accommodation at the spotlessly clean Claremont Hotel. The weather has smiled on us too. We have loved the various cliff walks we have made from Polperro, and enjoyed the deliciously fresh seafood dinners. Walking along deserted country paths and discovering new tracks along the fabulously wild Conwall coast reminded us how much we love nature, and being alone in the elements. It was wonderful. And then after our walks, in the evenings, meeting some colourful locals in various pubs, chatting with them like long lost friends was the other side of travel which we love. In a way, it feels like we’ve started our trip – just not on the bikes yet…

– Anne

Polperro harbour

Cornwall coast walk

While Anne was getting root canal treatment yesterday, because of an absces, under a crown, Anthony spotted one tool we’d been looking for which the endodontist was using: a short metal ruler to measure our chain slack, one of the crucial things to check to ensure chain longevity. Luck would have it that the endodontist had just received new rulers and the old ones were waiting to be thrown out. So now, we have the perfect ruler! Once again, life is working out just perfectly for the 2 Slow Speeds.

We will be making the most of our forced delayed departure to take some rest now – more news on the 25th June.

– Anne

One of our show stoppers being dealt with – Anne getting root canal and absces treated

Dental ruler, perfect to measure the chain slack.

Today is the day we were going to head off, leaving the UK for France and making our slow way back to Australia. But…

We still have a number of items on our list which we have not managed to tick off. The last few months seem to haven taken their toll and now we need to make sure that not only are the bikes ready and administrative issues taken care of, we need to take care of our bodies. Anne’s tooth abscess has not been resolved yet – in fact she did not make it to the dentist last week. Suddenly feeling very faint, an ambulance was called to take her to hospital. Poor Anthony was confused when he got a call (while collecting the Russian visa) from a petrol station and then the dentist calling him to ask where I was. We won’t get the results of all the tests until late in the month.

Of course, we are very disappointed about this delay (and the time constraints this now puts on us to get through Russia as the visas have been issued for specific dates) but the good news is that we will now leave for our trip rested!!! We will take some time out for rest and relaxation, not sure where, but we will find somewhere to pitch the tent, take long walks and recharge our batteries.

– Anne