After my accident last year in Portugal and my repatriation followed by surgery, I was keen to plan my next adventure. I wanted to travel back to Portugal to finish what I started but I knew that would potentially be difficult for a number of reasons.
So after a lot of soul searching, I have decided on a different trip this year.
Firstly, I will head to Corsica with a small group for a road cycling adventure. It's a tough trip with 900km over 8 days and more than 16000m of climbing. Not my jam but a real challenge that will stretch me in more ways than one. Firstly, the riding! I'm not a hill climber. Secondly, staying in hotels, again not my thing. Thirdly, travelling with a small group, again, not my thing. So a big challenge for me and completely out of my comfort zone. I've decided to hire an electric road bike to try to make this achievable. Interestingly, it's the descending that terrifies me.
With terrible Brisbane weather, I've been focussing on strength training to give myself the best possible opportunity to be successful. I've been doing more climbing that I normally would do. And I'm reducing my risk by not riding in big groups and avoiding rain when I can.
Following my cycling, I will travel back to Portugal to the town I was released from hospital and attempt to walk the final 250km to Santiago de Compostela. It's a two week walk. For those who know me, walking/hiking is not my thing. Dodgy feet make it very difficult. A dear friend will meet me in Spain to walk the last five days with me into Santiago and I will be forever grateful for that company. I'm anticipating that arriving in SDC will be very emotional for me given my journey to get there.
I'm intending to continue my blog for this journey, albeit different to my usual tours. At least I'm not packing a bike this trip!.....
