The Juicy Ending

Welcome to Turkey!

Live on Radio in Greece! (i've had a lovely cheese pie)

Our very cheeky Greek skim

What happened next (slightly delayed)

Continued...

What I thought had all happened the prevıous day was nothing compared to the next. So I fıxed the flat tyre whıch stıll had the badly damaged spoke. We continued on throught the epıc hılls of Serbia and BANG ! the ınner tube explodes. I really could not get any more bad luck. So pıcture the scene Tom and I are stuck at the top of a hill ın Serbıa wıth no way of fixing the spoke and I now have a ruined innertube. Its safe to say moral was low. Luckily a chap cycles past us and after what felt lıke a mamouth game of charades and phoning everyone we knew that could speak Englısh and Serbian we manage to get hım to phone us a lıft to Nıs 20km away so I can get a mechanıc to fix the bıke. Eventually after some tıme two what I can only descrıbe as Serbıan rogues rock up to us on a motorbıke askıng for money whıch we dıdnt have on us. Eventually after more charades they come back wıth two of the worst cars I have ever seen and drıve us at break neck speeds to Nıs and drop us off at Planet bıke ıts now that our fortune changes.

Here we meet Bane and Boben. Bane was the mechanıc that fıxed my bıke free of charge I mıght add and Boben was hıs frıend that took us for drınks and pızza and even put us up for the nıght ın hıs house not before takıng Tom and I for a tour of Nıs. These guys really were heros and made our tıme ın Serbıa even more specıal. Boben even offered to cycle wıth us to Bela palanka as a sort of tour guıde and ın the process took us on the most epıc road we have ever had the pleasure of rıdıng on ıt was just a great endıng to what had been a great tıme ın Serbıa (other than the bıke troubles).

We say our heart felt goodbyes to Boben and cycle on across the boarder ınto Bulgarıa !

Carry on campıng

Bulgarian Burn!

Serbias Cycling Secrets

Serbia !

You will not believe this !

Ok I have a lot to update you all with. Firstly I would like to give huge thanks to all of the amazing hotel staff at the Agape Apartments in Serbia who treated us so well, Tom and I have never experienced such generous service in any hotel on this trip and we can wholeheartedly recommend the Agape Apartments to other people who wish to travel to Belgrade it was amazing, as were the German guests who were staying there that treated us like their own family.
After leaving Belgrade and conquering some epic hills we made good progress and covered our 60 miles in a good time setting up camp just off the road north of lapovo.
Now it all happens, we covered around 40 miles and then Bang..bad news broken spoke and it is not fixable as I do not have the parts we phone the bike doctor (John from chelmer cycles) and we are given the best advice for the situation, cycle slowly tie the broken spoke to the adjacent spoke and give some of my weight to Tom :). Luckily I manage to cycle another 20 miles on the injured wheel and we camp again, sadly my poor fortune continues and I wake up in the morning to a flat tyre....to be continued

The Revised Route

Sensational Serbia

Croatia !!

The beauty of Budapest by night

Toms fountain antics!

Bratislava - Europe's number 1 city for scaffolding

Shaking down the ballers bikes

Chris & Tom take you on the cyclists tour of Vienna

Vienna on Foot

Chris & Tom take a romantic boatride

London 2 Istanbul - Prague by day

Bratislavas bloggy eggs!!

We have made it to Slovakia in a day! (from Vienna) due to there being absolutely no hills in this entire region. We are staying in a small apartment in the centre of the city. Chris and I decided to do our own cooking in our lovely kitchen consisting of 2 hobs. This was rather experimental as we ended up frying oven chips in butter as at the time we thought we had an oven when doing are shop in Tescos. We also fried up eggs and sausages and it ended up being a complete buttery mess. We spent the next day walking around Bratislava, which is a lovely small city with interesting statues, history and a fountain round every corner. Went to a rather large Castle, was under restoration, couldn't go in but we loved the views although it was mainly of a gothic cathedral which was also under restoration. So maybe if your up for visiting Bratislava, just leave it a bit until it's all finished. They've got lovely street performers and wonderful musicians, showing off the skills of the slovakian people. Just listened to a jazz trio which created a wonderful atmosphere. (even if it was outside mc donalds and they only played 3 songs). Excited to cycle on to Budapest. The Istanballers!


- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Location:Hviezdoslavovo námestie,Bratislava I,Slovakia

Germany Part 2

Rapid Vienna

Hello everyone and as you may have gathered from the title of this blog we have made it to Vienna in one piece, Tom and I got over the Austrian boarder this morning after our stay in Znojmo last night. We were immediately greeted by the most breathtaking scenery of the trip so far you could see for miles in all directions it was even possible to catch a glimpse of a few sprouting Austrian mountains to the west it was truely epic!
We have just popped up the tents as we decided to camp on the city outskirts, and we are about to grab a bite to eat somewhere in the city, ready to do a proper explore tomorrow.
The videos from Germany and the Czech Republic are coming so keep your eyes peeled.
Thankyou for all the support we have been receiving we really appreciate all of it and we hope you are enjoying living the trip with us.

Many thanks

Chris & Tom

The big update!

Hello to everyone me and Tom would like to give you all an update of how everything is going. Ok so currently as I'm writing this I'm sitting in a beautiful campsite in cervena recice south east of Prague, today has been intense the heat at times was unbearable and even with a 4 day break we were feeling fatigued I can honestly say this is the most knackered I have felt so far, the hills seem to endlessly roll on unforgivingly luckily we use the idea of getting to a new country as motivation and it helps to push us on.
Ash has left us now and is heading home it was great to have him with us and we have learnt a lot from him that we will take with us for the rest of the trip we just wished he could have stayed with us till the end. Tom and I have more videos to upload to the blog including part 2 of Germany and of course all our films from the Czech republic so far and especially Prague. So please keep following and supporting us and we will try our best to upload the videos as soon as possible.
Chris & Tom. Posted using BlogPress from be my iPhone

Location:Cervena recice

Germany part 1

Glorious Germany

We are sorry that the Luxembourg post has come after the Germany blog entry, however we have only just had the opportunity to get ourselves to an internet cafe and upload. Currently we are in Bayreuth a city in the south east of Germany and with luck and decent weather we should be at the Czech boarder by the end of play tomorrow. Germany has been epic and the cycling through this glorious country has been the best yet from our experience through europe so far. We are just keeping our fingers crossed that the Czech Republic and all the other countries can live up to the standards of Germany. The scenery the hills the beautiful quaint villages and the desire of the German people to help us at every turn has made this country truely memerable.

Auf Wiedersehn

Chris, Tom & Ash

A taste of Luxembourg

Guten tag

Hello to all, we would like to just keep everyone updated. We are all fine and loving the cycling we are currently in Germany in the town of Mainz we have another 5 days of constant cycling and camping before we reach our next country which will be the Czech Republic. We would like to apologise for this late post we have had no chance to upload any videos because of the lack of a computer so any updates will be coming straight from Toms I pod. We will be putting up new videos of the trip as soon as possible so that all you guys can follow us on our journey, keep your eyes peeled for the video updates.

Chris, Tom and Ash
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Location:Mainz

A day in Brussels, What A strange Place :)

Paris 2 Brussels, What a Ride!

The Mayor of Montay !

Right so here is our first official blog of the trip and if you have been following us so far you will know we made it to Paris in one piece (just) and we are now heading to Brussels we were suprised to be graced with Ashleys precence as early as Paris which was awesome. The cycling so far through France has been exemplory and we could not have wished for better, however on day 5 we had to overcome our first major issue. Our ever so reliable Garmin GPS device decided to give up the ghost and melted in the seering french heat. However we are all big believers in karma and every cloud has its silver lining and we have been extremely lucky to bump into the mayor of Montay, and his wonderful family who were not only generous enough to give each of us a bed for the night but they also let us join them for a fantastic barbeque and Ash managed to consume his 4th ice cream of the day, and we have all been introduced to Armagnac which I think we are still getting over now. A great family and a great evening, and we have experience the varying customs of a traditional french breakfast which I think we will all be taking back to England with us. We were overwhelmed by the levels of generosity and the hospitality shown to complete strangers, a stellar example to us all.

Merci beaucoup, au revoir

The istanballers !

A Day in Paris!

London 2 Paris - The video blogs have began!

The Time Has Come !

Right this is it, the time has come and we are about to embark on our European adventure of a lifetime, I would just like to take this moment to say a big thank you to everyone who has supported us throughout the build up to the trip and especially to those who have donated to the charity it really does mean a lot to both of us and the Children out in Ghana. All of the apprehensions and worries are starting to subside, and now excitement and a lust to get going are starting to take over, so please wish us luck and keep your fingers crossed we get there in one piece. We will continue to update the blog as we travel through Europe and Tom has promised to post pictures and videos of everything he deems to be juicy, thanks again and keep supporting us Chris & Tom

In the Paper!

Our first 1000 !

Thank you so much to everyone who has donated so far, we have hit our target which is fantastic but if we can surpass it that would mean great things for the children out in Ghana. Please keep donating, your support means a lot to both of us.

Many many thanks

Chris & Tom

The route (2400 miles!!)

Its almost time !!!!

I just thought id make the first of many posts, from me and Tom, so far training is going according to plan, we are cycling every other day covering between 50 and 70 miles, and touch wood the thighs are holding up. Excitement levels are through the roof at the moment and we cant wait to begin this epic voyage, ONLY 2 WEEKS TO GO!!  

Thank you to everyone who has donated to this wonderful cause so far, and any further sponsorship will be immensely appreciated.

Thanks for reading and keep your eyes peeled for further updates

Chris & Tom