Day 4: Compeigne to Paris

The weather is foul, my right knee is in agony and Compiegne’s suburbs are distinctly ugly, but none of this matters: there’s only 60 miles to go and I know I’m going to make it, unless I get struck by lightning (and those clouds do look a bit suspicious). The first 40 miles are a snail-paced trudge, but when I realise the fields and villages are giving way to the vast suburban sprawl of Paris, adrenaline hits me, and I begin to pelt it through the traffic, despite the pounding rain.

The finishing line is a park just one mile from the Arc De Triomphe, where we gather and cheer old and new friends as they make it to end. The atmosphere is rowdy, congratulatory and very, very noisy. And then it’s time for our victory lap: 120 cyclists in matching “London to Paris Bike Ride 2009″ t shirts, circling the Arc De Triomphe and racing down to the Eiffel Tower, with Parisians cheering us from sidewalk cafes and tourists snapping photos of our bicycle convoy. There’s not many people who can say they were once, very briefly, a Parisian tourist attraction, and it’s an utterly exhilarating end to a tough but unforgettable trip.

At the celebration meal later that night, my room-mate for the trip leans over and says, “so, what about doing London to Geneva next year”. And I must have drunk more champagne than I thought, because the next morning I seem to remember that I said yes.

A huge thank you to Mute Records and Polydor Records, for their extremely generous donation of prizes to my fundraising efforts. I’d never have hit my target without them.

Thanks to everyone who sponsored and supported me, particularly United Response, to my new cycling buddies, and to the one stone of extra body fat that I left behind…