Competition time

We thought it might be fun to have a puncture sweepstake.  Let us know how many punctures you think we're likely to get over 6 months.  The winner gets a tacky South American souvenir of our choice, painting of Machu Picchu on a grain of rice, miniature panpipes, alpaca poncho and other 'things that money can't buy' surprises.

Post your bets on our comments page and we'll keep a running tally as we go along.

Sabotage. Already...

We've decided to store our bikes and other expedition essentials in a bunker at a secret location deep in the English countryside. 

Over the weekend there was a serious breach of security at the bunker.  Under cover of darkness a team of saboteur mice broke in and made an attempt to eat our bikes.  They started by nibbling at the tan leather saddles and then must have been scared off before they managed to get on to eating the handlebars, the wheels and all the rest. 

Mice - like the saddle eaters.

Apparently mice love the fat in leather.  It is the perfect appetiser before sitting down to eat an entire bicycle.  Or in this case two...

Bikes are here, so is the tent

Finally we've got our hands on the crucial bit of kit.  It's very exciting and we've both become massive bike geeks.  Lucky we're off to the other side of the world, I can see people are already beginning to tire of our bike chat.

We're stuck for names although Brenda and Leonard has quite a nice ring to it.

Leonard the bike ...  before the mice got the munchies