Desert camp at the Red Sea to Desert Camp at a Police Station

I have one word to describe today and that is AWESOME!
One hundred and thirty three kms of tail wind, blue sky, the Red Sea by our side and an average speed of 35km per hour – you can not get much better than that!

I headed out this morning with 3 Canadian guys (John, Frank and Sven) as well as a Swedish girl, Anna. Iit was a bit of a late start due to some mechanicals and we were the last to leave but once we got on the road the pace quickened and it was only seconds before we were sitting at 33km per hour with ease, chatting away and enjoying the morning.

We picked up a few riders on the way to join the bunch, one being Simon who came 3rd in yesterday’s stage, a few other came and went.

We arrived at lunch before 10am, a very quick 70km under the belt thanks to the cracking pace that Frank set all morning.  

Back on the road after lunch with much the same group plus Mark who had finished his morning sweep duties, we were back up to 40km per hour easily. At 97km we came across a little café and gas station in the middle of no where, we pulled off with the boys excited at the prospect of beer but were quickly disappointed. However we did fuel up on Pepsi and a few brave riders had an Egyptian coffee which was described as Spicy but to me looked more like lumpy syrup!

The rest of the riding day was spent cruising at a similar pace and arriving at camp at 1250! 133km before 1 pm, brilliant!

After another awesome swim in the Red Sea most riders were feeling pretty happy with themselves. There are a few sore buts and tired legs but so far not many reported problems (I wonder if it’s a bit early in the trip and they are to shy too show their butts to me yet!)

I do need to make a special mention to a particular girl on the tour who has developed the Tour D Afrique Detox program. For the past 5 days she has been taking supplements that are in the form of a syrup, one of which was Iron, however when she mixed them she thought they looked a little soapy. And then today while riding she was wondering where her degreaser was and it dawned on her that she has been drinking a teaspoon of degreaser every morning instead of her iron! (she is physically ok though, I wonder about the rest)