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Cycling round Europe on a tandem isn’t everybody’s idea of a relaxing break, but for Emily Woodhouse and her friend Joe it was the perfect two-month holiday. Emily has always been keen on outdoor activities and previous family cycling holidays had whetted her appetite to explore further, so the decision to make the trip was taken quite lightly. Apparently, there wasn’t even an extensive period of training in preparation for the tour – what it is to be young and fit enough to even contemplate 50 days of non-stop cycling! However, when you realise she is also the sort of person who completed Ten Tors four times, including doing the 45-mile route twice – ‘just for fun’ – then you start to get the measure of her determination and sheer enjoyment of the outdoors.
Emily actually started life in California while her father was working there for a few years; this was followed by a period in Berkshire, until the family moved to Devon when she was eight. The proximity to Dartmoor was obviously a major boon for someone with her active inclination and she spent a lot of time walking on the moors. She now helps to train ‘would-be’ Ten Tors teams with the Dartmoor Plodders, and also takes part in Dartmoor Rescue call-outs as a probationary hill party member, with a view to ‘getting badged’ as a full team member. Emily has recently finished a degree in Maths at Durham University, where she naturally got involved in outdoor activity and ended up becoming president of the walking society. However, this is also when the tandem first came on the scene in the form of a Dawes Galaxy.
Emily, being the shorter of the cycling duo, was allocated the back seat with the dubious honour of chief navigator, but without any control over the steering or the gears. Having mastered the art of cycling a tandem around Durham, there was a three-day trial run in Wales and then the couple set off on the tandem from Cambridge, heading for the ferry to Holland, with Switzerland as the ultimate goal. The level Dutch landscape with its well-organised cycle routes allowed a period of acclimatization before heading into Belgium, Luxembourg, Germany and France on the EuroVelo network. They then had to tackle the 4500m of ascent on the Jura route into Switzerland, reaching 1341m at the highest point of their tour and being fully rewarded for their efforts with the stunning panorama. Although, if the uphill was a struggle then the 17 miles of downhill was both exhilarating and terrifying as they negotiated the mountain pass hairpin bends, succeeding in heating their brakes to the point where they boiled water.
The return journey back through France to Roscoff should have been quite bland in comparison. However, the end of the summer season brought its own challenges in the form of torrential downpours and limited overnight stays with the majority of campsites closed up for the winter.
Emily and Joe made it back to Plymouth though, having covered a total of 2274 miles – their Google estimate had been 1200 miles. What is more they were not the only people riding a tandem round Europe – they counted another 30 tandems en route, although none of the others were attempting the Swiss mountain routes!
Emily loved everything about the whole experience from the complete freedom down to the small acts of random kindness they encountered, such as a gift of water bottles when they stopped at traffic lights. She can’t wait to do it again and is already planning the next cycling tour - maybe Scandinavia next time?
Rosemary Best