I’m in the process of moving everything to a new WordPress blog. ExpressionEngine is great and all that but it’s too slow and image handling is a bit rubbish. You can find the new site at http://www.buttonsofmymind.co.uk/.

I’ll probably leave this site alone for a bit but direct people to the new site.

Next week we’re off on a cycle tour of Wales exactly a year after our LEJOG. The plan is to cycle from Chepstow - Swansea - Fishguard - Aberystwyth - Shrewsbury using NCN routes. About 450 miles in seven days (60 miles/day). We’ll be camping and carrying all of our equipment.

Follow the journey on my twitter feed (http://twitter.com/jochta/) and I will post images along the way.

I’ve finally moved the astroimages to their own gallery (which is what I should have done ages ago). So no more broken category listings and the galleries should run a lot quicker. I’ve started a new category for images of the Lunar 100 which I will be filling up when I can. I’ve also tidied up a few broken links and edited the about page.

I’m going to try blogging a bit more often too.

My host has kindly updated the PHP version this evening which has caused some problems on the site. Most noticeably the photo galleries which are exceeding the memory allocation. I’m on the case and will fix them ASAP.

UPDATE: I isolated the problem to the category index. So at the moment it’s showing all the categories in both galleries. The thumbnail generator is also misbehaving at the moment and resizing images that don’t need resizing!

Well it’s a long time since I posted isn’t it? Just been busy on Twitter instead I suppose. It’s appropriate therefore that I post a new image of a partially eclipsed Blue Moon which happened on New Year’s Eve. It was a lovely sight and I was lucky with a break in the clouds which allowed the Moon to peek out right around mid-eclipse. Although only 8% eclipsed it’s always an unusual and beautiful sight. A Blue Moon is the second Full Moon in a calendar month BTW and happens about once every 2.5 years. Which is even rarer than me posting on my blog. Must do better!

Has he given up? No new trainings for a while? Fret not dear reader for I have created a whole new website dedicated to LEJOG 2009. Check up on all our latest exploits, training etc. at http://www.jochta.com/lejog/. And why not sponsor us while you’re there

I found this ride quite hard work for some reason. The weather was fine and I wasn’t going too far but I didn’t seem to get into it today. It was the first chance after the snow and ice to get on a ride for a couple of weeks. It was also surprisingly lonely going on my own, it’s much more enjoyable going out as a pair or small group.

The route I used was basically bolted together from several previous rides. I used the NCN 5 to get to Abingdon and then cycled through Shippon and Gozzards Ford. I think this was the first time I have reversed this section through Frilford Heath and Fyfield. I headed south west through Fyfiled Wick and Lyford on a small lane I’ve not used before. There was a small flood over the road here from recent rainfall and snow melt.

I turned north through Charney Bassett towards Southmoor. This was followed by the flat stretch through Appleton and down to Bessles Leigh and across the A420 (for the 4th time). After Wootton I decided to take in Boars Hill, a steep climb …

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After several flat rides recently it was time to take in some hills so we started from Andrew’s house in Middle Barton for this round trip to Buckingham and back.

There was a stiff easterly wind forecast so we planned to head east to start with. It was also cold with the odd snow flurry during the journey. We cycled through Duns Tew and North Aston to Somerton with the steep drop into and climb out of the Cherwell valley. Then on towards Ardley and Bucknell on quiet lanes. We planned to bypass north of Bicester but we went wrong somewhere and ended up on the A4095 and A4421 for a short while before diverting to Stratton Audley to get back on to quieter roads. Very small quiet lanes took us north to Tingewick where we used the cycletrack to cross the dual carriageway and into the village.

We continued north to Stow Park with it’s undulating roads and we joined the regional cycle route number 70 into Buckingham. We tried to find (unsuccessfully) somewhere to have a coffee but Buckingham is clearly not a Sunday town or expects many …

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I was on my own for this ride which I didn’t enjoy much at all. I wanted to see if there was a route to the Berkshire Downs without having to go via Wantage. There isn’t. Well, there is but it’s rubbish. Literally rubbish.

I cycled through Harwell and Didcot and onto the old railway line to Upton. There are byways that lead to the West Ilsley turn on the A34 which I wanted to try. The first bit wasn’t too bad, uphill on an unsurfaced track but quite cyclable. Once I reached the bridge over the old railway it turned nasty. The deep cutting here has been turned into a landfill and the track to the A34 was made up of broken rubble and bricks used by refuse lorries. There was a road scraper apparently ‘levelling’ it when I was there, he was turning it into more of a mess. It was also covered in a brown/grey slime that absolutely stank. It was too far to turn back so I very slowly and carefully picked my way to the road. My mudguards and tyres were covered in the smelly …

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We (Andrew and I) set off for this roughly 58 miler to Lechlade and back around 8.30am on Sunday morning. The forecast was for a strong westerly wind so the route was designed to minimise the time spent cycling into the wind.

Using the NCN offroad route to get to Abingdon town centre we reversed the end of the previous week’s ride through Shippon, Frilford Heath and Fyfield. Crossing back over the A420 at Southmoor using the bridleway bridge we headed south to Charney Bassett before turning to the north west towards Buckland. Along this stretch we suffered our first training puncture. Andrew picked up a rear wheel puncture so we stopped to switch inner tubes and set back off. I got to the Buckland turn on the A420 looked behind and he was nowhere in sight, slightly concerned I headed back about half a mile before I spotted him repairing another puncture! A slither of flint had lodges in the tyre and punctured the new innertube. Another tube and we were off again.

After Buckland we had the fast smooth descent to Buckland Marsh and over the Thames. We …

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