Tonsai Bay, Krabi, Thailand

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Well, let’s just say that this was a once in a lifetime experience of a different kind - one that I won’t do again in this lifetime! Don’t get me wrong, I still am a big cycling fan but I really do prefer watching it on TV where you get to see the lovely mountain top views with castles etc, but more importantly, you get to follow the action when it’s on TV.

Anyway, this trip was a bit of a last minute thing organised by Gin, and I figured why not. Especially if Cadel Evans was in with a chance of becoming the first Australian to win the Tour de France. Gin and I booked Eurostar tickets during the week and we left on early Saturday morning. First time I’ve really traveled via the Eurostar and let me just say that I love it! Instead of catching a bus/train for 40-60 mins to get to the closest airport it was a 15 min taxi ride (we were going to catch the tube but there were delays) to St Pancras International which is the station where the Eurostar departs, right at the northern end of the city. And then when we arrived at Gare du Nord in Paris, it was just a 10 min walk to our hotel.

The Saturday we arrived we pretty much spent walking around Paris as it was a nice day. Gin and I have both been before so we took it at a very leisurely pace. Actually, the first plan was to try and get a train out to Saint Armand Montrond to see the time trial but I’d already checked for tickets during the week and there didn’t seem to be anything available. Still, when I did get into Paris I did try briefly asking information whether there were any trains out to St Armand Montrond. No one seemed to even know where this town was so I pretty soon gave up.

Aside from stuffing ourselves with French crepes, escargots and beef tartares all weekend, we did catch some cycling on Sunday. Woke up late and ate lunch along the Champs-Elysees which was already starting to fill out at this time. We found a spot about 100m from the sprint point (which I initially thought was the finish) and pretty much camped (stood) there for the next 4 hrs. I wandered off at some point to see if I could find a better location on the other side of the street but no luck (I think you’d have to get there before 12pm). Anyway, whilst I was waiting (standing), Gin wandered off to do some shopping and general entertaining to keep herself from getting bored. She came back with food and water on occasions, and she also found the corporate areas and where the finish line actually was (at Place de la Concorde, down the other end of the Champs-Elysees). Somewhere along the way, we managed to pick up those big green (foam) hands as well that you always see on TV. I guess they learned their mistakes from making them out of cardboard.

Anyway, at about 5:30pm, the peloton arrives. It was useful as we had this Parisian uni student next to us and so we kept on asking him questions about what the commentators were saying over the loudspeakers. Apparently though for the previous 3 hours or so whilst I thought they may have been talking about the race or maybe just general French news, they were actually advertising! (With intermittent bits about the race). It all kind of made perfect sense though as about 1hr ago the ‘publicity caravan‘ arrived and all it was was car after car after car of advertising from the sponsors. They didn’t even throw out any freebies!

There’s a video on my Facebook of the peloton arriving and I think Gin’s comment at 0:21 is a classic and pretty much sums it all up. I’m glad I’ve done it but I don’t think I’ll be going back to watch any part of the TdF live any time soon.

Phew… tired now. L2P photos up on my Facebook.

I’ll hopefully have some energy and time to write up more about it later.

Guys, link to some pics from my latest trip around the Med with the Lo’s.

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Hopefully this works… Hope everyone is doing well back at home and look forward to catching up when we return in early Nov.

Well, it’s been a while since I last rambled on about cycling, so here’s the catch up dose. Hard to believe that there’s only 2.5 weeks left before my 600km adventure to Par-ree. Yesterday Hay and I attended the final L2P organised training session in perfect sunny 25 degree conditions. The ride took us through Surrey and a few of the ‘Surrey Hills’. This was really the first time I’d climbed anything longer than 50m in London and (as sadistic as it may sound), I miss my climbs! We did about 3 climbs, the first two of which were very sheltered with literally no cars and probably a gradient of about 5%. Reminded me of the 1 in 20 except quieter and shorter (it was also on a very narrow, but smooth 2 lane road). The third climb was to a place called ‘Box Hill’ which had absolutely beautiful views over a typical English countryside (rolling hills, fields, etc). I was going to take a picture but the group started rolling again before I could get my phone out. There was also a nice café at the top which looked to be a regular cyclists hang out (at least on sunny days).

My only complaint about all the climbs was that they were all way too short, lasting at most 2km. Hay and I being the lightweights that we are, claimed all the KoMs without a contest. We weren’t meaning to be disrespectful or anything but everyone seems to be grinders over here and I just couldn’t stand pedalling at a slow cadence. It was just easier (less effort) for me to go faster than the bunch. On one of the climbs I did my usual creeping up the pack as I settled into my natural cadence and I heard someone latch onto my wheel. At first I thought ‘who the heck was that keeping up with me?’ only to realise a good 100m later that it was just Hay. Hay’s certainly put in a lot of hard work between our first L2P training ride (which I just realised I never finished writing up) and this last one. Definitely not getting dropped on the hills anymore….

The L2P ride is broken up into the 4 different groups. Group 1 - the racing group, down to Group 4 - the hoping to finish group. Hay and I contemplated group 3 but we thought we’d play it safe and stick with group 4 for the training ride (for fear of getting dropped and subsequently lost). We’ll probably attempt a group 3 ride at some stage on L2P itself, as you can change groups in the morning or at the lunch break. The ride is essentially broken up into 6 parts over the 3 days.

In case you’re wondering what differs between the groups, it’s the speed.

Group 1: 34-36 km/h
Group 2: 29-32 km/h
Group 3: 27-29 km/h
Group 4: 25-27 km/h

Each of the groups will also have a pace car (which you’re not allowed to pass) and a mechanic’s van who will follow you around and fix your punctures by swapping your wheel etc (so you can get that full ‘professional’ treatment). I think they even carry spare bikes just in case there’s that big big a problem. Of course all of that stuff is probably only really useful for group 1, who are actually going to be racing under the British Cycling umbrella (Cycling Australia equivalent). Caught a glimpse of Emma Davies (one of the British Olympians) who will be leading one of the teams in group 1 before we started our training ride. Also at the start of our ride was this rather large lady (who I hadn’t seen before) who I think had a bit of a misconception about the L2P. Nothing against ‘large’ people now, as I’ve seen some large (and old) men hammer it down for much longer than I can, but this lady couldn’t even keep up for 10 minutes! I think one of the organisers will be having a quiet chat to her about possibly deferring the ride to next year…. some people just have absolutely no idea on what they’re getting themselves in for.

Anyway, since recovering from my flu about 3 weeks ago, been pretty much doing back to back century rides every weekend with Hay. This weekend had been no exception, and in fact it was even tougher with the addition of the 200-300m high hills. I’m planning for one more big weekend this week (I may have a spot in the 80km London to Brighton ride happening this Sunday as a colleague’s friend pulled out), but after that I’ll just be tapering and trying to fatten up a bit for the ride. Not much more I can do now. In some regards, I’m looking forward to getting this ride over and done with as I’ve pretty much devoted a good part of the last 6 months of my life to training for it. I was secretly hoping to ride in group 3 but due to my illness I guess I’ll be happy to finish in 4. Now, if only the weatherman can do something about the weather for that last weekend in June…

Given that I haven’t posted anything for a while, here’s a few words (and pictures.. sorry HP) on what I’ve been up to:

Turkey
Went to Istanbul over Easter. In short, worth the visit for a weekend if you haven’t been to Budapest or Egypt, but 4.5 days was just a bit long. Or if you’re going to be there for that long, go travel around Turkey a bit more. I hear it’s pretty in other parts as well (just don’t go too close to the Iraqi border though I guess…). Photos on my Facebook if you haven’t seen them yet.

London (general living)
Well and truly settled in now with the UK tax year just passing (they have it on April 5th), but the one pet hate to date still is British service. It’s so bad and we have so many stories about setting up phone lines, internet connections, etc that we thought about starting up a thread just to b!tch about it. The latest casualties have been Anh and Hay given that they’ve recently moved (they were crashing with us for a little while).

Here are some pics from our apartment on the Sunday when it snowed in London. It’s still been cold, but slowly warming up (hovering around 10 degrees during the day).

And finally…. Read the rest of this entry »

Guys, just some random pics from a couple of trips/ shows from last year. the cities should be pretty self explanatory for you geography buffs out there… enjoy

Read the rest of this entry »

This occurred about 5 hours after leaving L.A airport heading home, on our recent trip to USA. There was an overhead announcement asking if there was a medical doctor on-board. I turned to Ash and asked if I should volunteer. She told me, “Of course you should!” I was a bit guarded because one of my bosses had told me how limited resources are on the plane. Anyway, I rang the bell and a steward came to me and asked me what sort of doctor I was. I told him, and he asked me to follow him. He told me that someone was having a seizure.

Ashleigh reckons that from that point, I took some time to put on my shoes. I think that she’s right because I do remember trying to remember the best way to treat seizures as it has been at least 5 years since I’ve done so! I then followed the steward up the stairs to Business Class. At that point, an Obstetrician/Gynaecologist joined us too.

As I was walking up the stairs I was thinking about my management plan if the patient was still fitting. Simple things first, of course! ABC’s - Airway, Breathing and Circulation. If he was still fitting, I’d need to administer a benzodiazepine, although I don’t know if the plane would have it.

When we reached the patient, he had already finished fitting and was confused. He was otherwise fine. A nurse was with him talking to him at that stage. I hung around for a little while giving advice as to how best he should be treated, ie., whether he can eat, whether he is allowed to go back to sleep. One of the staff then asked if we should take his blood pressure; I agreed. As he went off to get the sphygmomanometer (blood pressure machine) I realized that I hadn’t used one for 5 years! I usually read the blood pressure from the charts or used an automatic machine which gives you the blood pressure with the press of a button!!! However, after a little thought, I quickly remembered how to take a blood pressure using the manual machine! Anyway, I wasn’t needed for that task as the Obstetrician/Gynaecologist took the blood pressure! I hung around for a little while longer just making sure that the patient was OK.

Twenty minutes later, I returned to my seat and continued to watch the documentary about how the company Apple was saved by the iPod (very interesting documentary, by the way!). About an hour later, the steward presented a bottle of champagne to me, thanking me for my help! I was a little embarrassed about it as I didn’t do all that much (except for providing QUALITY and PROFESSIONAL advice)! Another few hours passed and the steward again returned with vouchers for use of the Qantas Club lounge! I was still embarrassed about it! We did use those vouchers at Sydney Airport which was very nice!

I had pretty much forgotten about the incident until two weeks ago when Mum rang me telling me that she had received a letter in the mail from Qantas. They thanked me for my “professional advice” and mentioned a few other flattering sentences! There was also a $200 voucher attached for use when buying airline tickets! Very flattering and embarrassing!

So from a small incident, I managed to score a bottle of champagne, Qantas Club vouchers and a $200 voucher!

Not bad for a humble Orthopaedic Registrar…

On our recent US trip, we purchased Broadway tickets on the Internet via Ticketmaster website. Yesterday my credit card bill came and I found that I had a charge of US$9 under the name “Entertainment Rewards”. I didn’t know what that was so rang American Express who researched it. It seems that when you use Ticketmaster to buy tickets, you’re automatically signing up a subscription with Entertainment Rewards, which is a company that offers vouchers for restaurants, hotels, etc. Apparently it’s in the small print. This subscription costs US$9 per month!

Very, very dodgy!!!

Anyway, American Express were kind enough to refund the US$9 and I cancelled my membership with Entertainment Rewards.

I Googled “Entertainment Rewards” and it seems that a lot of people have been ripped-off by them too!

Glad to see that I’m not the only one!

Here are a handful of photos from our recent North America trip.