First the good news. 70 mls on that dodgy knee. No problem. Sorted. Have now reached A Small Town In Germany. The region of the westrhineland is impossible to navigate using conventional maps. There are no road signs at junctions and no road numbers either. Not only were we having trouble finding the source of the Rhine but we were having trouble finding the river at all. But we stumbled upon the correct navigation method for this part of Germany: one must use ...

As we'd arrived so late in Someren last night we started a bit later, about 9am. On the roll out towards Weert, and after about 10km, something went pop in my left knee. Painfully pop, like being flicked hard with an elastic band. (Soprano, at you'd look at it, it was at about 1pm on the outer aspect of the left patella). Over the next few miles it did it three more times, just on the beginning of the downstroke. Eek! I stopped, massaged it, did some stretching ...

Having only just caught the train to Harwich from Liverpool St (due to delays on the service from Bristol), with only 7 mins to spare, we duly caught the night sailing to Hook of Holland. No entertainment, but I did lose €20 at the casino. We'd set ourselves a rather ambitious target for Day 1: to get beyond Eindhoven. We actually did this (despite 'issues' navigating Rotterdam) and duly arrived in the small town of Someren just after sundown. A nice little pl...

Two days to go. Have assembled useful objects. Compass etc

One week to the off. Bikes serviced. Mine still needs a good clean. Had a chat with JC yesterday. Agreed that Hook of Holland to Rotterdam looks trickier than we'd thought. So many waterways to get on the wrong side of. Hopefully the signage will point us in the right direction. Fingers crossed. We aim to pick up one of the minor waterways of the Rhine delta and to follow this , more or less. It would be good to make the Eindhoven area by the end of Day 1. The...