Travel Reference
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'I insist. You're more than welcome.'
'Thankyou.Thatsoundsgreat.Butthesearetheonlyclotheswe'vegot,'Isaid,tugging
at my dirty suit trousers that I had been wearing continuously for seven days.
'Oh don't worry about that. It's just a bunch of old people having a barbeque in a field.
It will be too dark for them to even see what you look like anyway. It's the annual get-to-
gether of
The Severn Bore Society
. It's going to be the biggest bore for 25 years tonight,'
he said.
'Cool. What's the Severn Bore?' I asked.
'A pig isn't it?' said Ben, realising straight away that he had said something stupid as
Rob was choking on a mouthful of beer.
'Ha,no,it'snotapig.YoumusthaveheardofTheSevernBore,no?'Webothlookedat
him blankly. 'It's a wave that comes down the river,' he continued. 'Anyway, I'll tell you
allaboutitinabit.Weneedtogetgoingifwe'regoingtomakeitintime.Slingyourbikes
in the trailer outside and I'll be out in a minute.'
'Ok, brilliant, is Rooballs coming, too?' I asked.
'Errr, no, I've no idea where he's staying. He looks happy enough here,' said Rob.
We waved goodbye to Rooballs who was still flicking beer mats at the table in the
corner. He grinned and waved back.
Rob's trailer was parked just outside the pub and we retrieved our bikes that we had
pretend-lockedtoanearbypillar.WewerejustabouttoputthemintothetrailerwhenIwas
suddenly hit by a dilemma.
'Hang on, Ben, isn't this cheating getting a lift somewhere with our bikes?'
'Whatdoyoumean?DoyouseriouslythinkweshouldcyclemilestoRob'sfarm,inthe
middle of nowhere in the pitch black?'
'No,Idon'tmeanthat.Imeanthatwesaidthatwewouldn'tuseanyotherformoftrans-
port for our bikes, didn't we?'
'Yeah, but we also said we could do different things that were not on the route, as long
as we rejoined the route where we left it. Like when we hired that speed boat in St Ives.'
'I know, it's just that Rob will probably have loads of other stuff to put in the trailer in
the morning and we might have to leave the bikes at his while we come and help him, and
then when we get them back and head off it means we won't have cycled the bit between
here and Rob's house, wherever Rob's house is.' I was even confusing myself. Just at this
moment, Rob and a couple of the other guys emerged from the pub.
'OK guys?' he asked, noticing that I was holding my bike in mid air.
'Yeah, everything's fine, it's just that, and this will probably sound really stupid to you
but…' and I repeated my pedantic concerns about the authenticity of our challenge to Rob.
'That's no problem. I guess if you're going to do something as crazy as this bike ride,
you might as well do it properly,' he said. 'Here's an idea. We put your bikes in the trailer,
just for a few minutes and drop them up at Mike's house at the top of the street. You can
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