Day 10. Chester to Church Stretton. 57 miles

Another eventful day today! August 18th 2009 shall go down in the annals of GGD JOGLE history as "Brokey Spokey" day. We left the hostel in Chester and headed across country to Shrewesbury. Rode through some glorious countryside in the middle of nowhere - clearly the worst possible place for something to go wrong. An ominous noise from Darrin's bike proved that once again we were the victims of Sod's law - 2 spokes had broken on Darrin's back wheel. Handy Gandhi broke out the tool set but we couldn't get the rear cassette off the bike to change the spokes, despite all manner of improvised levers, including tyre irons and stout pieces of wood. Finally Gandhi and Darrin ran down to a local farm where agricultural engineering techiques were employed (a hammer and a length of rope) to get the tricky bugger off. After a 2 hour delay and with new spokes fitted we headed on for Shrewsbury. As we got to the outskirts I heard a strange "doink" noise. After having made sure that I hadn't popped out of my lycra, I pulled over to discover that I had now broken a spoke on my rear wheel. Fortunately, my bike had the good grace to break down close to civilisation, so I nursed it to a local bike shop where they sorted it for me. Had a very interesting conversation with the local nutter who was picking up a bike from the shop that he had "found in a field"and taken in for repair, claiming that it only had a minor bend in the frame. When the thing was wheeled out, it was clear that it was beyond repair - it must have been about 60 years old. When he got on it outside and tried to pedal, the wheel wouldn't move. He still insisted that he'd be doing JOGLE on it next year. We wished him well. After a further hour's delay we headed on again for Church Stretton. By now it was getting late so we headed straight for the local campsite - which was full. We managed to find a room in a hotel which was signed as being "up the hill". Turned out to be a small mountain - not the way we would have chosen to end our day! Still it's a nice gaff and they have a bar - and tomorrow starts with a big downhill!