Sponsored cycle: Southampton - Berlin. The photos - part 1.

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Here's a first bunch of photos from the ride.



Day 1 - Departure from our community in Southampton







Fr. Vic McClean, parish priest at Goudhurst, Kent, with whom I stayed the first night. Had never met him before but discovered that we had many common interests (music - both musicians, film, etc...) and that both our fathers were butchers!



Day 2 - Staying with my friends Christian + Marie-Brigitte Frère at Wailly-Beaucamp, south of Boulogne-sur-mer in N. France.




Day 3 - Leaving the Frères' farmhouse.




A disused mine, heading towards the Belgian border.



A famous stretch of cobbles (not on my route) going through the Arenburg forest that is used in the Paris-Roubaix one day cycle race, one of the most famous  professional cycle races after the Tour de France.


Fr. Pierre (right) and Br. Bruno (left), both Salesians, at their children's home Le Hornu, near Boussu, Belgium.



Two of the children.








Day 4 - More cobbles, this time in Belgium. These I had to ride over.






Arriving in Maastricht, Holland. Here cyclists on their cycle paths have priority pretty much everywhere!





My good friend, Br. Marcel (aged 90 - a Brother of the Immaculate Conception whom I got to know during my studies in Paris in the mid-'90s) in his community in Maastricht.

More to follow...

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