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Last weekend I travelled to London for the Prudential RideLondon 100. It is a 100 miles (160km) sportive going through London and the Surrey Hills. This one is held on completely closed roads and is also the biggest sportive I have ever attended, with around 30000 cyclists on the road. I stayed in an Airbnb in Homerton, which I mainly choose because it was near the Olympic Park, where the start was. And it was good to be close, because I had there by 6:40 latest. You are assigned a colour and a starting wave. They stagger the waves to avoid congestion on the road. I think faster riders will also be in the earlier waves. I guess I was somewhere in the middle. It rained all night, so the roads were pretty wet, but the sun came out a bit later. The route went through London, past the sight seeing attraction like London Tower, the Thames, Richmond Park (saw one deer), Parliament, Big Ben and so on. I don’t have many photos, because I really didn’t stop a lot. This one is from the Surrey Hills at a food stop. ...

The year comes to a close and it is time to see what happened to my New Year Resolutions. Yoga Everyday Well, this didn't go so well. Overall I managed about every second day, though I have done most of it in the first half of the year. But it turned into a habit now, so I tend to do it a few times a week. Cycling Mini Adventures I managed to do quite a few and had fun doing them. GFNY Barcelona Gran Fondo Mussara La Ruta Minera Tour de France weekend in Andorra Long solo weekend trip around Ripoll Geocentrum 2 and a few solo rides to places around Barcelona Draw something every day This turned out to be pretty much a failure. While it was going good at the beginning of the year I just gave up after a while. It was just impossible to find the time or inspiration to draw. Blog once a month Nearly...this should be number 11 for the year. 12 Books It was a difficult start, but then I found some easy to read thriller series and space operas and ended up reading 23 books. Some more goals ... During the year I picked up a few more smaller goals and habits where I have been more or less successful. I had the cycling goal of reach 8000km for the year and achieve all Strava Climbing and Gran Fondo challenges. But an illness in December made this impossible. So I just got 11 of the 12. I also started to do Vegetarian Mondays with a 64% success rate. I found it difficult when traveling or when there were social events. I worked on my Spanish with Duolingo for most of the year and finished all the lessons. You have to keep it up though so you don't loose it again. And I reached my goal weight. The remaining fat has somehow to be replaced by muscles. Of to the next year... I haven't quite decided on anything yet, but I definitely take it a lot more easy :-)

Short tip this time, just to confirm to anyone googling for the 144 hour transit visa for Shanghai that it really works. I have just been to Shanghai using the 144 hour transit visa. My trip was from Barcelona via Dubai to Shanghai and finally Manila. You can find more information on the net, but this is how it basically works: you can stay only 144 hours (there are some rules on when these begin and end) it has to be transit, you can't just return to your origin after the visit. you have to go to a third country (Hong Kong doesn't count either) you have to use one of the two main airports in Shanghai, you can't just use any odd border (I think there is a port option too) it doesn't cost anything you have to have a passport from certain countries Europe/Schengen and USA are fine for example The main problem of the transit visa is that nobody knows about it. The Chinese consulate here had no idea and the Emirates staff also had not heard about it. It is best to bring a printout of your flight tickets to Shanghai and continuing to the next country, plus a printout of the the hotel you are using in Shanghai. When you do the check in at your point of origin the airline staff will ask you for your visa, which obviously you don't have. If you then say transit ticket they might insist that it is only for 24h, you will just have to convince them. Once you land in Shanghai it is much easier, there is a special queue just for the 144 hour (and 72 hour) transit visa. In my case it was just about ten people, but it still took about an hour to process. Mainly because most of those people didn't full fill the requirement of the visa and were for example travelling back to the country of origin and not a third country. As I had everything correct and the printouts ready it only took about two minutes and I was in Shanghai. Leaving is equally quick, no hassle at all. Again for the check in at the airline desk you might want to have the printouts of any following flights, depending on where you are going. In summary: a very nice visa and a good idea, but it has to be wider published to be really easy to use

Amazingly this is the first multiple day cycling trip that I have done alone so far. I had the weekend for myself and decided to use it to explore some new roads in Catalonia. After asking my cycling friends for some tips I decided on using Ripoll as a base. It is a two hours and €8 train ride from Barcelona and surrounded by nature parks and nice mountains. I found a reasonably cheap Airbnb, which I booked from Friday evening to Monday. I had been warned by the host that the stairs are steep, many and without much room to move a bicycle. And she was absolutely right. I still managed though and otherwise the flat was really nice, with a washing machine (!) and fully equipped kitchen. I cooked every day and basically lived on pasta. I had picked some routes before, but decided on the day which one to pick. The weather turned for the worse and it was a bit colder than I expected. I am not an early riser anyway, but in this case I waited until 10:00 to start each ride so that it could warm up a bit. In the end I only got into the rain once though. Many thanks have to go to Mauro to helping me with the routes and suggesting the area in the first place. ...

I wanted to this for a while, but it came up again recently, so here it goes. This is my small saddle bag, that I use daily and in group rides. For sportives or Gran Fondos I use a slightly bigger bag, which I will come to in a different post. I don't really like to have too much stuff in the jersey pockets. On the usual rides I just carry my phone, cash, credit card and keys and maybe one gel. When it is colder or changing also a wind jacket. mini tool chain tool the silver tools, where I have no idea what they are for tire levers CO2 cartridge and valve spare tube, this is a pretty big and robust one for 28mm tires chain pins tube valve extenders, in case I have to borrow a tube tube valve tool presta adapter, to use petrol station compressors patches spare contact lens All of this fits into a Lezyne Roll Caddy, which looks nice and fits to the saddle easily. In case you are wondering where my pump is: it is a small Topeak pump fitted to one of the bottle holders. Use the comments for any tips or questions.