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crossedthread
clubman
My Route
My route and destination were mainly decided by the availability of hostels. Once there were many YHA hostels within a day's ride from London, now there are very few, which is annoying if, you take my view that for 'proper' touring you should get on your bike at your own front gate and ride - no using trains or cars!
So, the obvious first stop, going west, is Streatley. This is an excellent traditional hostel with a nice old building, not too badly hacked about, and an enthusiastic and helpful warden. From Willesden the first 15 miles are pretty miserable, but after Colnbrook things start to look up until you have to deal with Reading. I took the route through Tilehurst to Pangbourne which did involve quite a hard climb on a narrow and very busy road.
The next day took me through Wantage and Lechlade to Cirencester. I used B roads were I could without doing excessive extra work, but in the end the A417 proved easy and not terrible from the traffic point of view.
On the third day I retraced to Lechlade and then using lanes to Eynsham and then Oxford where, thanks to my sister, I had very luxurious 'hostel' accommodation at Worcester College.
Home by the usual A40 route the fourth day.
I'm impressed that you could manage with only 8 lbs of luggage. My 20 lbs does include spares, minimal tools, the rack and the bags themselves. I did carry some spare clothes including non-cycling wear for the evenings. I too suffered from the cold and was wearing everything I could.
The Bike
As you can see from the photo this was not a pedigree lightweight like your Gillott, although the Sunbeam frame is similar in age. A point that may be of interest is that I took the advice of "The Modern Cyclist 1923" which states: 'for touring a low gear is a necessity, a high gear a luxury'. I did this by abandoning 'top' gear altogether (on my Sturmey AW) and by using sprockets of 47 / 24 I had a top gear of about 69" for level conditions and 52" and 39" to use
for climbing. This works reasonably well, but the gap from top to middle is still too great - however that's not a serious problem for my sort of touring.
In fact I didn't use the 39 much, but I must admit it did come in handy climbing Aston Hill (on the A40) back towards Stokenchurch.
Here's the bike with its load: