As I wake to the sound of roosters, there’s a dream-like quality to yesterday’s ride. Was it that  86km was further than I’d ridden for 3 decades, or was it the extraordinary sight of Peter, the lycra-clad young Englishman on his shiny white road bike heading the other way who stopped to chat, or maybe…

‘Yes Jane, but how is the cycling going?’ I hear you say… Well, as you will remember, Rafiki, my (Rachel’s) bike went back together quite well, considering.  And a few test runs around Vientiane led only to minor adjustments to the saddle height and a yet-to-be-worked-how-to-do-it tensioning or untensioning issue regarding the gear to the…

‘God is still a quest, an exploration, or an unexpected flourish of grace, not a ghetto to be safe in, or a set of traditions to be defended.’  Neil Darrogh ‘I feel especially lucky today,’ the cafe proprietor informs me as I sip on nectar from the gods in the form of a mango and…

My sense of relief surprises me as I look from the plane and see the familiar bike carton you see in the picture below, moving along the baggage conveyor down to the handlers at Vientiane airport. But the relief is soon tempered as I consider the looming challenge ahead of ‘bike reconstruction for dummies’ without…

Happiness has 4 stages. To eke out the most happiness from an experience, we must anticipate it, savor it as it unfolds, express happiness, and recall a happy memory’ ( Gretchen Rubin). ‘Mum, do you really need two pairs of shorts for a month of cycling?’ asks Alice, my minimalist daughter whose 10kg backpack saw her…