Regular Skedaddle customer (..he’s been to Guatemala, Croatia and Chile / Argentina with us) and all round top bloke Roland Marx (the missing brother?) decided to join us in Sardinia for our Coast to Coast trip. After a few missed connections and delays getting over from New York he made it and here’s his biking story!

Skedaddlin’ through Sardinia.

biking sardinia coast to coast
across the gennargentu mountain range
arrive cagliari two days late 
weather delays missed flight connections
arrive agriturismo
la minierva fiorita at ten pm
sit down to vino rosso regionale
cucina locale tipico

guides gionata enrico nicola
laugh gesture eat and drink with us
 
antipasto parma ham sun-dried tomatoes
olives red peppers onion quiche
gnocchi parmesan romano olio locale
sardinian roast pork delizioso
grappa filo di ferro
alore tutta va bene en sardegna 

easy today says gionata
8 hours 40 Ks of long climbs
bone-jarring rocky rutted down-hills
cross-country over hard tractor-wheel tracks

wildflower meadows in full bloom
next day starts in rain rains most of day
downhill rocks handled better today
hit sticky mud like chewing gum

sticks to tires compacts in wheel forks gears
can’t ride can’t even wheel bike
use stick rock to dislodge gummed mud
try to ride on grass or rocks
 
more forest open dirt road cross-country
rocks fixed loose pound tire jump left right up
44 Ks in only 6 ½ hours
cappuccino stop to warm up
 
leave agriturismo in sun
bikes cleaned brake disc pads replaced
like no chain now
6 K climb up down off-road forest 10 K climb
 
fruit tarts and juice break
another 10 K climb cross bridge river
 
sheep bells bird song flower smell
across the gennargentu
high peak of punta lamamora always present
 
prima colazione at eight
sun’s out 10 K uphill to warm up 
parque forestale great rock shapes formations
up down up down up at 1100 meters

nuraghe era roman stone fortress
villagio fortif café at ranger station
thunderstorm swamps us
some bike on to hotel

last day start off cheeky 17 Ks up 
next 15 Ks up down off-road
rough loose rock track
like james bond martini shaken not stirred
make it across 6-plus-inch-deep stream
rough rock bottom couple meters
 
flake out on rocks
pasta olio pomodori white parma ham lunch coast down last 25 Ks
to cala gonone on east coast …

RM … may 2011  

We are very excited to have just launced our very own Skedaddle App, which you can use on your funky iPads

Although this is Skedaddle Version 1, we are busily working on the next stages and so soon there will lots more functions available soon including versions to use on iPhones and the like..

Click Here to download your Skedaddle Biking Holidays App and get Sked-app-padin’

Looking to find out more about our singletrack trails on our Peru mountain biking holiday, then have a look at this superb video from Martin Fernandez - Click Here 

If you fancy joining in the fun in 2011, then we’ve just one date left :

PST11/02 - 10 to 23 September - click here to request the full details

For some crackin’ photos here’s the link - Flickr Peru Singletrack Photos   

If these trails seem a tad tough then our Manu and Mach Picchu trip might suit better.

Trip Notes : Click Here

Photos: Click Here

Congratulations to Murray Taylor from London, who was the lucky Skedaddler plucked out of the office competition hat (ok - Adam’s sweaty cycling helmet) and won a Green Oil Maintenance Kit worth a whopping £35 earth pounds!!

Murray is going to be at the Torq 12:12 Event over the August Bank Holiday and is signed up to do the Vets Solo event, so if you see someone with a very clean and well lubed bike, looking like the above chap then it’s Murray.

We’ll also be there too with the Skedaddle big blue gazebo, guides and riders so do pop along to say hi.

For more about the event - Click Here and for more about Green Oil’s eco-friendly range of products click here - we love’em!!

Great new book from Guardian Books all about Biking and based on the Guardian Bike Blog.

To celebrate the publication of Cyclebabble, they also have some lovely ‘bike blog ‘ t-shirts. What’s more, when you buy the book for £7.99, you get the shirt half price. This means that you can be the proud owner of both a Cyclebabble book and t-shirt for just £16.48! To take up this offer, click here

We’ve just ordered ours at Skedaddle!!

Click Here to find out more

If you have been wondering where Skedaddle cycling and mountain biking holiday guide Paul Davies has been recently, well here is the answer - he’s on an epic cycling holiday with his wife and is cycling from from Vancouver, in British Columbia Canada to the Mexican border down the Pacific Coast of the United States. Here’s the first installment, from Vancouver in Canada to the Oregon Border.Click Here for rambling, photos and general chit - chat 

Paul Adopts the Straw school of bike maintenance… if in doubt hit it with something large.

Congratulations to the below folks who all won places on the Kielder 100 in a recent newsletter competition:

Winners of the FIVE free places for this corking event were:

Ian Stewart - Dundee
Matthew Anderson - Nottingham
Gordon Hull - Cumbria
Matt Barton - Northants
and
Sandy Menzies - County Durham

..all of whom rightly noted that our Highlands Off Road Coast to Coast was 235 miles long.

Sorry if you didn’t win this time around, but there are a smattering of places still left for the event if you get a move on!

Skedaddle will be at the event, so do pop along to see us if you have entered or are along to support your nearest and dearest.

This superb desert biking adventure focuses on the deep south of Morocco, a land of big skies and stark mountain ranges where mud-brick kasbahs appear to rise up out of the desert, sitting in tranquil palm oases and framed by dramatic backdrops of snowcapped mountains. We ride along Morocco’s dirt roads, taking us from Marrakech to the Tichka Pass, the highest in the High Atlas, and then southward, descending along the Draa Valley to the fringes of the Sahara Desert.