Taz tries out some poses for upsidedowndog.com

Tuesday 21st September - Quillan

Tricky fellow, Johnny Foreigner. We decided on a green "facile" cycle route of 21kms today. Admittedly it said something about the hills at the start taking us by surprise if we attacked them "a froid" but it didnt mention that those hills would almost finish us off before we had completed 3kms. AND THEN, when we got back I looked at the routes for mountain bikes and the same part of the route was coloured red ie bloody hard!!!!!

It wouldnt have been quite so bad except that on the way back to the campsite I spotted a hairdressers and being in desperate need of a cut and something to hide the grey, I went in and they said they could "do" me straight away. Well, after they encased me in a nice nylon robe, I went through 2 packets of tissues trying to surreptiously wipe the sweat off my face before they started. And I was a little worried about finding a colour for my hair that would go with my puce face.

The excitement is rising. In a few days we will be staying with our friends, the Baileys, in a real house! (And according to Simon its a stunning house with amazing views of the Pyrenees - but it only needs level floors and to have more than one room to be special for us) Having eaten and drunk extremely well at their UK home we have decided we need to prepare our wastlines and livers. There has been much discussion about whether we should cut out alcohol or step it up to avoid any shocks. But the bottom line has expanded since hitting France (and especially the Nougat Region) so its strictly 1 gin and tonic a night, no wine, no crisps and no stopping at the Patisserie. But David found a loophole. If the supermarket we shop at stocks Cadbury's chocolate we can carry on with our 1 square of chocolate a night (a 4" square is absolutely the limit). I will decline to declare whether this loophole came before or after the last shopping trip.