Zhytomyr - Babyn 174km

The sun comes up much later in the morning these days which makes getting out of bed or the tent in this case much harder. My new sleeping mattress went down a treat and just made it even harder to drag myself out of my shelter to pack up the bike. It's also much colder in the morning now and the days of packing up while just wearing my shorts as the sun beat down upon me seem to be well and truly long gone; now it's all about layers and warming myself up for the day ahead.

Once again the road was great today and I'm finding myself riding through more forest now as opposed to vast open fields; it makes a nice change.
The weather picked up later on in the day and I was able to dispense with the jacket and revert back to my t-shirt.

Ukraine has lots of these designated sites which are great for stop at and having a rest or even just taking a stupid picture of oneself.

Again I hope it doesn't seem like I'm writing much less these days but not a lot happens to be quite honest. I just continue picking up my right leg and follow it with my left and do this for a good eight hours or so. The pace is good but certainly not strenuous.

I did meet a couple of really friendly policeman on my ride today. They were doing their routine speed checks and flagged me down. It was clear they hadn't stopped me for breaking the speed limit but they were just interested in why someone would be riding a bicycle through their country.
It's funny when I meet locals one of the first questions they seem to ask is “Have you had any trouble from the police?” And the simple answer is no. I think if memory serves me correctly I've only been asked for my passport twice; once in China where it was taken into the police station to be checked and once by a soldier as I neared the Uzbekistan border in Kazakhstan. It's interesting how we have a natural tendency to look upon the police with a certain level of mistrust. I usually give them a small tip of the head as I pass and as I say I've not experienced any problems.

I spent a lot of the day thinking about the upcoming football season. It doesn't matter how old I get I still get that tingle of excitement before the big kick off although the wild optimism that used to accompany it has now I'm glad to say lessened. I debated whether I should try and stop and find a hotel for the night so that I could perhaps watch the football but then I remembered that I'm no longer in China and that there is now only a two hour difference between here and the UK and I no longer need to stay up until ten at night to catch a game.

I once again found myself a nice field for the night overlooking a nice valley. I'm about 220km from Lviv I guess and if I really wanted to push it I suppose I could make it there tomorrow. However my plan is to probably ride about 180 and then arrive early on Monday morning but as I've come to realize on this trip I'll get there when I get there, it's as simple as that.