David Millar has won his stage of Le Tour and we have the beers in at the bar. 8 of us here. The others unaccountably delayed by punctures, hills, floods, crocodiles and all the usual excuses. But hear that bikes have been mended and bodies patched up and all are back on the road. Tonight we are all eating together to celebrate the evening of Bastille Day. To Arms Citizens.

60 miles done. Straight French roads going up and down. Wind in our faces. One bike has collapsed a few miles back it seems. Someone else has totally exhausted themselves and has nothing left. So on we go to St Omer.

40 miles done and drinking coffee in a bar tabac. The way this works is that we divide into three groups and then go at our own pace looking after each other. Our group has been bowling along with more up and down looking for a coffee stop. At last. And Jerome has sniffed out a boulangerie for some pastries.

6.30am and it’s grey and wet outside. But this is the last full day in France. 88 miles of rolling roads.

Raining hard. Feels freezing. Roads up and up and then down. Cold wet but not miserable. Even Paul was heard to say, “I enjoyed the hills!” Rolling along at a happy 18-20. Now about to eat lunch in a bus shelter. Kathryn is cutting bread in the passenger seat. 50 miles to go and we are singing.

The most frequent question is, “Why?” There’s no one answer or easy explanation. The charity fundraising is certainly a motivation and the Air Ambulance is a good cause. There’s the friendship. There’s the travel and the scenery and I suppose for some getting away from one daily routine to replace it with the simplicity of turning the wheels. By this stage the answer to “why?” Is simply a dogged determination to do it, and a refusal to give in. 85 miles today and a straight 900ft climb out of Epernay to begin.

For this is what it was today. Somehow we had been lulled into a false sense of security that 70 miles today would be less of a challenge than the past two days. How wrong we were.

Sadly we didn’t get the police escort out of town that John and Katie Mackinnon enjoyed on the way in yesterday – but we did get the lovely RAF boys who we met at breakfast flying overhead as we bade farewell to St Dizier.

We had been aiming for a coffee break around 23 miles in but sadly there was no cafe to be found on the road to Epernay. And the sky grew ever darker and the wind ever stronger. So it was decided to try and crack through to Epernay as fast as possible. Very soon it was pouring with rain and we found ourselves cycling straight into a ferocious headwind which was worse than climbing hills (and we had a few of them thrown in for good measure too.)

Although the original plan had been to lunch in Epernay, our good catering crew took pity on us and met us 57 miles out with lunch to keep us going for the final 13 miles as food was becoming essential to see us through the final miles and keep up morale. They truly pulled a rabbit out of the hat as they had less than an hour to get lunch sorted for us all, buy it and set it up.

We’re still cycling in three groups and have now jelled well together. We cycle in peletons – single file or double (which can irritate the drivers, but they are still not a patch on the swiss drivers for rudeness). There is  a healthy rivalry between the three groups but the back group is best of course (Editor’s prerogative),  lots of laughter generated and the tidiest peleton apart from when Will and Ian make a break for it.

We arrived in Epernay around 3.30pm and it was breathtaking to cycle past the grand noms de Champagne on the way in.  Our normal daily routine on these rides is to get up around 6.30am, breakfast, cycle, arrive at the destination, clean bike and wash clothes, eat and go to bed. So it was nice to have a couple of hours to wander around the town and to enjoy a glass or two of the town’s most famous produce. Robin and Barbara, clearly still suffering from eating too many greek salads were found tucking into lemon tart, strawberry gateau and petits fours, before we even got to supper.

Cycling over the next two days will be tough. 80 miles tomorrow to St Quentin and 5000 ft of climbing..joy.

Whoops of celebration were heard as we entered the town of Chalons this morning as this marked the official 1,000 milestone of travelling for the team who started out on this epic olympian adventure just 12 days ago. They’ve done a fantastic job and although they are now getting seriously tired they plough on keeping everyone going . It’s a fantastic achievement.

Please do keep your messages of support coming as they mean so much to the team on the road – you can post on this blog or via Twitter at hashtag o2o2012 and if you are in Canterbury on Saturday please do come along to the Cathedral to welcome them back at around 4.15pm. All welcome.

A short day today – just 65 miles. The Champagne country has its own vast beauty but it makes for hard cycling especially with a strong wind in your face like today.

Several people left breakfast saying they were going out and might not be back for some time. But it’s not too bad. Much cooler (temperature). Undulating but not steep. Half way by 11am. Here we go…….