Cycling round the world is bloody hard work! That’s the conclusion we came to today, in any case. It’s not so much the terrain that gets to you (although that can be a challenge too) but the constant decision making and uncertainty that represents life on the road. We’re not complaining – we love our travels and the views and experiences we have from our saddles – but the daily routine of life on a bike is something we think is often missed. It’s too easy to imagine only the romance of travel. Our tedious daily chores include going to the supermarket, trying and usually failing to find an alternative to pasta for supper, and working out where you’re going to spend the night. Just today we spent at least an hour in the grocery store and there’s rarely a day we don’t stop to stock up on food. By the time we’d actually found the store and finished our shopping it was nearly noon, so that was half the day gone before we’d even started. We found a lovely canal towpath in the afternoon and made good time into Agen, with the intention of staying at a campsite marked on our map in the town. We wanted to get off the bikes early and into the campground so we could do our laundry, another of those recurring chores. Long gone are the days when we had enough clothes to put off washing for a few days. We dream of our lives when we could throw a wash in the machine and come back from work to find it dry! Today though the laundry had to wait since the tourist office informed us that the campsite marked on our map didn’t exist and the nearest one was some distance away. We debated what to do next and decided we were too tired to make the hike to the campground, so instead we found a picnic table and took “showers” under a nearby watertap as we prepared supper. Early evening closed in on us quickly and we still weren’t sure where we were going to sleep. There was nothing for it but to keep cycling, setting a course for the campsite as a last ditch option. After a half hour we finally found a field for our tent, home at last!