You could say, spending several months day and night in the company of one person who you might previously have seen on a casual weekly basis, should give.you a good insight into their character..... Nothing quite prepared me for the force of nature that Doug Ramsay truly is!
I've known Doug for about seven years now. I first met him, his wife Maria, and eldest daughter Fiona briefly at my nephew's (and their next door neighbours daughter's wedding).
Two years later we moved to Bournemouth and still having Doug's phone number from our chance introduction,we met, all lycred up, at the pier and he then introduced me to a group of 'middle aged' cyclists . We have since met up, on and off, twice a week to partake of that sport that so endears us to the steel encased four wheeled users of the highway!
Some few years later (and probably after a few pints of Doug's homemade beer ) a trip across Europe's Eurovelo 6 route was mooted (but I quite remember by whom!), and a couple of years after that (about a year ago) a date was fixed in the diary for September 1st 2023. Having fixed the date we immediately swung into action. Or at least one of us did. I promptly forgot all about it.
Doug thankfully set too with a vengeance. You might just get an inkling at this point how the rest of this story unfolds.
From April to October for the past six years my wife Deb and I live and travel the European inland waterways on our Dutch Barge, a steel cruiser. This year my only worry was where to moor the boat for winter so as to be as near as possible to the start point (St. Nazaire) of EV6, and how I was going to cope with forfeiting two months of my comfortable floating existence for two of undoubted hardship of an unimaginable kind. I have to say this did give me a couple of sleepless nights, but after a giving myself a stiff talking too, I managed to forget all about this too.
Doug meanwhile got stuck in! Garmin and Strava (not an American pop duo!) were heavily involved and after many hours of dedicated planning Doug came up with a daily route plan, complete with pre e mailed campsites for every night. Kit lists soon followed with every imaginable bike trip requirements itemised. "Blimey, we're going to need an articulated truck for all this lot!", I thought.
So we met at the start point at St. Nazaire. Doug had just cycled the 325 kms from home to get there (nothing like a gentle warm up ride before the main event!), whilst I sat on a perfectly comfortable train seat which whisked me and my heavily laden bike to our rendezvous point, on the other side of a very scary bridge!!
Day one we set off, it rained. Heavily. All day! "Let's get this done", I thought, misery levels were escalating off the scale. Head down, I kept pedaling. All the while thinking, how soon can we stop for a three hour coffee break??!!
Doug , on the other hand was like an otter on wheels. Gliding along the pathways , playfully splashing through puddles, rain streaking off his unconcerned body. This man's in seventh heaven I thought. What HAVE I let myself in for?
The answer was manifold. Someone who revels in the outdoors, who will take every opportunity to explore his environment both physically and socially, who will instigate conversations with strangers whatever the situation, who is seemingly immune to hardship, who talks to cats, who is caring and thoughtful of others, is in short an ideal friend to spend a couple of months with!
Doug, what a great trip, and thanks for making it so much easier for me!
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