Definitions of touring cyclists required.

[librarian]

I camp, cycle and tour - sometimes with all the gear, sometimes just with a credit card and youth hostel membership.

There's a touring state of mind that I've achieved on only a few occasions. The journey become the whole focus of your existence and all the detrius of job, responsibilites, relations, train connections, traffic and getting home just fades away into nothing.

Each day starts before dawn with a breakfast ritual in the tent. Every move is rehearsed and repeated from days before. You pack in moments and get on the bike and wait at the roadside for the sun to rise and then (more or less) stay on the bike until the sun touches the horizon in front of you. All you think about is flies, sunburn, water and the fact that you need more matches before the end of tomorrow. Entertainment is mainly counting the number of zig-zags (1402!) you can manage down the lane markings before someone comes along. Some days you'll talk to a few people, on other days you talk to no one, and love it. At night, you fight bugs, gawp in child-like wonderment at the sky above, and add a couple of tally marks in the margin of your diary. You pray, deeply and sincerely, to the imaginary gods of tomorrow's wind. Despite being sore all over, you sleep peacefully and at peace, but bursting with excitement for the next day to dawn.