This page was last modified on 27 September 2021
In the formulation, preparation, checking, testing and maintenance of these route notes and their supporting page, I have done much work myself; however, very few projects are undertaken entirely by just one person, and this isn’t one of them. I have received assistance in various ways.
My thanks to:
All of you who have written in with kind words and helpful comments.
My wife (when she was my fiancée), for cross-checking the notes and providing constructive feedback, whilst being driven along the route in each direction on successive days.
My father, for cross-checking the first draft of the notes against the map late at night before the first trial in May 1995;
and for telling me on the phone, You wouldn’t want to ride it at
this time of year!
, but cheerfully staying up to greet me,
hoof in mouth and hot soup at the ready, when I then turned up on his
doorstep at 4am on a December morning!
also, for providing useful suggestions for alterations to the notes after cycling the route for himself.
My mother, who humoured me several times by driving the bike route instead of the car-route, despite me getting her lost in the process.
Rupert my brother, who has ridden the route almost as many times as I have, and given his feedback accordingly;
and for coming perilously close to being killed whilst riding my route in 2014, yet being both able and willing to ride it with me a year later.
Myra VanInwegen for providing the initial impetus for the web-publication side of this project, and carrying out some beta-testing in the Cambridgeshire/Bedfordshire section of the route.
Gareth Dawson, who flagged up an alteration to amenities in Ampthill.
Simon Beck, who wrote in with a correction (an A-road which was wrongly numbered in the notes).
Sam Franklin, for drawing to my attention a couple of errors relating to the disused railway near Old Warden.
Moshe Kamensky, for drawing my attention to the major road-closure near Soulbury in September 2006.
Roger Bryan, for pointing out in April 2007 that part of the new bypass was partially open as a way of reducing the length of the diversionary route.
David Splett, for offering a substantial amount of constructive criticism by email, making journeys along part of the route on my behalf, having a pedantically logical outlook that’s useful for this sort of project, and for accompanying me between Sandy and Ampthill in December 2004.
My godmother, who allowed her sitting-room floor to be covered by large amounts of mapping, with pieces of string taped to them.
Cambridgeshire County Council Libraries & Information Service, whose Central Lending Library furnished me with OS 1:50,000 Landranger sheets 153 (Bedford and Huntingdon), 165 (Aylesbury and Leighton Buzzard) and 164 (Oxford)
Honour Tomkinson who, with Kevin Moreland, runs both Bainton Bikes (bike hire) and Walton Street Cycles in Oxford, and who wrote a kind article in the Oxford Mail about this web-resource.