The conventional route from London to Plymouth by train is directly from Paddington station. Our cheapskate tickets had us depart from Waterloo and involved a change of train at Exeter. This really presented no inconvenience to us South Londoners, in spite of the lengthier journey and we set off in sunshine for the nation's largest station. Our train was due to depart at 16:20. We allowed plenty of time. London was quiet and the ride was pleasant enough to put us both in holiday mood. We had no trouble either stowing the bikes or finding our seats. We shared a table with Mary, a psychotherapist from Yeovil in Somerset and Ron a food writer for What's On In London magazine, who was travelling to Exeter to stay with friends. They were both entertaining company. This was a good start.

Between Exeter and Plymouth we passed through places we'd cycled through on last year's short trip from St. Austell in Cornwall to Lyme Regis in Dorset, that time shadowing the South-west coast of England. [is there a theme here?]

It was dark when we arrived in Plymouth, an hour and three-quarters before the due departure of the ferry at 11.00pm.

The cabin was surprisingly large and comfortable. In the capacious bar, we ate, drank and listened to the on-board entertainers running through Motown hits to the accompaniment of a rhythm machine, then went to bed.

The sea was calm and we had a reasonable if incomplete sleep; we were woken at 6.00am British time, an hour before docking at Roscoff. I ate a croissant and drank orange juice and coffee. We cyclists were allowed off the boat first and so rode away into a 40kph wind.