We left Wigan at 8am just as the rain set in and it carried on raining for most of the rest of the day. We survived crossing Preston in the rush hour and after that traffic levels were fine. We made good speed to Lancaster and then on to Kendal practically without stopping. Kendal seemed to be full of people looking for something to do in the rain and was extremely busy. We found a covered alleyway in which to have a dryish lunch as it was still raining hard. Cycling up out of Kendal we came across another group of cyclists with their support vehicle and drivers. They were cycling a more direct and shorter route to John O Groats in 7 days averaging 125 miles a day. At the top of Shap Fell pass one of the drivers kindly took our photo (see attached). These riders couldn't keep up with us on the downhills due tpo our luggage weight but easily caught up with us on the uphill sections for the same reason.
During the 8 hours of rain we 'enjoyed' today, we discovered that every piece of waterproof clothing eventually let the water in, so we arrived in Carlisle dripping and squelching and even then the hotelier advised us to take the bikes up to our room! Fortunately the waterproof panniers really were so we had dry things to change into. Our room now looks like a Chinese cycling laundry.
