Time out.

I believe the last time i updated the blog was in cappadocia, a good three weeks ago, so i'd like to appologise for the lack of news on my journey.

it has however been a pretty mental 3 weeks. i don't have time now to tell you all about the adventurous things that ollie and i have been up to but i would like to briefly tell you about one event in particular, so that i might justify the lack of blogging and the inevitable delay that there is going to be in telling you about the remainder of our trip.

Whilst in syria, on our way from hamma to lebenon, ollie and i found ourselves caught in the middle of a shoot out between Syrian security forces and what were later described to us as 'terrorists'. to cut a long story short (and i promise to give a full account of this episode when i have time) we were used as a human shield by the 'terrorists' as they escaped from their car which had had its tyres shot out by the security forces. the bullets were flying all around us and not really knowing what was going on i genuinely thought that the gun toting badies were getting out of their car to kill us. we peddalled as fast as we could past the car, bullets still whizzing by, and whilst heading for cover i crashed my bike into the 6ft steel upright of a sign post. the adrenalin pumping i did not initially feel the pain and ollie and i were able to firstly crawl and then leg it to relative safety without being shot. the gun battle raged for 15 minutes and it was whilst hiding in a school that i realised that my back was totally screwed. again to cut a long story short, i was rushed to hospital in an ambulance and after x-rays i was diagnosed luckily, not with a broken back, but a compressed spine.

i have been in a lot of pain since and was forced to take a 100 mile bus ride to damascus where i rested for 5 days. having to take the bus was really tough to do as i felt it compromised the 'purity' of my ride. i felt pretty low about it.

we are now back on the bikes and having gotten out of syria we have made it to petra via jerash and the dead sea.

we will hopefully make it to cairo and the pyramids in time to get our scheduled flights home but it was the delay in damascus (where government controlls on the internet meant i couldnt use facebook or blog) that means i am going to have very little time to keep blogging over th next two weeks. i do however promise to finish the blog as soon as i can as things have been getting very intesting lately, with the ride becoming more of a mental challenge than a physical one.