Kutaisi to Khashuri - 112km

We left Kutaisi with regret, after another huge feast of a breakfast! Nugzar and Timur led us to the edge of town, and I was racing behind wishing I was sitting in the luxury of a leather seated Jeep. It was flat for 35km out of town and then the 'sticky wheel' syndrome started.

It is very strange how an uphill can look convincingly like a downhill, and it is amazing how frustrated one gets with oneself at not being able to go faster on the downhill. I even stopped to check my wheels and to see that the brakes weren't rubbing. Thankfully Humphrey was going through the same, and I think we had been deceptively climbing a long time.

Many people stop and shout things at us, mainly 'hello' and 'where are you from?' I was racing down, or trying to, one of the few actual downward stretches when a man shouted out, ' Are you from Great Britain?' I shouted back 'Yes!' without stopping, thinking to myself, how refreshing it was to hear someone say Great Britain, most people don't know what it is! He shouted something else, but I just waved and carried on.

I caught up with Humphrey and told him about my 'GB' encounter and he was equally surprised. Then the chap who had shouted pulled up behind us and got out and introduced himself as Temur. And then asked whether I knew Tony. The penny finally dropped...My friend Tony had put me in touch with a friend of his in Georgia, and although we had not actually spoken, I suppose there aren't many cyclists on the roads in Georgia!! It was such an extraordinary way to meet him.

From there the road got worse and we faced a 3km steady climb up to a 1000m pass. I was surprised at how well I coped with it, and it was mainly the boredom that made me stop. We got to the top and raced through the tunnel, and it was downhill from there!!!

We arrived in the town Khashuri as it was getting dark, and asked the police men about a hotel to stay in. They pointed us to one 20km down the road. An impossibility, Georgian drivers in the dark is not a good combination. So we donned our high vis vests, lights on and sped as fast as we could out of town to try and find a suitable camping spot. I suggested we pull over to the left down a lane and there happened to be a farm there. We went to ask whether it was OK to set up a tent there and they invited us in for coffee. We walked up the stairs and were greeted by a very rural scene. It was barely furnished, with just wooden stools and benches to sit on. A wood burner in the corner being fuelled by pine cones, two grubby but beautiful children wandering round one of whom had a book that he was ripping pages out of, both of them scratching their heads with lice...There was no running water which put paid to Brown's statement that broadband was as important as running water and heating! They were wonderfully welcoming, brewing us Turkish coffee and offering us some of their food. Humphrey did a stirling job of communicating in Russian with them and I relied on hand signals. It was quite late and we made signs to go and put up our tent but they said stay here!! We have two beds! It was difficult to refuse at this point. They made us a cup of fresh mint tea, freshly picked from the garden and then we went to bed. It was quite extraordinary to see the huge gap between the rich and poor here.

We got up early and were on the road by 8, but were faced with a horrendous head wind that slowed me down to 15-17kph and made the journey to Gori very tough.