What's the Beef?

Salt Beef

It leaves a nasty taste in the mouth when a charity you have worked for is hung out to dry. When that charity is providing an invaluable public service, that taste is even more salty.

Sadly, having been squeezed of funding and practically left to fend for themselves, that is how the 450 independent legal advice centres operating in England and Wales feel. Five of those centres operating across 6 boroughs in South London are run by South West London Law Centres.

Changes to the way the government hands out its legal aid budget mean that these centres are now threatened with closure.

I have worked in Morden Legal Advice Centre for the last few years as an evening advisor and have seen first hand the incredibly valuable work that the centre does.

Unless the government changes its policy on legal aid, centres like Morden and the other centres run by SWLLC face closure. For a goverment trying to improve access to justice, this is quite simply a disgrace and would be a catastrophe for the 26,000 people who use the centres.

I have decided to donate half the money raised by this trip to SWLLC to try and keep these incredible centres doing their wonderful work for as long as possible.

Support Me With a Donation to SWLLC

Hand-Reared Beef

Kazakhstan is a developing country and as such is facing many difficult social and economic issues. Ravaged by high unemployment, inflation, extreme poverty, drug addiction and AIDS, any citizen has his work cut out to make ends meet. Imagine what chance an orphan has.

Thanks to SOS Children's Villages, there are three centres across Kazakhstan helping improve the chances of these children being brought through from a rough start to a positive and successful adult life.

The centre I will be visiting on my ride was established in 1997 and is on the outskirts of Almaty. Over 95 children between 18 months and 15 years old live in the 11 family houses with their SOS mothers. There is a nursery school that also takes the children from the neighbourhood and medical care is provided by a small SOS clinic.

There are now two further SOS centres in Astana and Temirtau.

SOS Children's Villages is the world's largest orphan charity and they are second-to-none in their committment to creating the very best environment possible for these youngsters.
Since I will be enjoying the pleasure of their wonderful country for a couple of weeks, I will be donating half of all donations to making sure these children get the best start possible.

SOS Children's Villages Main Site

Support Me With a Donation to SOS

Hormone-Enhanced Beef

Vinokourov Descends Galibier 2005

The original inspiration for this ride came from Alexander Vinokourov. "Vino" remains arguably Kazakhstan's most famous sporting export since wrestling on horseback failed to achieve global appeal (though rumour has it BBC are planning to show it on Grandstand in the autumn).

I watched in awe in 2005 when Vino scaled the mighty Col du Galibier and went on to win stage 11 of the Tour de France, a mountain I had crawled up only a couple of weeks before. It was an immense ride. He was at the peak of his career.

The following day L'Equipe hailed "Le Grand Alexandre" on the front page and I set off determined to cycle the mysterious country that had produced this great climber. France is the Mecca of cycling and yet they can't produce a champion. If Kazakhstan could produce Vino it must be worth a visit.

Sadly in 2007, legendary cyclist became stinking cheating coward when he was thrown out of the Tour de France and given a one year ban for injecting himself with someone else's blood. In the frankenstein world that some cycling team doctors live in this is a well known way to improve performance. I was hoping for a more parental style of punishment like injecting him with more and more blood until he learnt his lesson, but I guess there are better uses for the stuff. The exposure of his cheating shattered any respect I had for pin-cushion Vino.

Nevertheless, I decided to continue with my challenge to travel across Kazakhstan by bike. Vino has now retired to some junkie bedsit on the back streets of Astana and is rumoured to be starring in the sequel to Trainspotting.

In a small gesture of recognition to Vino's role in originally inspiring this trip, I will be permitting one performance enhancing drug on the Tour of Kazakhstan - vodka.

Welsh Rare Beef

The other cycling inspiration for this trip has been unsung cycling ace Nicole Cooke. I grew up about 3 miles away from Nicole though whilst I was trying to coax my Grifter through the flooded lanes to Cowbridge, Nicole was winning national senior titles and therefore (strangely enough) our paths never crossed.

Nevertheless as a part-timer it has been an inspiration to watch a local girl achieve so much through incredible amounts of hard work and dedication. Nicole has won the UCI World Cup twice, the women's Tour de France twice as well as taking Commonwealth gold for Wales in 2002.

When I set off to drag my rickety trailer around a sandy central Asian republic, Nicole will be half way through another attempt on the women's Tour de France in preparation for a shot at Olympic gold in August. Good luck Nicole and hope to one day catch you on the road to Southerndown.

Mad Cow Disease

To me there is nothing more logical than heading out on the bike over an enormous wilderness in search of adventure. However, I appreciate that there are those who will think that this kind of behaviour should put me in Paul Gascoigne's team in the great kickabout against the men in white coats.

The reasons I have mentioned above are the main motivations for this tour but I guess I have a little desire to go and do something a bit unusual as well.

I don't think that's madness, but as one antipodean cousin said in reply to a blog post I put up describing my trip:

"it probably is madness yeah, but a bit of madness every now and again's alright eh?"

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