Vans piled high with bags, suits, pears, apricots, cashews, cake and spare inner tubes, one month ago we road to COP26, from London. All 175 of us.

Well, actually, whilst some of us rode the whole trip, some of us did a day or two, and others, still, drove.

But we got there.

As the dust settles, and the dried grit hardens on our Ride the Change caps, we asked riders to reflect on, look back and digest what happened in that week at the end of October, when a load of us took to our bikes, loaded vans with snacks and packs and cycled to Glasgow to mark the significance of the international 26th Conference of Parties. To say the simple, impactful message of ‘this is important, we care’.

For those that care about cycling stats, facts and figures; our route tells a West Side Story; from Vauxhall’s Tea House Theatre we got to Oxford then Coventry, Stoke, Preston, Penrith, Dumfries, East Kilbride and finally Glasgow, 7 days later…

We cycled 504 miles, spent 7.5 days on the road, climbed 7,277m of hills, averaged 72miles a day (which hides the Day-5-90-mile-Beast), survived an amber weather warning, cabbaged in front of a film festival, ate 400 juicy pears (collectively), scoffed 140 pouches of super soft apricots (mainly by crew) and fixed 89.5 punctures (more on that below).

More importantly, so far, Ride the Change has saved 5,517 chickens worth of meat, 18 x 25m swimming pools worth of water, 2809 flights from Glasgow to Amsterdam, 7356 wheelie bins full of waste and much (thanks to Joe's endless pear juices, pear jams, pear tarts and pear purees throughout November), by riders raising pledging through Do Nation’s platform.

That is impact.

To mark this collective journey, and to share our collective memories, we’ve pulled together a special Adventure Uncovered Edition dedicated to Ride the Change, featuring stories from the road, the riders and those we met along the way: The Road to COP26.

Claudia Ruane shares a run down of the ride, the project’s origins and the all important pledge update.

It was the community of people that made this ride special. No doubt about it. So we spotlight some of the riders and share their reasons for signing up. Filmmaker Ellie Mackay collected messages from riders to take to COP26 to accompany these.

Anna Lawson and Ben Smith from Arup share insights from the organising group, and the road itself, as does Grace ter Haar, Matt T and Ajai Ahluwalia. Harriet Talbot shares her reflections through a beautiful poem.

We also invited reflections from those we met along the way, Preston Councillor Carol Henshaw and Climate Action Preston’s Cycling Co-ordinator Julie Ridley share thoughts on cycling, sustainability and climate action in their city. Anna Hughes, crew mechanic and Director of Flight Free UK shares a hopeful message of bicycles as a force for social good as does Norman Armstrong from Free Wheel North in Glasgow.

Writer Julian Sayarer naturally managed to put pen to paper twice over, once taking shelter inside a 'dry' pub (isn't that an oxymoron?) in Cumbria, an idyllic place to reflect towards the end of the ride. This followed his meandering cycling backstory on how he actually ended up on such a ride.

Veteran COP cyclist James Levelle writes about how he made the most of his incredible 9,000-mile emission-free mission to the UN Climate Conference in Chile, which, after social unrest in Santiago, never happened and moved to Madrid. And last but not least Hermione Taylor, the chief instigator behind the ride, reflects on how the ride actually came about and where it was born 10-years ago in a beautiful personal account.

So there we have it.

A project, that took two years in the making, with jack-knife twists and hairpin turns (not least the major interruption of COVID-19), is now complete.

Except, in reality, this is only the beginning.

With murmurs of another ride next year (who’s down for the London - Egypt triathlon #TriTheChange ? - branded swim cap anyone?) it’s now down to us, the 175 riders, to grow this vibrant and hopeful community and to keep this common dream alive.

See you on The Road*

The Team @ Adventure Uncovered.

*ideally a flat, quiet and smooth one.

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