The Chain Gang Cycle Tours

Well, Well, Well

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Last night I was dragged along to a wine-tasting event, The Chiswick Wine Society Christmas Extravaganza 2008 (Monday Edition) by a good friend of mine, Damaris.

Among many other attributes, Damaris is an 8-time veteran of Chain Gang tours – she hasn’t done all 7 tours like the legendary Taras, but she’s a repeat offender on our Bordeaux and Dordogne trips.

Years ago, at a wine-tasting event, we met a fabulous guy who runs wine clubs, tasting courses and runs his own wine business. Lots of people do that, but Tim Syrad is the guy I’d trust to turn anybody on to wine. Damaris, a Chiswick Chick these days, joined Tim’s Chiswick Wine Society, and as an occasional visitor I was delighted to be invited along yesterday.

We tasted some lovely wines, a vintage champagne alongside a Bollinger Special Cuvee, 2 first-vintages, a Super Tuscan from Montalcino and a sublime Vosne-Romanee from Nuits St George in Burgundy. On the way out I got chatting to Tim who mentioned that he kept up-to-date with the Chain Gang through his wine clubs.

A bit puzzled, I asked him how that would be, and it turns out he has plenty of Chain Gang cyclists among his tipplers. Which is how he came to introduce me to Richard Seeley and Judy Carr, 4-time Chain Gang veterans (Burgundy, Provence, Bordeaux and Umbria )!

Taras and I are the only people in the whole world who know they’ve not done our 2 best tours . . . answers on a postcard please. I’ve never met Richard or Judy, and here they are sat in the same wine-tasting, what a treat. It was so difficult setting up The Chain Gang - I don’t think anybody really believes the feeling of joy and screaming delight when somebody says “I’d like to cycle with you again”. If you can understand that, then imagine how it feels to meet two 4-time repeat customers out of the blue on a December night at a wine-tasting.

Words fail me. Great to meet you, Richard and Judy, and thanks for making my week.

An Early Christmas!

Every year, once our cycling season has finished, there’s a list of jobs to be done, especially relating to next season. We have to book all our hotels in France and Italy, for example, as early as we can, especially in hot spots like Provence, Tuscany and the Loire Valley.

But we can’t do that until we’ve had the chance to review all our customer feedback. We have to decide on dates, prices and update our booking forms. When we know if we’ve changed any routes or hotels, we still have to write and design a new brochure. Then we have to make sure The Chain Gang website is updated and get all the print sorted out.

There’s a lot to do to try and get ready for early January, but because nobody is chasing me in October and November it’s very easy to let a bit of time slip, and before you know it, it’s that December time again. All the French hotels are on fermeture

Annuelle, designers are going on holiday, and printers have all shut down for the year. And all this matters, because people are beginning to plan their holidays, and it feels such a disaster to send brochures out in February or March. I can hardly bear to think about it.

Not this year! We have our first bookings already, 6 of them, and it’s not even Christmas. 2007 was our record year, but even so we’ve never received a booking before Christmas, and now we already have 6 of them.

Have we turned the corner? Could this be the start of something wonderful? Who knows, we may be on the verge of overnight success after 11 years. Wouldn’t that be something?