Today was not an ordinary day on our Rome2Home trip. It
started as normal, Jack being last to the shower, awful porridge, a wet tent
and leaving few minutes late. But, it soon went down hill…
Jack and Arch were smashing through the miles a good rate
this morning. The only interruption was going through a street market, where
dismounting was essential to weave our way through the crowd of mingling
people. Luckily we avoided hitting anyone of the many French who insisted on
walking in front of us. However, this was when our luck ran out……. Jack had a
pretty bad crash and ended up in an ambulance being driven sirens and all to a
specialist hospital. Don’t worry too much, it was only his elbow!
Basically he fell off, landed very heavily on his elbow and
now has large hole (going down to the bone) in it.
Picture the scene, Archie says to Jack “err Jack, you have
got a rather large hole in your elbow.”
To which Jack replies, “Bollocks, I don’t believe you.”
“No mate, I am being genuinely serious here. It looks pretty
bad.”
At this point the pain catches up with Jack, “This
F*&!?)^ing hurts. I can’t see it
though.”
Cue picture taking of elbow, it being shown to Jack, then a
realization by us both that it was pretty damn bad. From this pint on Jack is
chiefly lying on the floor in a lot of pain.
It became more of a disaster as Arch just couldn’t get hold
of Fred in the support car. So in panic he started waving down cars and
knocking on doors to ask someone for help. A very kind French couple stopped
their car to helped us out. They called an ambulance, gave the ambulance crew
their address and outlined the wound. They then stayed with us until the
ambulance arrived, and even left their number to call them if we had any
further problems. Such kindness from complete strangers was truly incredible.
An ambulance arrived and we were rushed off to hospital at
full speed. At this point we finally go hold of Fred who picked up the bikes that
we had left at some random French persons house, and gave him the address of
the hospital we were going to.
Jack had lots of X-Rays and saw many doctors, and they
finally got onto fixing his elbow. They cut a few bits out here and there,
stitched it up a fair bit, before releasing him with strict instructions not to
use it for the next 15 days.
By this point the day had sort of passed us by, so we
grabbed some lunch and started to drive to Calais. Cycling after all that had happened,
especially trying to cover the 80 miles we still had to go, was just not feasible.
On the way we paused to stop and pay our respect to some WW1 cemeteries near.
It was a rather humbling experience, and rather put the suffering and stress of
today into perspective.
We have checked into a room in Calais, we thought it might not
be great for Jack to camp with such a wound! Hearsey was playing up a bit, just
some stuff leaking out of her…… fingers crossed she makes it!
What an end to our last day on the continent…..
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