It's now only a few weeks until the annual nationwide 'Bike Week.' Essentially this is a celebration of cycling, and an opportunity to promote and highlight the associated social, health and environmental benefits. It aims go get us all onto a bicycle for even just a short while during the week, and encourages people to consider incorporating cycling into their lives for general transport, commuting, shopping or just for fun - anything goes!

There will be fun events, rides, competitions and workshops happening all over the U.K so make sure you check out the Bike Week website and see what's happening near you.

I'll be heading back to Northern Ireland and working with Sustrans (the U.K's sustainable transport organisation) to give my "Cycling Reporter' lecture in a number of schools during the week. Keep an eye on my site for further updates on that and possibly a few other things.

So if you've been meaning to get that bicycle out for ages but haven't got round to it, or even if you're already a bike fanatic then there's plenty for you to get involved with during Bike Week - no excuses!

Who would have thought that typing things into a computer could be a bigger challenge than riding a bicycle half way around the world? Nevertheless it seems so, at least in the early stages. After a couple of months of planning and procrastinating (in unequal measure) I've finally started the task of effectively gathering and ordering the stories, adventures, lessons and philosophies that 'The Cycling Reporter' brought into my life.

Right now the thought of authoring an entire book with any sort of coherence terrifies me more than slightly, but if I learn one thing from cycling it was that by chipping away at something day by day and ignoring setbacks then just about anything is achievable. Practice what you preach they say, and 'they' are rarely wrong.

In other news - it's a bank holiday next week in the U.K. I'll be having myself another lovely little mini-adventure - I encourage you to make the most of that extra weekend day as well!

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One of the really rewarding aspects of my recent New York to Hong Kong cycle has been the supportive emails, messages and general feedback I've received. A recurring theme was that readers of my blog were enjoying being able to live vicariously though my travels; that is, to take pleasure in the experiences I was having from their own location hundreds or even thousands of miles away.

I felt (and still feel) incredibly lucky to be able to spend a year of my life doing what I love - riding a bicycle, playing with video cameras and travelling through exciting new places. To be able to share it online with the world was a wonderful bonus, and now I'm finished I find a similar sense of fulfillment following the travels of others.

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 It’s now been 2 months since I finished cycling, and inevitably I have itchy feet. I’m being kept more than busy but I’d be lying if I said I didn’t regularly wake up disappointed to not be out under the stars. So what better time to find the adventures waiting on my doorstep?

Following in the footsteps of some real bona fide adventure bloggers who champion the ‘micro-adventure’ idea such as Al Humphreys and Tim Moss, I’ve come to the conclusion that there’s plenty of scope for something exciting to be done over the course of a few days or a weekend. The much-anticipated Royal Wedding came along last weekend and I can honestly say I was absolutely thrilled. Not about watching the wedding of course, I’d rather eat off my own leg, but rather the fact that it provided a 4 day holiday for most of the nation. The perfect chance for a micro-adventure, but what to do?