Arachnophobia on a bike

Stage 6, day 4 (Tuesday, 27 September 2011)
Znojmo to Mikulov (91 km)

The slithery sandy track I’m on disappears into a thick, dark wood. It looks ominous, but I press on. I can’t see much with my sunglasses on, but straight away I feel the thick, sticky pull of cobwebs across my skin. And where there’s webs, there’s... SPIDERS! Big, plump ones suspended one after the other across the overgrown trail. The horror! As an arachnophobe, I couldn’t continue along here even if it was the last available route out of hell. All I can do is turn around and retrace my tracks. Unfortunately, that means taking with me the remaining webs and spiders I didn’t pick up on my way in. Back in the field, I descend into panic. I try to flick the beasts off me, my body convulsing and my arms and legs flailing (imagine, if you will, Ian Curtis attempting the cancan on two wheels). Just as I’m beginning to recover a mite of composure, I spot a whopping specimen with a bloated grey abdomen hitching a ride on my handlebars. Worse still, he’s crawling towards my right hand. What has, up to now, been a mere panic attack turns into a fully fledged physical and psychological meltdown. I blow the bugger off his perch just as he’s reaching my thumb, but he immediately starts scrabbling back up his thread. The bike lurches to one side as I momentarily lose control, and in the process the angry arthropod gets a dose of my spokes and is knocked to the ground. That, I’m glad to say, is the last I see of him.