French turn back duo who ‘cycled’ across the Channel for cancer charity
THE idea was simple, if somewhat madcap: pedal across the Channel on a tandem bicycle strapped to two canoes in tribute to a lifelong friend who died of cancer last year. But the French authorities were having none of it.
Father and son Andy and Bradley Lang had to turn back halfway through their fundraising attempt on Monday after being refused permission to take their “unorthodox craft” into French waters.
The pair, from Torquay, Devon, had intended to pedal the 22 miles from Dover to the French coast to raise money for Cancer Research UK following the death last year of Dominic Donoghue, a friend of Andy’s who had suffered with an aggressive back tumour.
However, they had to turn round on reaching French waters and pedal all the way back, landing at Folkestone after seven and a quarter hours of nonstop effort.
“We had been hoping to go all the way across,” said Andy, 50. “But the French introduced a ban on unorthodox craft going into their waters because they were fed up with rescuing people. We applied for exceptional permission to cross, but were refused.
“We still pedalled the full distance, just that it was halfway there and back, instead of all the way across.”
He built the sea bike from scratch at a cost of several hundred pounds, adapting a normal tandem by attaching it to two canoes, with a rudder controlled by a wire connected to the front forks. So far the duo have raised more than £3,600.
He said of Mr Donoghue: “Dom had a tumour in his back and it spread. He fought it for six or seven months. When he died I had to do something in his memory.
“Every time I felt a bit of pain as we pedalled across I thought of what he went through. And my son Brad would gee me along whenever I started complaining. We encouraged each other.”
The pair enjoyed good conditions for their crossing – even managing to change the chain driving their pedalpowered propellor when it snapped several miles in. But they had to be constantly on their guard for the huge freight ships and ferries using one of the world’s busiest shipping lanes.
France introduced its ban – known as Rule 126 – in 2013, after the authorities became fed up with rescuing eccentric adventurers attempting to make the crossing.
The rule prevents “unorthodox craft” that are “not adequate for deepsea navigation in a heavy traffic area”.
It put an end to a fine tradition of crossing the Channel by weird and wonderful means, which began when William Hoskins did so on a bale of straw in 1862. The first crossing by bike
‘We still pedalled the full distance, just that it was halfway there and back instead’
came in 1883, when Terah Terry mounted a tricycle on a canoe body.
The French still allow swimmers and their support craft to cross the Channel as long as they register in advance, apparently believing that they pose less danger to other craft and themselves. Those who flout the ban face fines or prison if they have to be rescued.
Lieutenant Richard Duchet, of the French maritime authority Action de l’etat en Mer, said that while unusual means of crossing the Channel may have been a quaint, eccentric tradition in the past, “the sheer size and numbers of craft in the Channel bear no comparison to the situation a century ago”.
Andy and Bradley Lang were not irresponsible in setting out on their tandem to cross the Channel. They planned for the weather and the need to avoid shipping. What stopped them was a French ban on “unorthodox craft”. So the father and son team turned back halfway into the 22-mile crossing and pedalled home to Blighty, saddle-sore but pleased to have raised money for charity. It was not as though the attempt was unprecedented, for the first successful crossing by tricycle was achieved in 1883, eight years after Matthew Webb found a place in history and a label on matchboxes by swimming the Channel – and what could be more unorthodox than that? The English Channel – at least our side of it – is bound to go on attracting eccentric record-breakers, for no more reason than because it’s there.