Cycling 2920 miles ... to see pals
A former Wallace High pupil took on a gruelling cycling challenge - with a four month spell in war-torn Palestine breaking up the journey.
Ruth Cape, from Bridge of Allan, first visited Palestine in 2009, when she spent the summer volunteering with a Palestinian family on their farm near Bethlehem.
Since then, she has longed to return to reconnect with friends and show solidarity with their plight.
However Ruth’s determination to get there without flying - to be more green - meant she decided to cycle the journey, despite never having undertaken a long distance bike ride before.
The 26 year-old had practised for the 2920-mile journey by cycling 10 miles to work.
“I hadn’t done any tour cycling before,”she said.“On the Isle of Harris, where I was working, I had the best commute in the world cycling up and down the west coast of the island, which was 10.5 miles.”
Setting off with her Edinburgh University pal Bella Crowe in September of last year, Ruth cycled through 11 different countries from Cornwall to Istanbul.
They then caught a boat to Athens, after which they caught a cargo ship to Haifa in Israel.
The pair both spent four months volunteering in Palestine, helping out with the Tent of Nations project, which aims to bring people from around the world together to learn about their situation and to protect the family’s land from confiscation.
“There are so many horrendous things happening there,”she said. “Being one person, you do what you can to make it a little better without expecting to be able to change much.
“You can show solidarity and support to people, hear their stories and take the memories back home with you.
The people are so friendly, and I really enjoy the country as well.”
At the end of March, Ruth started to cycle the 3000km back from Athens by herself, having parted ways with Bella in the Greek capital, and arrived home six weeks later on May 24.
There were many challenges she faced along both journeys, especially on the way back as she was riding by herself.
“There were some wild dogs in Hungary,”she said.“But I guess the way back was more of a daunting challenge as I was riding by myself.”