Aching muscles, mysterious bruises and a dehydration headache are all familiar to me. Except now I've been sober for three years, they come not with regret and anxiety but alongside satisfaction, pride and a stronger mind.

The Dartmoor Way is a wonderful, 90-mile cycle route around the national park's hilly perimeter. It has everything from lanes and gorges to freely roaming sheep and rushing waterfalls.

Dartmoor is a place of striking granite tors, pockets of temperate rainforest, wide open moorland and secluded river valleys. There are endless cycle routes to explore thanks to the lanes, byways, bridle paths and open moor that you can explore with reckless abandon. This is a fantastic 30km ride in the east of the national park.

Cycling up hills is never easy but it's no reason to avoid riding. As a pro-grumbler but an avid cyclist, here are my tips for getting the motivation for cycling up hills. Frankly, much of it applies to general life too. Especially the first one.

As I cycled past them, this dog was suddenly no longer up the bank but running across in front of its owner and straight out onto the cycle path. The only thing I had time to do as I watched my 23 mm tyre slam into the side of this exuberant creature was think, 'f*ck, I'm going to kill it.'

With only one whole day a week in which to go on a Long Expedition with a part-time sun and fickle weather, the pressure to plan and execute a glorious adventure can run away with itself.But not every ride and walk are going to blow you away and sometimes it's the smaller things that provide the joy.

Stretching from Bovey Tracey right on the south eastern edge of the Dartmoor, to around 7 miles up to Moretonhampstead, the Wray Valley Trail mostly uses a disused railway line.Not content with that, I decided we'd carry on to the Teign river and get some mud on the tires and sweat on the brow. This is a beautiful 22-mile route with plenty of views!

I don't find it too difficult to plan a bike ride, but I do find it difficult to have faith in my planning skills. I'm terrible for underestimating the steepness and length of hills - last Sunday I spent 20 minutes of a 3 hour ride going up one, incredibly long, steep hill - and I'm equally awful at remembering to let my stomach have a say in the preparation.Every time I go out for a jaunt and forget something, I think, 'the moment I get home I will write a damn checklist!'

This is a trail likely familiar to most two-wheeling residents. It actually stretches from Exmouth on the east coast of the estuary, all the way to Dawlish on the west coast. Exeter lies in the middle of the trail, upriver, allowing you to chose either direction and reach the sea with relative ease.

As Devon bike rides go, cycling the Grand Western Canal from Tiverton is an exceptionally beautiful one. 22 miles and flat, it's a slice of paradise that I'd never known existed.