If all has gone according to plan then today Mr Danny Fantastic should have set off on his journey to India.

"Big wow," some might say, "India's so 90s." Or, "Terrific! What a place to visit. Not the best weather at this time of year, but hey, who needs the sun?."

But for those who don't know the thing that makes Dan's trip a little different is that - but for the little matter of the English channel - he's planning on cycling pretty much all the way from Barnet to Bombay (and maybe a little bit further) with just 40GB of iRiver music and a big book to keep him from losing his marbles.

Having packed in his job with the evil Murdoch Superglobomegacorp, he'll ride through Europe, Turkey, Iran, and on to India, camping where he can, relying on the kindness of strangers when necessary, and maybe giving the odd dusky local beauty a story or two to tell about her night with the strange English boy who rode through town one day.

He even has the ambition of providing local news outlets with the occasional outrageous "And finally..." along the way.

Whatever he gets up to, he's promised to document at least some of it along the way, on his specially built blog.

We're not expecting him back for about nine months, and he'll leave a big hole behind. As a founding member of Albatross his reliability, intelligence and steadying influence will be missed at the pub quiz. And it's strange to think that we won't be seeing his big smiley face, listening to another of his seemingly endless supply of fresh anecdotes, hearing him play sax, or just talking crap over beer for a long while.

I think I'm right in saying we're still building our friendship after a fairly slow, tentative start that dates back several years, but this much I know: he's a good man, a good friend, and he'll be missed.

God speed, Dan. Travel safe, and come back soon.