A HORWICH man who is cycling across the world is progressing well with his incredible challenge — reaching the central Asian country of Kyrgyzstan.

Jimmy Hailwood began his 20,00 kilometre journey from Australia to Bolton at the start of the year and is hoping to make it back to his hometown by Christmas.

So far he has manoeuvred his way through Indonesia, Bhurma, Bangladesh, Nepal and India.

His next stop will be Tajikistan and then Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan before making his way across the vast landscape of Iran.

The intrepid 28-year-old will then move into Turkey before cycling through Europe and back to his beloved Bolton.

Mr Hailwood is completing the seismic challenge in a bid to raise money for Derian House Children’s Hospice, which he chose because of the support the centre gave to a friend of his whose daughter passed away.

His remarkable efforts have so far raised close to £4,500 for the hospice.

Mr Hailwood has lived down under for the past five years and after deciding to come home — he did away with plans for a traditional flight back to England, opting instead to make the epic journey on two wheels.

Mr Hailwood has been updating his friends, family and followers of his trials and tribulations along the way on his facebook page.

He told readers that his trip through India represented the toughest challenge so far.

He said: “India has been without the hardest country — its a crazy country for both good and bad reasons and it's hard to sum up a country which holds 1.3 billion people within its borders in a few sentences.

“I suppose you have to judge a country on its people as that is what makes it and with India I'd say it's definitely not the best of the countries I've visited so far, in the sense that the Indians don't seem very welcoming and are frequently rude when compared to its neighbours of Nepal and Myanmar.”

The locals in Kyrgyzstan were also not hugely welcoming of the Horwich cyclist, but he has managed to warm them up a little with his attempts at broken Russian.

He wrote: “You can definitely tell Kyrgyzstan used to be part of the USSR, all the buildings look square and out dated and even the police here are driving around in the old school lada's like the ones you see in the movies of Soviet Russia, it's funny to see.

“The general public aren't the happiest looking people either, all very stern looking.

“It is like they're not allowed to smile at you — but they seem to crack a smile when I use the little Russian I’m learning — probably cause I'm getting it completely wrong.”

If you would like to support Jimmy in his fundraising efforts visithttp://justgiving.com/backtobritainbybike/ or text the code BBBB92 followed by any amount from £1-£10 to the number 70070.