To Aberfoyle and Back - 200Km DIY - 23 December 2019

I'd been mulling over route options that stayed low and didn't climb much.
I'd been mulling over whether 3xRRTY was worth heading out again.
I'd not bothered to sort out the Mavic rear wheel until the Hunt snapped a spoke.
I didn't have a wheel for the Focus.

So it started, I wasn't massively up for the ride, my trusty Dawes Sardar hauled out from the back of the garage to stand in once again for a broken bike. I did briefly mull using the Synapse but that would have meant reduced carrying capacity and so more shop spending.

I hadn't used the Sardar since the Rannoch 210Km from Forfar last summer (2017) so gave it a shakedown on Saturday on my usual short route, being reminded in the process just how slow and heavy it was, I scratched around for the flattest possible route and having decided that any new route would involve risking navigational issues hauled out the significantly over distance "Aberfoyle and Back" route.

The route is a basic out and back, from Home to Auchterarder,  on through Dunblane to Doune then Thornhill and Aberfoyle, a nice simple 210km round trip; unfortunately that doesn't allow for avoiding the A9 which takes me out of Auchterarder on the Braco road, along to Kinbuck and then down into Dunblane, adding another 8km to the total.

First photo of the day, Braco

To assist with enthusiasm the weather forecast was promising, 5C overnight and into the day, decent cloud cover to trap some heat in.  I woke as usual to the Kraftwerk alarms bounced out of bed, breakfasted, got dressed and looked out the door...

After a sharp intake of breath forced by the frigid air that hit me I stepped out and obtained the Sardar from the garage I had it loaded up so only needed to set the computers and wheel it out the drive way onto the glistening road.  Early progress was slow and I passed the submitted start point at 0640.

My first major problem presented itself immediately after leaving the influence of the village's street lighting, I'd used a bad benchmark when setting the light angle and instead of a nice beam on the road I had a nice view of the top of my bar bag and a dim light on the road, thankfully enough to make out the edges. What was worse was that I couldn't get a grip on the tightener in order to adjust it so was stuck with it.

I started to feel wheel slip in places on the Gauldry climb, unseen ice waiting to catch me out. By the summit of the climb at Muir Dens I was below the required average of 14.3kmh, being slow up here is nothing normal, and usually I can claim a fair bit back on the descent of the tay coast road but with poor lighting and ice around I had to ca canny.

Despite taking care at the bottom of a dip my comfort braking was overtaken by the slippy conditions and I crunched along through the ice thankfully without enough squirm to land me on the deck.

Sheriffmuir from the Braco road

Much relief was felt on arriving at Newburgh and the A912 was both quiet and thankfully clean of hazzard. With light appearing in the sky I daftly chose the Dron route to Kintillo and returned myself to a skating rink but again got away with it with the improving visibility helping.

The Dunning road was thankfully pretty clear and I was passing the Maggie Wall monument when I felt the bike sliding down the ridges in the tar, I'm not sure if this was ice or if it was just the low speed and fat tyres make more obvious than normal but none the less it was disconcerting.

Auchterarder was busy and I was glad when I made it up onto the Braco road and stopped at the summit for a roll. With some heat in the sun now and the roads not bad I was able to make decent time and my average was now climbing nicely with over 17Kmh on the clock. I decided to give the shorter route I'd spotted to the Doune road a miss in these conditions and cracked on through Kinbuck and Dunblane with it's annoying one way system.

Braeval shrouded in cloud, but my target is in sight!

The A820 was as usual pretty quiet to Doune where I turned onto the Thornhill road, eventually the Laich of Mentieth appeared to my left and in the clouds ahead was Braeval and the Auchterarder junction, the second 55km of this rider are definitley much faster than the first!

In Aberfoyle I struggled to find the public toilets which I was convinced were in a prefab concrete block rather than outside the tourist info centre, after finding them I contemplated cake in a café but instead popped into the co-op for some water and millionaires shortbread to go with my 2nd pre-prepared sandwich.  Despite this I still spent over half an hour at the turn.

Setting off again the imperceptible wind must have been on my back as despite being a gentle climb to Doune I seemed to be powering along and my moving average was once again rising.  The Kinbuck climb does drag though and at one point I got confused and thought I'd gone through Braco and had missed the turn resulting in me heading to Creiff, a slightly concerning occurrence but I did quite quickly remind myself of where I actually was.

Rolling along slowly... Somewhere!

Braco Tower

Rolling into Braco for real I realized there's no way I could forget passing the tower in the old church yard and brought myself to the junction with the road to Auchterarder.  Finally I could see the top of the climb at the back of the hotel and stopped for the last sandwich from my bag to ready myself for the descent to Aberargie and into darkness.

Darkness finally dropped around the point it had lifted, I stopped in the underpass on the Dron road and decided to try my headtorch as an extra light, wrapping it round the bar bag, the weak beam flickering with the rattles and picking out not very much meant it was of limited use and I soon removed it.

Some interesting Christmas light displays were to be seen, with the cabins near Aberargie looking a lot like a manger scene at a distance, and Newburgh having rather colourful lights including surprisingly happy looking turkeys!  This of course signified the last climb, I had contemplated taking myself up to the A92 for a gentle blast along the main road but was up for the climb which on this side is thankfully much easier than the other.

Thankfully darkness means the 3 lumps of the coast road climb were less noticeable and other than a stop for a photo of the moon at Black Earnside I hardly noticed the efforts to get to Hazleton.

The descent however was another matter, normally I can really hammer it along here but with next to no visibility I had to take care not only of missing a turn but also of hitting pot holes and ice.  A couple of times I was able to make use of a tailing car's headlights to see where I was going and amazingly this happened in rather handy places including the Coultra drop and on the Gutchers! Relieved to finally be in the village I rolled along to the spar where I had the finish point set to buy some celebratory Creme Eggs.

Moulin Rouge - DIY 200 9th December 2018

With Kingdom come in my legs, a sniffle in my nose and a chill in the north westerly breeze I set out to blat out what had become my favourite 200km DIY route of my own creation so far.

Admittedly it only really competes with an out and back to Aberfoyle for that title BUT... it is rather nice.



The route starts off in Newport-On-Tay and then heads along the Tay Coast via the Gauldry hills; I had a worryingly low average up here with a threat of being full value on the cards already. The rude awakening always produces worrying numbers but usually you can pick it up again on the descent to Newburgh, but with that North Westerly blowing it was still looking like a long day.

My bike was making a number of "Interesting" noises with clunks from the back, sometimes clearly from the drive train, other times not so obvious. At Aberargie despite the quiet roads I still took the Dron road to Kintillo, frost glistened on the surface but I still felt enough traction that I didn't worry.

At this point I discovered that one of my bottles contained sports drink that could best be described as "off"; I had thought I could get away with keeping it from the previous week but the fizz and terrible taste said otherwise, I decided against stopping at Kintillo shop, my best chance of picking up some speed being on the relatively flat blat through Strathearn to Auchterarder, there are a few ramps along here and some days you hardly notice them while on others they grind you to a near halt and set your lungs screaming of penance . Today was the later.

A quick stop at Dunning shop for some alternative sports drink (Lucozade sport) which I watered down and some chocolate and I was off again.

Along to Auchterarder where I don't stop and onto Hunter Street; the Crieff road junction, this oddly ever since having housing estates tagged either side takes two unsigned turns, one a T-Junction and the other a roundabout, and back out into the country side.  This road lumps its way towards Crieff via Kinkell Bridge, the first part of this route to feed the name, being referred to as "Kinky Bridge" by some.

The Highlands looming ahead,
the gap at the foot of the
rainbow is the Sma' Glen

From the bridge we start to climb seriously after turning off the Crieff road at Millearne, although we're still in the Midland Valley this is where some of the toughest climbs of the day are, lumping over to New Fowlis on the A85, sometimes it's busy, but often not, you could spin along to Monzie (that's a Yough not a Zed, there's plenty more of them on this route) to climb into the Sma' Glen on a more gentle gradient if you really wanted to, but that would be too easy, climbing the Braes of Fowlis takes you through Fowlis Wester with it's replica pictish stone at the road side, and now we're going up severely, sever enough for the OS to give it a single chevron on the map. 100m up from New Fowlis in little more than 4km; at the summit the Highlands rise in front of you, the edge of the Midland Valley and start of the Highlands.

Descend to Buchanty on the River Almond, this is Lowland Glen Almond, the river near following the Highland Boundary Fault, before long a sharp ramp leads to a triangle junction with the A882, as you join this road the Highlands surround you as you cross the Fault and enter the Sma' Glen.

Through the Sma' Glen the road actually descents to Newton bridge, where you leave Highland Glen Almond behind and start the ascent to Amulree, quite a steady climb.
At Amulree you could divert by the leg burning and lung busting climb of Glen Quaich for a technical descent into Kenmore. However it's a direct route to Aberfeldy today, relief from the climb is short lived as the Glen Cochil junction is reached.  The summit at 393m next to the "loch" is the highest point of the ride, and from here it's a gentle descent followed by a sharp plunge into Aberfeldy.

Looking towards the divergence,
Glen Almond (of which the Sma' Glen is part) to the left,
the climb to Amulree on the right

You arrive in Aberfeldy at the cross roads at the west of the town and if you need proof of passage or just victuals you need to turn right into the town centre.
There are two ways to proceed from here, if it's busy crossing "Wade's Bridge" to Weem and heading East along the North road makes sense, however in the off season it's often quiet enough to blast along the south road. It was not long after passing the Dewars visitor centre that a loud crack was emitted by my rear wheel, the wobble that went with it told me enough, the whacking sound from the spoke hitting the frame confirmed it. I carried on until a suitable road end was found.

The spoke "fix" after I got home

A single spoke had snapped at the nipple, and the tyre was wobbling towards the disc side chain stay. Bollocks!
I considered adjusting other spokes but decided against it as the wheel was still rideable and fiddling with them may just make matters worse, especially since I'd be fiddling with the spokes beside the broke one.
Zip tying the flailing spoke to a neighbour seemed like a good approach, and I dug a zip tie out my bag, then i realized I now had a zip tie flailing around instead, thankfully I had a new first aid kit in the bag, and I went to get the scissors out of that, but I hadn't broken the seal on that yet so I couldn't open it, a surprisingly strong plastic tie between me and the scissors.  Digging further I found my tyre levers which I used the hook on to get the purchase required to snap the tie, obtain the scissors, cut the Zip tie and stow everything back in the bag. I carried on with wheel wobbling and considering my options.

I could ride to Pitlochry, get a train and DNF the ride; or.... The wheel has 32 spokes, I'm avoiding adjusting tensions for now but can do so if I need to, my other wheel has 24 spokes, that's a whole 8 less, why don't I have a fibre fix spoke? (it wouldn't be any use, the nipple dissappeared and is probably like last time a clean break at the edge), 8 less so I should be able to get away with this provided another spoke doesn't go... which means don't strain them too hard, erm... just a bit of climbing to go... ok.

Carry on along the tay past Grantully and you eventually get to a bridge over the tay, the roads approach on either side; an interesting detour here would be to carry on to Balnamuir and cross the Logierait bridge to get to the village.

On previous editions of this ride I've taken the Dunfallandy road as used by the Etapé Caledonia to get to Pitlochry and the climbed up via Moulin Village to get to the muir; however today I crossed the A9 on the bridge into Ballinluig, past the Motorgrill and... all the way along to the end of the road, I'd missed the turn.  Doubling back I accepted that the only option was to take the Dalcapon road, I know this road from officiating on the Saltire rally, and knew well enough it was a steep climb before a long gradual descent through Dalcapon itself before a plunge into the East Haugh.

The Dalcapon road eventually flattens out

The aim of going this way was to try out the shortest route from Aberfeldy to Kirkmichael in Stratardle, the distance difference is marginal and if you aren't hungry at Aberfeldy being in Pitlochry gives you another chance to feed before the long climb over the muir.  I also know this road from the Saltire and know it's steep... A rather bizzarley placed mini-roundabout lets you choose between Edradour and Croftinloan, not that there's any signs, and the climb takes you in stages to "Scotland's Smallest Distillery" before spitting you onto the main road over the muir.

Sunset on the Moulin Muir

The climb onto the Muir is more of the same, though possibly steeper to begin with but it's worth it, a rest at the summit shows you the descent to straloch and back over the Muir to Faragon hill, pitlochry deep down in the valley out of sight.
At last some speed though with the descent into darkness, winter roads and a sick wheel I wasn't for the summer heroics down here (even though less traffic makes it easier to maintain speed); with only a few bumps needing effort to climb you can maintain a decent pace all the way down the glen.




Normally at Kirkmichael I take the climb over to Dalrulzion (another Yough) but today I was wanting to try the Netherton Road out of Bridge of Calley; this mean more mostly downhill where as normally I'd be climbing again, and then climbing steeply out of Bleaton Hallet to High Rannagulzion before descending off the muir into Alyth. However today I took the road by Netherton and Drimmie, missing the Alyth junction in the process.  The road is set up to take you to Blairgowrie and I think if heading to Bridge of Calley I'd want to go to Coupar Angus and then across to Meigle.

At Alyth I stopped at the Co-Op in the Square, this is one of many small Scottish towns where there are two co-ops, one a co-op group, the other a Scottish Midlands co-op, we are now once again in the Midland Valley, the Highlands left behind on the descent into Alyth.

Only the Sidlaw hills now stand between us and home, fast rolling roads and gentle undulating descents take us out of Alyth and through Meigle with Belmont castle hiding in the trees.  A house lit up over a bridge looks a bit like a low bridge, but the road turns right and we continue on to Newtyle at speed.  From here however we must climb to Auchterhouse, the hill is deceptive and looks steep but never really asks for serious effort.

From the summit the muir descends at a reasonable rate before forcing you to climb from Dronley up to Muirhead. The taste of success starts to enter your mind but it's not over yet. The climb into the village is hardly severe but we're now entering the urban sprawl of Dundee.  The road from Blairgowrie joins at a fork and you can judge how busy it's going to be on the climb.

The most enjoyable route (to my mind) is the one I will describe now, but should the road be busy through the village, turning Right just past the pub takes you down gourdie brae and across the Myrekirk where you can descend to the riverside cyclepath through the technology park.

But it's a quiet enough day, I'm pumping out a decent pace to the march at the summit between Templeton and Camperdown woods. The descent takes over and now all you need to do is watch out for the Circle at the main entrance to Camberdown park.

No one is exiting the retail park or park so I blast through the circle... oh in Dundee a roundabout is called a circle, Dundee has had Circle since long before the Roundabout was invented, just think like the Arc D' Triomph, this possibly explains why Circle etiquette in Dundee is to straight line it if it's a painted one.

Crossing the Kingsway at Dryburgh there is a slight easing of the grade as we pass the former Park Hotel, the dual carriageway normally has cars parked in lane one but it's a good place to let tailing cars past. Another Circle at the top of Lochee and you're onto the Lochee By-Pass, a big dip down to another circle and then a sharp climb out of Lochee past where the railway bridge used to be. The bus lane is inconsistently signed, at the bottom of the hill it says Local buses only, but at the top it says Taxis and Cycles are allowed in so I tend to climb the whole way in the lane, giving way at the bus gate a the summit.

Back into Dundee proper, and the junction with Loons road, get green lights from here and you've got an epic plunge where you can reach 30mph without trying. The City council are looking at how to improve this section for cyclists as at the bottom of the hill is the Dudhope roundabout, a clear run through and you're on the Inner Ring Road, keep left and as you reach the Ladywell Circle the Hilltown underpass is in front of you, the darkness (it is winter right?) punctuated by the tunnel lights, the King Street traffic lights are likely to be green as only Buses, Taxis and Cycles are allowed to cross, and you're onto the Seagate Circle, hold the right side of the left lane and (probably) come to a halt at the East Dock Street junction aiming for the dock gates.

The old docks here is now a buisness area and a few restaurants are here too, take care through the car park, past the Apex hotel and then onto the riverside walkway.

You can either carry the bike up the steps or go round to the lift, but watch out, the big pebble seats mark the start of a set of steps that run to the bridge wall, so go the far side of them to use the ramp. This is particularly bad design as you cant' see they're steps until it's too late.

Onto the bridge and pootle over to the bridge access car park, from where Newport is hardly far at all.

To Kingdom Come - 400Km - 1st December 2018

Earlier this year I was inspired by a data collection project for mapping the Audax UK permanent rides to actually ride some.
Of primary interest was a number of Scottish permanents offered by one "MacNasty" with a limited amount of information on the AUK website, living not far from him I visited one day to find out about the permanent rides he offers.

He offers rides ranging from the 400km "Kingdom Come" to the 2600Km "Scottish Star", the two that were tempting me were the Eightsome Reel, a 1600Km figure of Eight loop of Scotland, and the Twilight 600 from Edinburgh to Acharacle and back.

Having pored over the route descriptions provided for each of the rides I started discussing them with Robbie, eventually the idea to do the Kingdom Come 400 in December popped up and an irresistible force had been knocked into action.

It'll be cold, it could be stormy and wet... Ach we could always change the date if we need to.
Perms can normally be ridden starting from any control on the route, so after some deliberation, we decided to start at Stonehaven to get sections with the highest weather risk over in daylight.

I filled in the forms for both of us and took them round to "MacNasty" and in return I was regaled with a tale of a January assault on the route that involved dodging the police guarding the closed snow gates at Braemar and conditions befitting ice axe and crampons along with the required Brevet cards. I hoped we wouldn't face such conditions, I don't have any knobblies for my faster bikes.

I woke early and set off for Dundee Station to get the first train of the day north, a gentle but chill wind was blowing down the firth as I crossed the bridge, ahead of me Dundee glimmered resplendently in the crisp darkness. Riding through the V&A then into the station for my train north.

Dawn began to break over the North Sea as we hurtled along the coast of the Mearns, it was the back of 7, the Mounth was still cloaked in darkness.

A rude awakening on the Slug

Robbie met me off the train and we headed for the nearest shop just across from the station.  We decided to start promptly and obtained a second breakfast from the Co-Op bakery to kick start our receipt collection for the day.  Croissants consumed we mounted our steeds and started on the long drag of the Slug road to Banchory; as we climbed the sun finally broke through with some conviction and our lights were no longer required for seeing by. 
I had been off the bike for the best part of two weeks due to illness and the winter fug as a result it took a while to clear some of the remnants from my system, the climb being a rude awakening to the realities of my winter form.

In Banchory some Christmas tree pedallers thought we may like their wares, Robbie pointed out the problem of portage and we carried on our way unencumbered by Scots pine.
The roads were relatively quiet and we made our way at a reasonable pace up the long but gentle climb towards the Cairnwell pass, which is nearly 900m of climb over 80Km to the summit from Banchory. 

We bypassed our first control option at Ballater choosing instead to take up the option of Braemar for our 1st control on the road, a 3rd breakfast consisting of a fry up roll perhaps wasn't the best option to take with the final dig to the Cairnwell ahead but it had been well earnt.

Climbing the Cairnwell pass

By now it was the dying minutes of the forenoon and slow service in the busy café with lunchtime service approaching combined with a leisurely approach to the stop cut our rolling average significantly but we had only just broken past the 20kmh mark on arrival and were still comfortably above our minimum of 14.3Kmh. 
Eventually we set our course for the Cairnwell pass and left the village by the Golf Course road. Snow lay high on the hillsides but not by the road, and the ski centre remained out of action, thankfully this meant the road was still quiet as few take remote leisure trips in the winter.

Nearing the Cairnwell Ski Centre

At the pass we stopped to layer up for the descent, I spotted a friend's camper van in the car park and deduced they'd be up in the hills somewhere.  Suitably layered up we took the final dig to the summit and the county march to start the descent into Perthshire,  my poor cornering on descents coupled with the damp roads in near freezing temperatures meant Robbie shrunk in the distance as I dragged the brakes on and off on the steep ramps of the south face of the climb. Thankfully the fearful devils elbow bends are long gone, but the 12% long right handers are a nemesis of mine and I really must take a visit to the new track at Lochore to practice.

After reaching the bottom of Gleann Beag from the Cairnwell, the road leads out to the Spittal of Glenshee in a rather lumpy manner and from there the larger glen took us down to Bridge of Cally where the Shee and Ardle converge to become the Ericht which we then followed to Blairgowrie where we stopped for a supply top up in the Sainsbury's.

The A93 got busier from here as we rolled into Perth past the Racecourse,  were now working on my "local" knowledge for navigation and we picked an expensive Hursts petrol station shop for control number two though finally some non-breakfast food for a meal in the form of sandwiches.
The sky was darkening now in the mid-afternoon and we topped the Craigend climb out of Perth in the dying light.  we stuck with the main road out of Bridge of Earn as it was quiet enough to be comfortable but a badly worded direction call from me sent Robbie up the Aberargie road instead of Glenfarg, mistake corrected we ascended the gorge in darkness, ignoring temptation to stop for a pub tea at the Beinn Inn we crested the climb at Duncrievie to take the road into Milnathort rather than face the Arlary junction.

The Kingdom, but not the Kingdom. Kinross' christmas lights

We were now in the ancient Kingdom of Fife if not the "Scottish Unitary Local Authority Area" (catchy name eh!) the Christmas lights of Milnathort and Kinross lit up our darkness, but it soon returned, Benarty and West Lomond normally so prominent on this edge of the Kingdom shrouded by darkness.
I missed the first turn for Kelty forgetting it's signed Maryburgh, but we were cracking on, I had to watch as another junction miss could have us on Cowdenbeath High Street, a roller coaster of a ride that legend says was once a flat road the undulations created by subsidence in the coal field below.


To the Kingdom we have come, Cantsdam, Hill of Beath, Jim Baxter glowing in the darkness outside Hawthorn's ground and then to Crossgates. Control number shree and historically the start of the ride; we stopped at the corner shop, Robbie went in first while I guarded the bikes; this isn't exactly the most salubrious part of Fife after all.  The girl behind the counter was rather enthused by our adventure and asked me about our ride, what we were doing it for etc...
Rather than explore the menu options at the local hostelry, even though I'm sure an American and a North Fifer would be more than welcome the thought of likely having to make the tough decision from the typical menu of such pubs was enough to consider other options and headed for the McDonalds in the retail park; which was a rather uncomfortable dash across the big roundabouts over the A92 and M90.

After a long McDonalds stop was completed we chose the rather slow route through Dunfermline's traffic lights and took the Knockhill road out of town rather than retreat to Kelty and the Cleish road to the Yetts o' Muckhart.

Faffing with gloves in the dark

As we climbed Knockhill we also climbed into the mists, thankfully visibility was tolerable enough that our lights didn't shine back in our eyes but the sense of isolation that darkness brings was heightened by our further reduced bubbles of light and exclusion of distant house lights. At  Powmill the world was still shrouded by whiteness, and the Rumbling Bridge was silent in the night.

At Yetts o' Muckhart the climb of Glen Devon begins, a gentle climb that seems to take it's time in daylight, in darkness it passed quickly.  There are no false summits here, when the descent of Glen Eagles begins you know of it, and we were soon limiting our speed to the visibility, the descent dropped us, still shrouded in mist at the station junction, closing time at the Auchterarder Co-Op was looming but we made it with 15 minutes to spare for a top up and spare bottle of water in case it was needed along with a couple of sweets just in case a sugar hit was wanted.


We had options now, the next control was listed as "Stanley or Coupar Angus", research had shown that Stanley has nothing past 10pm, and Coupar Angus has a solitary ATM available at that time of night.  The most sensible route to Coupar Angus to us was the Dunning road followed by the Aberdalgie road. Dunning felt faster than normal, but Aberdalgie was unknown to me and it proved to be a drag. Eventually Perth was reached and we took the loop of the City Centre passing the pubs and clubs at kicking out time, in Scone kick out time presented a brief problem as we attracted the attention of some drunks, who eventually decided trying to keep up with us on foot was a good idea; despite the climb it didn't take any extra effort to get away from them.

The ATM with no location

Back into darkness, a deserted A94 took us through Perth's small northern satellite towns on the way to Coupar Angus, a town which has never wholly been in Angus having being a border town split between Perth and Forfar until 1891 when it became wholly Perthshire.
Here our fears were realized, the cash machine's receipts did not state we were in Coupar Angus; we stowed our receipts in our brevet cards and set off to find an alternative.
While considering the suitability of the town sign at Duthie Park an even better option arose and Coupar Angus Bike Hub became the backdrop of our evidential photography.


We slipped out of town and the long flat of Strathmore took us through Meigle and Glaims to Forfar where we planned an early morning feast and snooze; however another disaster struck, kicking out time in Dundee had manifested itself as a bus load of drunk teenagers loitering in the McDonalds.
We locked the bikes up and sat inside but in sight of them just in case. This was a long break, but no sleep was forthcoming in the environment, we waited long enough for the noise to dissipate but by now we needed to get cracking.

Morning has Broken

The long flatness continued to Rosie Island, but we stopped on occasion to deal with the effect tiredness, after crossing the bridge into Montrose we spotted a shop open for the dock workers at this unearthly hour.  Unfortunately receipts were not a possibility here, so we scoffed and left, finding an ATM at a closed petrol station.  In the town centre we detoured looking for the public toilets which were sadly closed for the night.  Now there was just the lumpy coast road to Stonehaven remaining for us to tackle, the sky was starting to show signs of lightness, the dark blue lightning from shades of Dundee to Forfar and then the light from the rising sun reflecting onto the clouds out at see presenting a warm orangey/yellow glow.

A stop at Inverbervie where the toilets were open and another few seconds of shut eye, the lack of proper Audax hotels on this route showing with every bus shelter open sided and slope seated.
Traffic picked up with the light and on the climb out of 'bervie there was periods of heavy traffic.

By Dunnotar Castle the attractive glow in the sky had been replaced with proper daylight, a photo opportunity I had hoped for was lost, but the finish was in sight; a bank of cloud ran up the valley along the face of Fetteresso, the descent into town was clear, Aberdeen fans lingered in the town square waiting their bus to Glasgow.
Gregg's was shut, the local club cyclists were congregating and the town centre Co-Op was devoid of breakfast, we obtained receipts and loitered for a bit gassing with the club riders.

A short climb to the petrol station allowed us to breakfast and then it was time for trains home.


"Through the cold dark mist we just about made it around. 17 hours of darkness." - Robbie Fargo

17 hours of Darkness... I recognize that from somewhere...

A repeat of the Foray into Highland Perthshire - 11th November 2018

Wanting a 3rd 200 for the month I checked out the weather forecast for the weekend on the Friday, and seeing a rubbish Saturday and nice Sunday decided to get stuff done on the Saturday and ride Sunday.

Stuff duly done and the route slightly adjusted to allow receipt based proof of passage in case of GPS failure I woke to a day that was clearly iffy in many different ways.

In the woods in Lowland Perthshire

After struggling to wake up I set off along the Tay Coast, my legs felt heavy and slow, and the dark clouds in the distance didn't give me much hope of as nice a day as I was expecting.  As a regular ride opener for me I know the route well, climb from the house to Muir Dens, descend(ish) to Newburgh, flat(ish) to Kintillo, long slow climb to Forgandenny, choose between Invermey and Forteviot, through Dunning, past Maggie Wall's, stay on the wee road to save a flat crossing of the A9, into Auchterarder.

So many of my routes follow this because it's the nicest start to a north or west bound route, from here today we're heading north.

Buchanty looking North

Out of Auchterarder it's a pleasant undulating ride through farmland to Kinkell Bridge, the climbing starts to ramp up from here was we climb out of the Scottish Midland Valley, easily at first then as we cross the A85 at Fowlis it ramps up to the toughest climb of the day through Fowlis Wester village and onto Buchanty where Glen Almond eases us into the Highlands in the Sma' Glen. 
Autumn lingers here, trees still showing their Amber leaves, the heather still brown, but a taste of winter was in the air, mist ahead, dark clouds behind and a chill wind from the east, but the climb keeps me warm.

The Sma' Glen

The village of Amulree sits out here, alone in the wilderness at the foot of Glen Quaich where it widens to Strath Braan.  Speed picks up as you begin to descend towards Dunkeld rolling past the once derelict hotel now being redeveloped into homes and an inn.
All too soon the Aberfeldy junction arrives and it's time to get the climbing legs back in action to climb Glen Cochil until you're just shy of 400m above sea level.
It's taken the best part of 24Km in lumps, bumps and ramps to get to this height from 87m near Fowlis, but it's going to take only 5km to lose it all on the way into Aberfeldy.

Climbing to Amulree

Sunset at Rannagullzion

Almost Home

The threatened rain begins as I descend the already wet road, taking too much care at times, the rapid descent punctuated by road works.  The town is quiet for once and I lunch at the co-op before having observed the main road deciding there's no need to use the more scenic north road.
The ramp in Logierait doesn't feel as bad as normal, but it turns out I'm not trying as hard.  The rest of the road to Pitlochry feels the same, easy but I'm not putting as much effort in as normal. It's been a long year.  In Pitlochry I manage to miss the turn off for the Moulin, my glasses not helping visibility with the rain running down them.

Mildly cursing my error I turn, something that would normally be impossible in Pitlochry due to the flow of tourist traffic, a rainy day in mid-November proving great for a quiet ride.
In the rain I plod the climb out, still not feeling so bad, but still seemingly hardly trying.
I reach the first summit, the rain spoiling the achievement, ruining the view and leaving a pothole hiding layer of water on the road surface.  I knew on the way up that the descent into Strathardle would be restrained today, though the road has a good surface visibility through my glasses proved to be the limiting factor.
 

Rolling through Kirkmichael I realized there's two pubs in the village so no need to be dependent on the shop at all, I don't stop.

The climb over to the A93 at Bleaton and then over Dalrulzion Bridge at Bleaton Hallet the river in spate below and then the sharp dig to High Rannagullzion; they like their Yoghs round here. Finally the descent to Alyth marks the beginning of the end, I stop at the co-op for a late second lunch and a sweet I had promised myself.  Now riding dark wet roads I'm riding with light traffic after being alone for so long; the climb onto the muir from Newtyle saw the heaviest traffic of the day, three cars in a minute!

Riding the muir road towards Muirhead I see a stream of cars approaching the village from the Blairgowrie road and I consider taking the shorter but sharper Dronley road, but decline. In the village it's relatively quiet for such an important route into Dundee, by the time I reach the summit of this last climb in the darkness of the woods between Camperdown and Templeton I've had little to trouble me. The plunge into Dundee begins, 131m of descent from here to the bridge, watching for traffic exiting Campy, across the Kingsway flyover Circle, Dunsinnane circle and onto the Lochee Bypass, hardly needing to slow traffic is so light, the only climb of the descent is found as a sharp dig on the bypass takes you from south road up to the village limit at the railway bridge, the council have signed the bus lane badly, the first two signs say local buses only, the third and final says bikes and taxi's too. On the lochee road plunge I drag the brakes, not due to road conditions but because the car in front dare's stick to the speed limit!  Another clean roll across the Dudhope circle and I'm onto the Inner Ring Road, through the tunnel, the tunnel light bright compared to the outer surrounds and back into the wet darkness, finally I'm stopped by the lights at the East Dock Street junction, but from here it's a gentle pedal through the docks and a walk up the steps onto the bridge.

That's BR number three for November complete and I really need a rest, so for the remainder of the month I'm promising myself some easy riding, just enough to keep the fitness up for a crack at the Kingdom Come 400 at the start of December, it'll be... Interesting!

The Long Dark Teatime of an Audax Soul plus a 200Km DIY to round the weekend off - 3 and 4th November 2018

The Long Dark Teatime of the Soul 

is the term given to the wretched boredom of the immortal being Wowbagger the infinitely prolonged, who having not been born immortal has no ability to cope with it and by Sunday Tea Time is rather short of things to do other than travel the universe insulting people. It is also the name of the second Dirk Gently book, but that relates to Norse gods.

Anyway this is the Long Dark Teatime of an Audax Soul and this possibly refers to the fact that
a) It's running in November
b) It's running in Scotland in November
c) We were cycling to the Restaurant at the end of the Universe, just over the border in Longtown.
Possibly.


When I arrived a large number of Brevet cards were laid out on the table waiting for collection, sadly and likely due to the weather forecast the vast majority of them were still laying on the table waiting for non-collection when the starting time of 0800 was approaching and the handful of riders that turned up trudged to their bikes to prepare to set off.

I had been staying in Selkirk, and Selkirk is on a hill, Galashiels however has been built in a hollow, the result was that while I'd woken up to the sound of the wind whirling up the street and crisp packets scraping along the road down in Gala all felt calm.  We set off along the usual start route and just as we crested out of the trees the wind hit!

Headwinds aren't my thing, really, I'm not built for them, tallish, not exactly skinny and possessing the aerodynamics of a kite aren't exactly great for cycling into headwinds; I started to go backwards thankfully only metaphorically however my descent of the Clisham with a force 7 blowing down Scaledale and almost stopping me in my tracks on the South-West bound sections of switchback were in my memory at this point.

I made the classic mistake of following another rider when also knowing the correct route as we passed through Selkirk thankfully an easy error to fix but this sent me even further backwards through the pack, from 1st on the road to last in 5km!

The ride up the Ettrickvalley was largely uneventful, beyond having my head down trying to maintain a rhythm and keep going with the wind head on but at least sheltered by the geography and trees, however the road takes an exposed kink and here the wind really hit side on, and now I was remembering my second climb of the Bealach na Ba!  The strong constant wind requiring a distinct lean to hold a straight line, the gusts requiring that line to be fairly far left to avoid being blown off the other side of the road; the road turned back to South-West and went back to being only an annoyance.

The first control was the Old School at Eskdalemuir and I tucked into Beans on Toast also known as "the non-cheese option", I'm not usually hungry by here but today I needed it, 3 hours to do less than 60km and it's not even all that hilly a route.  I struggled to get my wet gloves back on and then shortly after restarting discovered I'd miszipped my rain jacket so had to stop and sort that.  From here the route sheet took us over the Castle O'er road rather than the more direct Langholm road; I had considered it but I'm not a huge fan of the A7 between Langholm and Longtown so stuck with the route sheet; I knew there was a decent amount of tree cover beside this road from looking on the satellite and there certainly was, except for the section where it kinks and puts you side on to a south westerly, handy!

Eventually the road descended although from my HR chart alone you wouldn't know it was a descent as I was pushing 140bpm to keep going and this remained the case along a rather nice country route into Longtown crossing the unmarked border on a bridge over the River Sark.

At the garden centre (Sadly not called Milliways) just out of Longtown it was time to eat again; another menu scan for the non-Cheese option and a ham and pineapple toastie was on its way to me; I ate my cake as I waited.

Some riders left as I arrived, others arrived as I ordered and some stragglers arrived as I left the Restaurant at the End of the Universe and turned back to Gala.

It was now of course close to dark O'Clock and my dynamo rear light had packed in, I suspect the problem was too much water getting in through the wire holes; note to self weather seal its replacement. I put on my backup battery light and hoped I had charged it up recently enough to last.

Not long before I started to climb the Castle O'er road again I was passed by a rider who I thought asked "14 miles to Longtown", it sounded about right so nodded, though I now suspect it was more "14 hour cut off?" if I had heard properly I would have suggested to her that being out of time (although the only indicator of time limits I was using was my disturbingly low average speed as there was no way I was taking the Brevet card out of its zip lock bag) it would make sense to return, oh well.

It was still daylight as I summited the Castle O'er road and lost the tailwind as the trees arrived, the further good news was that I knew Eskdalemuir and Tea Time number two wasn't far away.  I had taken extra care to try to remember any road issues I'd spotted on the way up just in case the road was flooded on the way back down, it wasn't put some of the potholes I had seen were now swimming pools for the toads.  One major note I had made was that one of the cattle grids was missing a rung and to make sure I kept to the left on the way back (I had swung to the right side on the way up)  This duly acted on it was through a minefield of potholes and into Eskdalemuir for a Chilli Baked potato (Again the non-cheese option)

By now I was really struggling to get my wet kit back on, I think it took longer to get my gloves on that it took me to order and eat the baked potato; it was now dark out there, the Long Dark Teatime really had started.

In my front light I could see the rain lashing down, the edge of the road and darkness in front of me; the road hardly distinguishible in the light that got through to it and I hit the odd bump obscured by standing water on the road, occasionally I felt my foot touch the water at the bottom of the stroke. 

I didn't really notice the climb and then descent, I just plodded on through the dark living in my rain diminished bubble of light; of all the times riding with MTB lights as backups to battery Road lights and my first could of Dynamo lit rides this was the one I could have done with it... and the MTB.
Somewhere in the darkness I passed two walkers huddling in a bus shelter, surprised perhaps at my cheery "Evening", and somewhere in that darkness crossed a stone bridge, turned a corner and felt the water rising; chocolate brown water sat on the road surface, disguising even the grass verge, my route only identifiable by the bushes and reflective poles at the side of the road. My feet disappearing into the water, my shoes full, my waterproof overshoes overcome their capabilities.  In the distance a light was approaching, I carried on weight slightly back just in case there was a pothole or other bump somewhere in there.

Out of the ball of light a pickup ploughing its way through the water, a bow wave spreading either side, I shifted my line and he ploughed on, the wave washing over my knees and crotch, I hardly noticed I was that wet already.

Aiden who had arrived at Longtown as I was leaving and was the only rider I saw before the woman who asked about 14hrs, caught me on the trike, I now knew I would probably be the last finisher, if I made it back in time and time was dragging on; however I was ploughing on as best I could and the average speed started to climb again after Ettrickbridge.

I finally rolled into the Arriveé at 10 to 8, soaked, bedraggled, exhausted, there was actually 3 riders somewhere behind me all had run out of time and/or energy including the woman who asked about 14hrs and found other methods of return. Two other riders wrong turned and took the road to Ettrick quite early on and packed at the café in Easkdalemuir  after correcting their route, knowing they'd be out of time.

The badge and card I received at the finish stated: "Where we went I hardly know" and shows a picture of bike lights shining in the darkness.

Probably my toughest day out on a bike so far.

A DIY 200

I decided I wanted to knock out two 200km rides in the weekend and then hopefully get a 3rd not much later in November in order to get quickly back to winter resting rides in preparation for repeating the process in December, January and February...

Initially I had decided to try and set off as early as possible, but after a tough day out in the wind and rain I decided I wanted longer in bed, eventually mounting my rather messy steed just before 9am and setting of from Selkirk to Biggar, roads were quiet so I stuck to the main road.  I grabbed a Sainsburys lunch deal and a bit more and gorged it all while standing at the door with the bike.

As I rolled out of Biggar I realized my front mech was no longer shifting, baws.  I had started the weekend with a falshing green battery indicator but hadn't thought to check how far I had gone in order to determine if there was 400km in it, evidently there wasn't. I was now stuck in the small ring for what should have been a big ring blast up to Abington and then on to Wanlockhead on the gentler side of the climb to Scotland's highest village.

At Wanlockhead I stopped at the museum and got some sweets, the tearoom was open but I didn't have time for another lunch!  I then ground my way up a steep ramp in a stupid gear, nearly stalling at the top which would have put me on the tarmac if I hadn't managed to keep it going; a 12% ramp, 20rpm at 6.5kmh isn't big and isn't clever... My cadence sensor then packed in...
Light, Gears and now Cadence sensor, well at least it's something minor this time!

The descent of the Mennock pass was spoilt by two things, not just the lack of gears but also a stiff breeze that I'd only felt breifly on the way up to Abington but was now allowing me to control the bikes speed by varying my aero tuck (it's allowed, I spin out 36-14 at around 30kmh).
A rather enjoyable descent though and I'm evidently just going to have to return, with working gears and descend it again!

At the bottom of the hill I turned onto an old alignment that had more cars on it than the A76 due to an Autotest taking place, the marshalls ushered me through and I carried on to Thornhill where a heavy dark sky loomed ahead; lunch two took place here as I knew there was basically nowhere from here to Moffat as I'd certainly pass Ae after the café closed; and I wasn't wering PJs anyway so would never blend in with the Downhillers in my bright lycra road kit.

The climb over to Ae proved pretty gentle thankfully and I found myself on the busy Dumfries to Beattock road in darkness worrying about the battery rear light flashing away too weakly to light up the ground below the bike like I'm now used to and so with no assurance that it was working, eventually I stopped and double checked, it was of course fine.

The climb from Moffat to the top of the Tail surprisingly didn't seem as long and drawn out as it usually does, it was a dark night but otherwise clear, I could see the houses dotted along Moffatdale and eventually the campers making their tea in the carpark at the foot of the waterfall (which the road doesn't actually follow despite me referring to the road as the Tail)

At the top I knew most of the suffering was over, it's all down hill from there, or so it seems, but when you're speed input is limited those flat bits and slight rises suddenly become mountains and I crawled a few sections that I'm sure I've previously done at more than double the speed.

Finally I got back to Selkirk, knackered, hungry and due to using cadences outwith my normal range aching knees. It was time for a fish supper and the drive home.

The Cumbrian DIY - 200Km - 18th October 2018

For my 3rd BR(M) of the month I was planning what turned out to be a near reversal of the Fred Whitton Challenge, which having discovered I'd need to divert my Whinlatter climb due to road works, and asking on YACF about the diversion and a "I think this might be over ambitious" statement in my post, Paul Revell suggested I could adapt his "The Cumbrain" calendar event to suit.


I was staying at the Yorkshire Ramblers club hut at Low Hall Garth for a long weekend with my hiking club, having arrived as Wednesday turned to Thursday I knew I was getting only a short sleep before getting up to set off.

The Kling Klang of Tour De France woke me in the bunk of the hut and I set down for my Weetabix in the cold communal area.  I had set the route to start and finish on the main Ambleside to Coniston road so I wouldn't need to ride from the hut or from the start of the tarmac at Stang End. I drove out to the road end in the darkness, as dawn started to break I mounted my Orange steed and descended into the inversion, I shivered on the bike struggling to make enough heat as I rolled though Skelwith and onto the Ambleside one way system before picking up the near deserted main road down to Troutbeck Bridge where I would start my ascent to the Kirkstone Pass; the road I climbed had felt steep in Robbie's Hire Van after Brant and Slape but I found it reasonable going at this early stage of the day. Past the grand buildings of the hotel and youth hostel then into the hamlets built of slate before the Kirkstone pass proper, all the time the temperature rising as I escaped the chill of the inversion.

374m in 11km, the Kirkstone Inn showed signs of life, but no open doors to tempt a cyclist in for a second breakfast, the struggle plunging down into the inversion over Windermere.  I plunged too but down into the inversion in Patterdale, before climbing back out and over to the other Troutbeck.
Blencathra stood in front of me, as did hordes of ramblers, standing in the middle of the road waiting for their group hike to start, too distracted by their chatter to observe another road user.  The loop of Blencatra and Skidaw saw my first stop at Hesket Newmarket at the shop there for sweets and water, sadly Bassenthwait village needed dodged due to a road closure that I'd scoped out on the county council website in advance (I was once again following a mandatory route as I hadn't been able to stop google trying to make me do CX riding for an advisory route) which mean a fairly boring spin down to Kewsick on the A road.

I nearly passed the Filling Station Café in Keswick but turned back to stop in for a cooked breakfast which I was just in time for (they switch menu at midday) though I was toying with the stack of pancakes I stopped that madness in favour of a protein load.  Next up was the Newlands pass over to Buttermere, I was climbing fine until the last sharp dig near the top where my legs decided they'd had enough and forced me to walk.  It was around 23% at this point but it's disturbing to think that only a year ago I got up the Cockbridge ramp on the Lecht without resorting to walking, but this year not only had I walked that but I'd walked a lot more too including this.

As I descended towards Buttermere I was forced to hang back a bit as a car crawled some sections where I could have had a bit of speed up, a drone flew overhead controlled from a van at the top of the pass.
I now turned for that famous landmark of Cumbria the Calder Hall Nuclear Power Station visible as soon as I'd climbed yet another rise and got a sight of the Irish Sea. Although better known as Sellafield there are two sites there, Calder Hall and the Windscale piles not operational since the fire in 1957 it will not finish decommissioning until 2040!

Thankfully Cumbria's hidden hand is just round the corner, in Wastwater and Wasdale, if anywhere in England does not deserve the Lord George Gordon Byron's call of "England! thy beauties are tame and domestic" it is here, steep hillsides lead to England's summit at Scaffel Pike and the lake at the foot gives you a scene that could place in his playground of youth.
I rode up to the Wasdale Head inn with enough time in hand for a coke, crisps and pork pie but little else and as I set off again my average was back down in the concerning zone, particularly as I could see there was 3 big lumps to drag myself over.

That first great lump was Birkerfell, from Eskdale to Ulpha, this I scaled with only a grumble of complaint as my tired body and mind took in the last of the daylight.

Then it was time for Kilnbank Cross, Dusk was coming in and the climb was relentless and steep, my momentum was broken by a cattle grid on the climb, enough dig to get over but not to then make the sharp uphill turn it launched me onto, I was walking again.  I walked a while as I struggled to find a hill section shallow enough to get going on. I finally summited with a bit of light left and entered my light bubble on Old Rake, thankfully a gentle climb on the Coniston road.  I rolled through Coniston in the dark finally reaching the Stang End Road with 12hrs 23m on the clock, just over an hour and a half in hand for the minimum 14.3km average speed (14hrs 7m) maybe I could have eaten more in Wasdale after all.

I decided not to head down to the hut but instead needed to visit a shop, the Co-Op in Ambleside would do but I spent the best part of half an hour trying to find a parking space that wouldn't cost me an arm and a leg for the 5 minutes it would take.

I returned to the hut with my sweets and next days lunch food and planned a gentle hike for the following day. I had great weather for my gentle hike to the shop ni chapel stile and then up Silver How and back, but heavy drizzle and compass bearing visibility for Wetherlam on the Saturday with my club mates, the Sunday started off a washout so I sat and read until the sun came out. Only Dom and Amy did sport that day and I set off late afternoon for home.

Galashiels Autumn Weekend 13th and 14th October 2018

It was time for the Galashiels Autumn double header, with 200km on the Saturday followed by 100km on the Sunday.

Unfortunately I had signed up early in the year and entered the 150Km Dick McT's Century Classic rather than the 200Km Etal-U-Can route that I enjoyed in 2017.

Sadly the original route for this using the two valley roads out of Selkirk was considered unsuitable due to road surface deterioration on the muir road to Moffat so it was rerouted to Etal via Wooler and returning via Kelso to get my distance up to the 200Km to keep my RRTYs alive I found a 50Km loop to ride afterwards taking in Lauder, Stow and Thornylee more on that later!

Dick McT's Century Classic plus 50Km ECE 13th October 2018

With the Motorhome still off the road and the tent pitches in Moffat being closed for winter I went looking for stone and mortar based accommodation, my first choice the Kailzie bunkhouse near Innerleithen handily with a nice looking 25Km ride each way that could have made the ECE was sadly booked out until Jellember when I contacted the owner back in September however I found a decent B&B that rarely appears as available on Booking.com for the two nights.

The forecast was looking horrific, similar to what was originally forecast for the 600Km Borderlands Explorer back in July, but as with that time the conditions forecast eased off to a slightly more tolerable minging.  This had however reduced the number of riders starting considerably and a large number of cards remained on the table while I sat and socialized with the other riders who were braving the weather.

The day actually started out not too bad with only a bit of occasional drizzle for the 9am start which saw my departure delayed by trying to get the back up GPS recorder to work, this was necessary in case the Wahoo failed as the ECE was to be following a mandatory route so paper proof of purchase as a back up even if it was possible, wouldn't suffice.

Riding out of Galashiels Dick directed us via the Midlem route towards Morebattle before joining the St Boswells route near Nisbet; I had decided to generally follow the route even though I had extra time pressures, but I made my first diversion at Nisbet by carrying on and taking the Eckford corner cut. Despite the delayed start I had started to catch the other riders and appologising for battering on rather than taking the social pace that comes with the less demanding average speeds of a Brevet Populaire, because I was having to ride at Brevet Ranndoneur speeds as I have to complete the full distance of both the BP route and ECE in the time limit of a BR, and also I don't get the BPs route distance I have to ride it at BR time for 150km and this ride was nearer 170km.

I had fitted my mudguards during the week due to the forecast and was starting to regret it as the noise from the rear guard was becoming increasingly irritating. On arrival at Morebattle I took one look at the rear guard, swore and walked into the shop to get a control receipt before setting out to tighten up the stay nut which required lifting the wheel out of the drop outs to get room.  The bulge of other riders arrived while I was doing this and they chatted while I grumbled. This however did give me a chance to explain my hurry to them.

Setting off again, I made it a few meters before stopping to make another adjustment, this time the stay was rubbing on the tyre, however only a few KM later the bike was on the ground once again and this time the guard was removed as the bolt had loosened off and now was nowhere to be seen.  Once again the other riders arrived as I was working on it and one even offered to carry the guard for me on his Carradice!!!

I shot off into the distance again at my unsocial pace, rolling through to Town Yetholm still amazingly dry and promptly rode into the rain somewhere on the Kirknewton road; some of the other riders caught me on the main road towards Wooler and I advised them I was taking the fast route into Wooler for a short sharp hill to the Co-Op; they carried on the back road and rolled in as I was exiting the Co-Op with a top up of water.
From Wooler I took the Doddington road and then the back roads which were in places more like Canals towards Etal.

The first Etal-U-Can rider I saw was just after Fenton, I was not surprised to see it was Richard who is a pretty quick rider, however what was surprising was the hoard of Bromptons that seemed to be chasing him down!  I rolled into Etal absolutely soaked and found Russell and Michael who were also on Etal-U-Can had just sat down for lunch. I joined them after ordering after as usual searching the menu for items that work without cheese!
We were joined by another rider before Russell and Michael left, after which the café owner made a joke about cleaning chairs for the next soggy person to occupy!!!

Cracking on again as 200km and 160km riders dripped in I decided to return on the Doddington route, with the amount of rain falling I was preferring the quiet canals to the main road, that was despite knowing in places the puddles were bottom bracket deep, something I thought I had left behind when I stopped MTBing so much!  Back in Wooler I decided an ATM receipt would do as I didn't need anything from a shop, I did my best to protect my wallet of reciepts from the rain at the Barclays hole in the wall.

The return route via Kelso I knew from the Borders 600km and this time my knees weren't aching and I discovered that after 120Km the lumps over to Kelso from Mindrum is actually pretty easy going. I did now have a technical problem, my Wahoo wasn't charging from the USB-Werk and I was starting to run low on battery; I had spotted issues on the last few rides so thankfully was carrying my Powermonkey Explorer II however I didn't want to go plugging things in while it was raining.

I rolled into Kelso still in the rain and went to the Sainsbury petrol station for a water top up and sweet; on inspecting the reciept I spotted there was no date and time, that was no use, so I went up to the main shop for another ATM reciept. After Sainsbury's I promptly got my directions wrong and started to follow the Selkirk road, and on realizing the error doubled back and headed into the town centre where I spotted a Blue Cycle Route finger post with the distance to Melrose on it.  As I didn't feel there was enough battery left in the Wahoo to use turn by turn navigation for any period of time and my routesheet was getting rather soggy as I constantly extracted it I decided to follow the cycle route, this actually took me onto Dick's recommended route and eventually it stopped raining!!!!

The air now dry, me soaking and Dicks route doing a bit more climbing up to Smailholm I decided to stick with the blue signs, these took me down a quiet road with suspiciously major road looking markings, past a "No Motor Vehicles" sign, round a barrier, and onto a wooden bridge and narrow path. Typical! Fearing a dirt track I pressed on aware that there was no time to return to Dick's route now and cursing myself for listening to a Sustrans route over one of the most experienced riders in the area.  Starting to climb on a widening track that I was still unsure of the surface due to bumps and a layer of leaves I soon heard the rumble of a pickup truck descending the hill. After the short climb I discovered I was in Newton St Boswells and all I needed to do was follow the signs to the "Rhymers Stone" road and I know the way back from there.

Back in Gala I got the Wahoo on charge while I stumbled into the Arriveé soaked and aware I needed to crack on, I handed Lucy my Brevet card and the jumble of receipts to sort while I got stuck into some of the food on offer. She also spotted that the Sainsbury's petrol receipt had the date and time and other Audax useful information on the rear of it so I had no need to go to the main shop after all.

Now I just had to haul myself round the 50km loop and keep my average speed for that section over the 15Kmh BR minimum; I also now had to follow the GPS trace that I had submitted for the ECE.
Setting off into Gala town centre to get onto the A7 before climbing Station Brae into Langlee and then turning up onto the backroad to Lauder, it now hit me just how much of a climb this was and I had decided to ride anti-clockwise in order to avoid the Stow Hillclimb course! Darkness set in and I returned to existing in my small bubble of light.

Houses and street lights started to add light to my bubble and then my Wahoo chirped a turn off and suddenly I was in market place in Lauder, people, cars, rain...  I rode through the town, another chirp, a turn off and back into my bubble; the road started to climb again and the mist set in.
My bubble and I moved slowly through the mist, climbing 198m, 269m, 322m, 357m the road summit of Lauder common, and then down into Stow, out of the mist, out of the dark, over the A7 and back into the dark.

A long gentle climb followed, the A7 across the valley and the railway were visible, the mist not covering the sky here, I could see beyond my bubble, but not much, houses dotting the country side, their dry occupants safe and warm, I wet and cold passing through the country side.  A train passed, the road diverged from the line and A7 and I climbed on in the dark. Bowland, Windydoors, Blackhaugh, the house lights shone in the dark. Blackhaugh, a junction I turn off for Thornilee and the dark narrow road starts to descend, eventually spitting me out on the A72.

My average speed for the ECE so far was low, around 16kmh, it seems so tight close enough that a mechanical would leave me with only the 150Km Calendar Event. THankfully the A72 descends on an old railway alignment to "The Nest" roundabout and my speed was considerably higher than my average along here and down to Fairnlee Farm, 8km and 30m of descent on a good road makes all the difference for maintaining speed. All I needed to do now was carry on over the hill to Gala town cross to finish the ECE and then head back to get the car from the Swimming pool.

Soaking wet I rolled into Gala, Dick and George were just leaving the Arriveé as everyone was back, so I collected the car, drove the 500m to my B&B and got warmed up.  By the time this was done all there was left for tea was the late night Subway.  That'll be a steak and cheese, without the cheese please.


Once I extracted the GPS data I discovered the Wahoo reckoned I'd climbed less than 1000m since Bikehike had the ECE loop down as 750m alone I knew this was rubbish, the corrected climb being 2691m in 222Km; 22km over points distance with no allowance for the extra, just like ACP validated rides, I was fine with that.

Ride of the Valkyries 100Km 14th October 2018

Thankfully I didn't need yet another 200Km and could now actually enjoy the 12Kmh minimum of a BP, even better the sun was out!

A rather pleasant ride from Gala over to the Tweed and then along the south bank from the first crossing, passing various MTB locations before climbing over to Mountbenger in the Yarrow Valley from Innerleithen on a rather pleasant climb.  At the Gordon Arms we were served tea and cake in the breakfast room while the residents made do with breakfast in the bar and then we set on for another couple of long muir land climbs first over to Tushielaw in the Ettrick Valley before climbing once again towards "Little Bleak Law" and then down to Roberton by the Borthwich Water and continuing down to Lilliesleaf for tea, cake and sanwich for lunch, before a short sharp climb back over to the A7 route and into Galashiels on the now well known route to the town cross.

What always makes these rides special is who you come across along the way or at controls.
As I climbed one hill I was surprised to discover Michael catching up with me! My first thought wasn't "what happened" it was "huh I didn't see you at the start or at the Gordon!", Michael had had a bit of a mishap, he was today ECEing from home and had misremembered the start time arriving 30mins late to the start, thankfully able to obtain his Brevet card and crack on!

I caught up with George Berwick near the top of one of the climbs, where he was later adamant he heard a bird that sounded like a telephone ringing, I never heard it but I know the bird call he heard, it does indeed sound like an old landline telephone buzzing, of course modern landlines and mobiles tend to ring like birdsong, or at least human attempts at birdsong.

Rolling into Lilliesleaf, it was a bit of a riot, bikes propped everwhere, non-cycling customers confined to a single table in the corner probably wondering what they were doing there! I found a seat that had just been vacated at the table with Aidan and Dick, Dick on card stamping duty doing his best to shout across the riot whenever anyone arrived to get their attention.  I was also jammed against the counter so all I could do to order was stand up an ask, my food was also passed over to me directly over the counter!

There were two trikes on the ride, Aidens and Edwins, unfortunately they look identical and I'd spotted that one of them had a single rear disc brake, I asked Aiden about whether that causes brake steer, he of course doesn't know as his has two rear wheel brakes and a front v-brake although I did learn a few other things about trikes.

George arrived asking everyone if they heard the bird which no one had, Dick suggested it was his phone with his wife calling him and the pair kept me and anyone else in earshot amused with their jokes, stories and general hilarity probably until they had to leave the café.


The last wee dig up over to the A7 was a reverse of the previous days route and that was it, 100km done in a leisurely 6 hours.

The Yoga for Cyclists session was interesting although I could do most of the routine, there were extended periods spent with weight on the hands and I was getting pain from where I had been holding the hoods and there was some extended time with the head lower than the neck and that causes me reflux problems.

After the previous day's soaking, the dry, gentle, sociable ride was a great wind down; I did spend the next few days with discomfort from some areas stretched by the Yoga session that don't normally stretch!

Brant and Slape - 200Km - 6th October 2018

Or Steep and Slippy in Standard English this was going to be a tough ride with 3.75 AAA points on offer in 200km.

Robbie and Élaina collected me from work on Friday afternoon after work and we arrived at the School in Troutbeck Bridge in time for Tea before sitting speaking to Organizer Paul and other riders who had arrived to make use of either the car park or the Gym hall.

Sleeping in a school gym hall in a makeshift bed in one aspect of these Audaxes that I hadn't yet experienced although it was a bit quieter than I expect to find on more popular rides in future.

With riders rising and arriving in the morning for porridge and flapjack the day was looking to be a cracking clear Autumnal day, a chilly wind was blowing lightly from the north and the overnight dampness was providing the "Slape" road surfaces.  We set off on what looked like a lakeside road but alas as usual and just like coastal roads, lakeside roads neither follow the lake nor stay at the height of the lakeside much! 

We undulated in the vicinity of the lake, faster riders including Robbie were ahead of me and slowly drifting ahead and I know David and Steve to be stronger riders too which comforted me as my legs gave me the warning discomforts of starting off too hard into a ride.

Paul's wife was found at Fell Foot stamping our Brevet cards at the first control just before the first proper climb of the day and Robbie had decided to wait back for me before the climb.
What a climb it was, rising sharply from Fell Foot, we gained 170m in 1.5km at an average gradient of 11.7%; I could make excuses such as it being early in the morning, it being an early first climb, I'd hardly woken up; I stopped for a photo when a fantastic view over the lake appeared over my left shoulder, there was no way I was going to get a picture from the bike while I was trying to keep the front wheel on the tar!

The brief respite taken I carried on to the top of the rise where the route showed it's first hand; a long descent on narrow, twisty, brant and slape roads took us down to Bowland Bridge, a village lower than Windermere is! From here just as it says on my Mukyz top, the "Only way is up!".
Another short climb took us to the top of the descent into Kendal where struck for Tebay on one of the gentler climbs of the day; after a short descent into the narrow valley where the M6 and our minor road follow the River Lune we returned to the order of the day and took the long drag up towards Kirby Stephen which of course is at the foot of a sharp descent!

With the amount of climbing already undertaken being over the 1000m mark in only 70km we had managed to average 20kmh, rather lower than we are used to from "hilly" Scottish rides.
Aware of our lack of time despite making decent progress on the way into Kirkby Stephen we controlled at the first shop we found which was the Spar; unfortunately Spar's lunch offerings are rather more basic than a Co-Op and neither of us were particularly satisfied, however we had the all important receipt for proof of passage. Other riders rolled into town as we were preparing to dodge the queue of traffic waiting at the lights by leading the bikes through the bottleneck so we took some little solace from this.

Now it was time for one of the highlight climbs, we weaved ourway along narrow country lanes with a grand view of the A66 threading through one gap to the north and a wall of hill everywhere else; we of course were about to climb that wall.
Starting with a set of switchbacks advertised as 20% after crossing the River Belah we were then facing a more prolonged but not much easier dig up to Barras where the climbing relented as the moor opened up and the profile returned to "Undulating".

Despite being an info control it would have been rude not to stop for a drink at the Tan Hill Inn so we sat in the shelter of the pub drinking Coke and taking advantage of the heat in the sun that was causing us to switch between wishing we had summer gear on, and wishing we were set up for a winter expedition.  Our average speed was plummeting and we set off again with little chance to improve it for the next section of road was the Sleightholme moor road a rough track surfaced mostly with loose aggregate punctuated by craters and the odd patch of tarmac. 
Gaetan had passed the pub with a short info collection and we could see his Hi-Vis jacket out on the track as we descended towards the turn, the road turned out to be slightly worse than my Geograph investigation had revealed possibly due to recent rain filling the craters, we eventually caught Gaetan and Robbie having a bit more experience riding skinny tyres off road through CX shot off into the distance while I picked my way between the puddles, piles of gravel and mud at one point being too uncomfortable to check he wasn't behind me cut Gaetan off as I picked a route round a puddle that was the width of the road!

Finally we found tar near Bowes and I could give my aching hands a rest from death gripping the hoods; this also presented the start of a fast descent down to Barnard Castle where we managed to salvage some time though not enough to be comfortable to take Paul's recommendation to sup at the chip shop.  We agreed to raid Gregg's and to our horror discovered the receipts don't state the location!  This meant wasting time hobbling up to the Co-Op for their reliable receipt format.

Back on the road and it was the start of a long climb up to the Stang 11km averaging 5.7%; which sounds tame compared to the rest of the day but the last 2km averages 10% and peaks at 16% on the switchbacks in the forest. As we struggled up to the summit an old couple parked up and taking in the view cheered us onwards. Thankfully the descent to the CB Inn proved to only be steep but by this stage in the day 5 minutes at 30kmh+ doesn't equate to gaining much on your average speed, and for all that mattered we were launched back into a climb for the next 2km that was only slightly less viscous than the Stang.  A large dip in the road took us over a bridge next to a slape looking ford before a good descent from Surrender Bridge into Swaledale, taking the route avoiding Crackpot and a relatively gentle run to Muker for our final Control of the day.  Thankfully the shop was still open, self service has never taken over this shops operations and a wall of food options was presented for our selection; spying the Tunnocks Tea cakes the treat was obvious, unfortunately they don't walk out the door at a similar rate to in Scotland and so sadly the biscuit was slightly stodgy and the cream a bit deflated just like my physical state.


It was now time for the last major climb of the day, the Buttertubs pass, linking Swaledale with Cotterdale it's a tough one!  Just to add insult to the tired legs, worn resolve and teacake disappointment the whirring noise of an electrically assisted folding bicycle was heard behind and then shortly afterwards ahead as we turned onto the Buttertubs before it disappeared into the distance above us.
The sun was setting directly ahead of us compounding the problems the gradients presented, three Kilometres of climbing relentlessly into the blazing sun, three kilometers averaging 9.5% on the face of it we'd already done this steepness before, but the >20% ramps posed the extra challenge.

On the speed graph the change from pedal power to pedestrian power is hardly noticeable, nearing the top of the first steep drag I switched from a seated grind to honking, unfortunately with this change came the need to still see where I was going, the blazing sun directly in my face taking this away from me in my standing position and I put my cleated foot on the ground.  I walked to where the climb eased off again and got back on, I got a decent enough speed up in the dip before facing the last challenge of the climb; in the shadow of the dip, no sunlight for an excuse the road rose at 25% to climb out over the summit; and now for the fifth time this year and first time this season I put cleats to tarmac and walked.  I ran over in my mind the day of the Bealach Beag now many years ago as I crawled up the main drag, the road closure car at the head of a line of riders in sight all the way from behind me to the top of the hairpins, and in close quarters to me the words "Sod it" being uttered followed by the sound of cleats clicking away into the distance behind; today that was me.

Another fast descent took us into Cotterdale but hardly dented our diminished average speed, another hill like the last few would almost certainly have dropped us below the 15kmh average but we knew that was the last of the big climbs; the road rose gently up Cotterdale and then we forked into Garsdale, finally the watershed!
The 20km ride from Garsdalehead to Sedberg finally allowed us to gain a bit more time on our average, and we stopped for a rest and to allow Robbie to check in with Élaina who was waiting at the Arriveé for us before starting the climb over to Kendal.

With only 30km to go the mental boost of being not far from the end was tempered by the knowledge that we still had to drag ourselves over to Kendal and then again to Windermere; more short steep ramps were presented to us, although 10% less steep than on the Buttertubs this was a tough ask this far into such a hilly ride.  Another short rest at Kendal after being blinded by the work lamps of a breakdown truck on the roll in, and the final climb of the day started. A miss-direction on a roundabout saw us stick to the busy main road into Windermere, missing out on the presumably nicer Crook road.  The final descent into Troutbeck Bridge was at last reached and Robbie managed to maintain more speed on the narrow cyclepath we had picked up at Ings as cars climbing the hill partly blinded us.  I was now navigating off of memory of landmarks, the closed pub near the bottom of the hill that I'd memorized as being near the School gates distracted me from turning into the school gates and I had to make a late correction to bump onto the access path; naughty I know, I could at least pretend to plead ignorance if anyone challenged me; what do you mean you don't have land access rights!

Robbie had stopped just through the gates to wait for me and we rolled into the Arriveé together after 12 and a half hours riding what we both reckoned to be the hardest rides we'd done so far.  The soup and Crumble that Paul had laid on for finishers was well earnt.