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...