Leith to Gala (via the Bike Shop)

Berit still has her flat in Galashiels so we decided on a weekend of running down in the borders - the Cademuir Rollercoaster race on Saturday and a long cross-country point to point on Sunday. I've done the Gala trip many times over the past year and have refined the route to find the best balance of quiet roads and speed.

Quiet roads

Two things were different about this trip from normal - I had to visit the bike shop on the way and Berit would be joining me on the way down. The reason for my bike shop visit was not a happy one. A couple of months ago I crashed my trusty single speed commuter into a wall on Fishwives' Causeway. This left the front fork rather splayed and I was worried about what it had done to the frame.  The prognosis was not good - it bore the tell-tale signs of irreparable damage. This frame was older than me - it has always been such a joy to ride in the various configurations I've had it. This isn't the first time I've crashed it - that was in 2007 in Glasgow when the handlebar snapped as I raced through Charing Cross. I had a moment to wonder wtf had just happened before the half of the bar dangling from the brake cable found its way into the front wheel and I hit Sauchiehall Street hard. A  fractured elbow, a comedy pinky dislocation and the frame being reborn as a single speeder were the results. This time my injuries were less severe than the bike's and I popped in to Eastside bikes on Friday evening to take a look at a possible replacement frame. It was exactly the same size and also made of steel. Probably not the Reynold 531 credited with make the old frame such a comfortable ride, but I guess we'll see how it goes.  I think now the stem, the right crank, and the chain ring are the only parts left from the bike I bought from the Bike Station for £50 in late 2006.  Is it still the same bike?

From the bike shop I headed east to Musselburgh and then up Carberry hill towards Pathhead. It seems like the wrong way, but I've found that this is the quickest way to get on to nice roads and avoids the Sherrifhall roundabout. I only started going this way when they closed the A6106 Millerhill Road, but I reckon I will stick with it when that re-opens unless a better route is opened following the completion of the railway works. I thought I'd be behind schedule for meeting Berit, so I put the hammer down.

Berit was waiting at the rendez-vous point

By the time I got to the meeting point Berit had been there for a wee while. We continued together on to Pathhead, where I always convince myself the climbing is mostly done. In reality there's plenty more until we hit the A7 at Falahill. From here we are on the A7 for a short section - made slightly longer by the railway works - and then it is the old coach road until we are just a few miles outside Gala.

Side by side on the old coach road

Over the last year we've really seen the railway take shape along this route. On one of the windiest days of last winter we accepted a lift from a manager on the project. He told us how they were cleaning the lead paint off the old bridges: blast them with high speed jets of tiny ball-bearings. Both the bearings and lead paint are highly toxic so this was done under a sealed low pressure tent. The workers had to wear special suits and go through a decompression routine before and after each shift or risk the bends. He was a lovely chap whose chief concern seemed to be that no-one should die building a railway. It comforts me to know that he is running the show and I must report that most of  the works lorries I encounter have always given me plenty of room when overtaking - and none have been so bad that I've been worried. The tents have all gone now and the bridges have been repainted in one assumes a more environmentally sound manner. Sleepers are stacked up waiting to be laid and piles of ballast are visible along the route - it's looking good for the trains to be running in autumn 2015.

Ready to support the railway

It's not all quite so picturesque

After the old coach road, the last few miles into Gala along the A7 are pretty fast, before we know it we're at the thirty sign and rolling down the hill to the flat in time to have a quick shower and grab dinner in The Golden Lion. The food here is suprisingly good. The menu looks like stanard wetherspoon's fayre, burgers, fish n chips, generic curry etc, but the curry can be spiced to your liking and the chips look and taste like they've been cut from actual potatoes on the premises.

On Saturday we rode to Peebles and back for the hill race and on Monday morning we rode back to Edinburgh. I forgot to take the charging cable for the camera, so no pics of these rides I'm afraid.

Elapsed Time: 2:34:00 (including about 5 mins in the bike shop).
Distance: 37 miles

Google says:
(including stop at bike shop)
Driving: 1 hr 8 mins [unlikely at 5pm on a Friday to be fair]
Public Transport: 2hrs 10 mins

Strava: http://app.strava.com/activities/182018974

Leith to Hillend

We had another midweek hill race last night - just up the road at the Hillend ski centre this time. For a race as short as this one there is no question of how we'd get there.  It simply isn't worth driving any distance to run for only 25 minutes. This would never be such a fun ride as last week's out to North Berwick: through the city at rush hour on the day the schools went back.

All routes to Hillend will end up going through Morningside and up Comiston road, but there a few options in getting there from Leith.  Google recommends some bike path and Princes Street madness, but I opted for Holyrood park and Grange Road.  The most direct way would be Leith Walk and the bridges, but from Leith Street all the way to Chambers street is always unpleasantly busy and is pretty much at a standstill at rush hour.

When in Edinburgh, even a ride through the city offers some decent scenery

Nothing terribly much to report on the ride itself. Pretty much all uphill and busy traffic, but riding through it sure beats sitting in it.

My first glimpse of the race route

At the race I registered and wondered where Berit was.  She'd set off before me and had a shorter ride.  A quick text solved the mystery - she'd ridden all the way to the top car park. Registration was at the bottom of the hill.  It was great to see that we were far from the only ones who had ridden there and that a good few folk ran there too.

No bike racks.

On the way back Berit nearly dropped me going through Morningside - she'd got a nice draft from a delivery van and was taking full advantage on the uphill.  I'd been sensibly taking it easy through the junction and found myself gapped.  Despite us keeping up with the van all the way up the hill, I could feel the cars behind becoming increasingly desperate to overtake, which they did at the first half-chance.  Of course we saw them again at the lights.

We popped in to Hemma for our dinner on the way home. I'm not sure if the short ride and shorter race justified the bacon and cheese burger, but it was rather nice and the service in Hemma is always great. It's a vast improvement on The Tun that used to be there but was rarely open and always quiet and a pretty good rival in burger quality terms to the Holyrood 9A up the road.

Getting There:
Riding Time: 38:13
Distance: 7.8 miles

Google says

Driving: 29 mins (round the bypass at 5:30? Hmm... )
Public Transport: 1:05:00




Getting Back:


Riding Time: 23:24
Distance: 5.7 miles

Google says:

Driving: 17 minutes (pretty quiet by then, so probably about right)
Public Transport: 47 minutes.


Strava: http://www.strava.com/activities/179835371  http://www.strava.com/activities/179835368

Edinburgh To North Berwick

Berit's year in exile is over and yesterday she started back at the Royal.  To celebrate we decided to do the North Berwick Law race, a short midweek hill race from the harbour to the top of the Law and back.  It starts at 7:30 so we knew we'd have to leave work sharp and just meet there rather than trying to ride out together.  I'd spent most of the afternoon hoping Berit would text to say she'd been held up at work and we could call it off.  I'd been out the night before and arrived home after 11 with a 14 inch pizza. Berit wasn't interested so I ate it all.  Then there had been a lunch time talk at work - more pizza.

Five o'clock came without a rescuing text from Berit, so I climbed onto the bike and headed east. I usually leave work a bit later than this and forget how mental the traffic is at five o'clock.  Leith was a carpark most of the way to Seafield Road.  I nearly came a cropper while filtering through it.  There'd been some kind of oil spill in Great Junction street and I could feel my wheels start to lose traction before I found a grippier section of tarmac.  Once out on Seafield road the traffic was free flowing but I felt strangely good and had no trouble keeping up with it as we headed round to Portobello.  The traverse of Porty always presents a Morton's fork: prom or high street?  Porty High Street is daft. Drive or cycle down it, doesn't matter: someone will pull out on you. In good weather the prom is mobbed so you are reduced to walking pace.  While the weather was fine, it had been very wet earlier so I figured the crowds wouldn't have had time to form so opted for the prom.

The council have got rid of the conflict inducing "Cyclists Dismount" sign from here.

Through Musselburgh via the shared bridge  I was soon on the relatively quiet coast road and making good time. By rights I should have been taking it easy, but there were other riders about - including one who'd come past me too fast on the prom so I had to show him that I was riding slowly there for a reason :-)

Road markings encourage good bike position through the pinch point

Navigation to North Berwick couldn't be easier - keep the sea on the left and point at the Law - and the coast road was nice and quiet.  I'd soon forgotten how shabby I'd felt earlier and was glad that Berit hadn't texted to call the whole thing off.

Through Aberlady and I discovered that I still can't take that right hand bend back onto the coast road properly - I must go back and repeat it till I get it right one day.  After Gullane I overtook another  cyclist going for the drop bar and panniers look. With a cheery hello I passed him and he promptly sucked my wheel all the way to North Berwick.  I upped the pace a bit to try to drop him, but he wasn't to be shaken.  He even tried a cheeky attack for the 30 sign, but I wasn't going to allow that and took it by half a bike length. He was just going along to watch the race rather than take part.

The sun on my back and my hands on the drops.

The final run to the Harbour was uneventful and I was well in time to get us both registered and chat to a few folk before Berit turned up from her ride with a smile on her face and cramp in her leg.

Now it was just the small matter of the race, followed by a steak roll, then fish and chips, a cheeky pint and the train home where good chat was provided by couple of our EAC clubmates who had been marshalling the race.  All in all a splendid way to spend the evening after a day's work

North Berwick

Total Time: 1:17:00 (forgot to start the garmin, so added ~6 mins to the recorded time
Distance:  22.5 miles

Google reckons:
Public transport: 1:15:00
Driving : 0:44:00 (without traffic)

Strava: http://app.strava.com/activities/176504062

The race?  You can see Bob Marshall's photos here: https://picasaweb.google.com/113562417702657933373/NorthBerwickLawRace2014

Kilsyth to Edinburgh

Berit provides the words for this ride:

Mitchell's parents live in Kilsyth, so it was fairly early on that we started to cycle out there from Edinburgh - traditionally from Edinburgh parkrun on a Saturday morning, occasionally making a very early start and doing Falkirk parkrun at the half way point. We've honed the route several times, and now know a very pleasant way with plenty of hills and country roads, and no Cumbernauld or A803. It's more unusual to do the route in the opposite direction, as we usually get the train back on Sunday night after a weekend visit, however on this occasion we were over to see some of the Commie Games with Mitch's dad, and after an overnight stay thought we'd take the opportunity to spend a day in the saddle, and avoid the overfilled trains.

We started a bit later than planned (as usual) after getting distracted by a surprisingly gripping lawn bowls match. As we set off the weather looked a bit ominous, but within 20 minutes I had to insist on a quick stop to remove layers. I also took the opportunity to admit defeat and give Mitch my pannier to carry - he was clearly nearly falling off trying to cycle slowly enough, while I was spluttering behind him with a progressively redder complexion. In my defence, I can usually manage fine behind him if we're both on our tourers, but since Mitch has put a rack on his old road bike and started using it for these trips I'm basically riding a truck while he's speeding along in a Jag!

Taps aff or Taps oan? The weather couldn't decide.

We set off again through very changeable weather and I was pleased to see a could keep on his wheel again. It's a pretty challenging route out of Kilsyth with plenty of hills, but plenty of stunning scenery to keep you distracted. Still, I was pleased when we approached Cupcake Cafe bar just before Torphichen, where we had agreed earlier to have lunch. We've stopped here a few times for food on our Kilsyth trips and have always received a warm welcome despite our often wet and dirty state. Today was no different, although we'd started to dry off again in the sun after the most recent shower. We both went for baked potatoes, and neither of us were disappointed other than that we were so full afterwards we couldn't try a cupcake! Total £15.25 for 2 baked potatoes  a ginger beer and a coffee.

Potato!

When we set out again I knew there was some climbing ahead, and as usual I had a post-prandial struggle with jelly legs and a heavy belly. The Torphichen  road was actually closed with roadworks but as usual we pressed on regardless, and as usual it paid off as we cycled through without mishap and had the benefit of a car free road. As we came to the top of the final big climb after Beecraigs country park we came upon another cyclist pushing her bike, at first we thought she didn't have the legs, but it was soon obvious that she had a rear puncture. She'd gone out without a repair kit, so we provided some roadside assistance and were all soon on our way again.

Good deed for the day.

We had a good 15mph back wind, so I knew once we were up that last climb the going would be good. I don't think we dropped below 20mph all the way to the Crammond brig. What I hadn't reckoned on was that my draft was less with the tailwind, and Mitch therefore managed to completely burn me up on this section. He dropped me just as we crossed the A90, and from this point on my legs were burning and weak.

Luckily we decided to follow the bike path network for the rest of the route, so our speed had to be fairly slow anyway. I still got dropped on all the tiny gradients, but we made it home in bright sunshine before 4pm, and then it was tea and cake time :-)

Total time: 4:03:59  (1 lunch stop and 1 repair stop)

Actual Riding Time: 2:58:10

Distance: 44.6 miles.

google says:

Public Transport: 1:17:00

Driving: 1:09:00

Strava: http://app.strava.com/activities/173011988

Kilsyth to Galashiels

We were staying overnight with my Dad on Saturday and needed to get to Berit's flat in Galashiels on the Sunday.

Berit goes on the attack!

We started on our usual route out of Kilysth by climbing through Dullatar and skirting round the edges of Cumbernauld - one of a select list of towns that I will always try to avoid cycling through or near (I'm sure the others will feature in this blog sooner or later) - but were soon on to small unknown roads.  The first part of the route headed south-east through a succession of small Lanarkshire villages. Each contained a mix of boarded-up churches, run down council houses and new-money mansions bordering on the vulgar.  One guy seemed to be in the middle of paving his entire front garden with actual cobbles.  Not your suburban keeping-up-with-the-joneses monoblock but actual old-school cobbles.  Maybe it's his tribute to the Queen of the Classics, but more likely it's just to give the two 4x4s parked on top of it a taste of the bumps they are missing on the school run.

Waiting on a lift?

We herded these guys for a while

By Carnwath we were ready for lunch so opted for the Robertson Arms Hotel - it being the only option.  It didn't look too inviting from the outside, but we were warmly welcomed and shown to a table in the outside non-smoking seating area.  The sun was beating down and we baked while waiting for our lunches.  We both went for cheese, ham and pickle toastie - an off-menu choice that raised a comment but didn't fluster the kitchen - paired with the soup of the day: potato and turnip. The soup was tasty but perhaps not quite as thick as I would have liked. The toasties were excellent - generously filled and tasty. Add a pint of fresh orange and lemonade and  £12.40 for the lot is pretty good value.

Some map checking along the way

After Carnwath our route turned eastward and became more downhill than up. With the light westerly wind the more favourable gradient and lunch in our bellies we started to up the pace.

Before long we were at Peebles. A quick water stop and now it feels like home turf: familiar roads and signs for Galashiels. The back road from Peebles to Innerleithen is familiar from many a training weekend but is no less enjoyable for it. At innerleithen the back road was closed for a mountain bike event, but we could pass in a break in the action and so had the road to Gala pretty much to ourselves.

We were not alone.

When we made it to Berit's flat and rehydrated with a couple of quick pints in the Ladhope before showering and heading out to Quinn's for dinner.

You might think that a route cutting through the central belt like this would be all on busy, ugly, roads.  No - they were pretty much all quiet and many of them were beautiful. This was a great day out on the bike - and it got us where we needed to be.

Total time to ride there: 5:47:09  (including 1 lunch stop)
Actual riding time: 4:54:33
Distance: 75 miles

Google says...
To drive 1:29:00

Pubic Transport: 2:45:00

Strava: http://app.strava.com/activities/168513347

Edinburgh To Aberdeen

Berit's parents live up in Aberdeen.  We live in Edinburgh.  Normally we drove or got the train up to visit them, but one day back in 2010 we asked the question: "Can we ride there"?  We weren't sure - it'd be the longest either of us had ridden in one day and we didn't know what the roads would be like.  We decided the best thing was to wait until the forecast was favourable and just go for it without telling them we were coming.  So if we failed we could slink off to the nearest train station and head for home with our tails between our legs.

Normally for long rides to stay overnight we'd ride on our touring bikes, but for this sort of distance we decided to travel light: road bikes and no change of clothes. We'd borrow clothes, chuck everything in the machine and then get the train back the next day.

I'd had the parkrun laptop that week, so we swung by Cramond to drop it off on the way to the bridge.  We set off before the run started though and were soon heading for Fife.

 

It wasn't long before we had reached our first coffee stop in Perth.  I can't remember what this place was called back then, but it is now The Crack'd Pot and is excellent.  The lady who runs it remembers us each time and we get a good bit of chat about cycling.  It's too early for lunch, but the last few times we've got her to make us sandwiches for later. The natural lunch stop would be Kirriemuir - but all the food places there are weird. They're stuck in some kind of time warp - the cafes that never grew up if you will (google it, it's a proper literary reference).

First cake stop

From Perth it was onwards to lunch in Kirriemuir - stopping only to watch the start of a bike race.  Despite the 70 miles in our legs we hung on to the back of the race convoy and then tried to pace a girl who'd been dropped back into the race.  She couldn't hold our wheels though, so we waited where our route took us off the race course (we had no choice but to stop, I think the marshal would have thrown himself in front of us to stop us going the 'wrong' way) and cheered her on.  I don't know if it helped.

Waiting for the Petit Depart

Lunch in Kirriemuir that first year was a sorry affair, but it gave us enough energy to keep going until first dinner at Subway in Banchory - including the climb of  the fearsome Cairn 'o Mount 100 miles in to the trip.

Cairn 'o mount

Subway in Banchory for first dinner

 

 

 

 

 

From Banchory it's a pretty short ride to Greenmoss, where we found Berit's surprised mother working in the front garden.  We'd made it and despite the lack of warning, Janet managed to rustle us up a very welcome cold beer and an even more welcome second dinner.

Beer!

We've done the trip four times now, each time improving the route slightly, but sticking to the same basic plan.  The roads are mostly quiet and although we've never had such favourable weather as that first time, it's always been basically fine.

Cairn 'o Mount rather stands out.

 Our fourth trip on Strava