Tulloch to Fort William on the mountain bike

We loaded the bikes onto the train at Fort William, and took it to Tulloch station.  From here it was a few miles along the main road, where we turned off at Monessie Gorge and crossed the bridge into farmland.  We followed the muddy farmland tracks and path along the River Spean back to Spean Bridge, then up through the forestry to Leanachan and Nevis Range, and then along the cycle path back to Fort William.  The views along the route were great, I just had to remember to look at them, when not concentrating on the uneven ground I was crossing!

Mountain bike from Calluna to the Lower Falls and back

I took a spin straight up the back from Calluna and joined the Cow Hill path up to the mast and then down the Peat Track to the forestry road and up to the Lower Falls.  It was a great cycle, cloudy but cold, with frost on the ground, made for some interesting slips along the way!

 

Quick spin to the Commando Memorial

Lovely Autumnal Sunday for a bike to the Commando Memorial and back.

Quick spin to Glenfinnan

First spin on my road bike since I got back, a quick trip from Calluna to the Glenfinnan Monument and back, in lovely warm September weather!

Freshnlo Pedal for Scotland 2013

Freshnlo Pedal for Scotland 2013

Susan and I at the start

On Sunday, September 8 I took part in the 2013 Freshnlo Pedal for Scotland, 47 mile challenge ride (there is 110 mile sportive ride) from Glasgow Green to Murrayfield Stadium in Edinburgh.  You can check out the exact route I took on my Strava profile.

The weather forecast had been for rain, but luckily, it turned out to be a nice sunny day!

Everything was very well organised, we put our bikes in the transport lorry at Murrayfield Stadium and got on the organised coach through to Glasgow Green, where we successfully collected our bikes of the truck.

We had booked into the 09:30-10:00 start wave, so we got in the line up of people and moved towards the start line.  Then it was 3-2-1-GO! We started off in a group of maybe 50 people, there was no problem with space.  Some of the roads we cycled along had been closed to traffic and where they were still open there were police directing the traffic and marshals all along the way.  There was also an emergency number you could call if you broke down (bike wise or physically) and you could be picked up.

We got to our first stop at Drumpellier Country Park around 9 miles, which had flown by!  The next stop was the longest stretch at around 23 miles to Avonbridge Station.  Then on to the main lunch stop, which was in the grounds of Linlithgow Palace.  Each of the stops had toilets, first aid and bike maintenance tents, I think some even had massage tents.  The stops had cereal and chocolate bars, bananas, soup, water, the Linlithgow stop had sandwiches and each stop had as much Freshnlow as you could drink! There was a further food stop at Kirkliston Leisure Centre, but we decided to continue on to the finish.

The finish line was very cool, it was inside Murrayfield stadium! On finishing we got a medal and a goody bag, with you guessed it, more milk! Just as well I love milk !

You can view lots more pictures from the entire event on Cycling Scotland’s flickr page.

Adventures on Mull

I headed to Mull, which is a 3 hour drive from Edinburgh to Oban, then a 45 minute CalMac Ferry crossing to Craignure as a foot passenger, having left my car in Oban for the weekend.

I was staying at Tavool House, which is used by Hebridean Pursuits, offering sea and mountain adventure activities.  It’s a very scenic 1 hour drive from Craignure on the Ardmeanach peninsula overlooking the Ross of Mull.

On Saturday morning we headed to Carsaig on the South of the Ross of Mull, we got wet suited and booted up and headed for the water.  It was cold at first but we soon warmed up as we traversed around the rocky coast jumping into the water at any given opportunity from the rocks.  There was a bit of swimming to be done across the small bays, but the scenery was beautiful and made the trip well worth while!

Saturday afternoon we headed to Fionnphort at the Western end of the Ross of Mull, where you can take a short crossing to the very scenic island of Iona.  We took to the water again for a couple of hours around the coastline, the white sand beaches and turquoise waters were amazing and the views over to Iona were stunning!

On Sunday we donned the wetsuits again for a quick trip down Tavool Gorge, right next to the cottage.  It was by far the best way to keep cool in the heat, jumping into all the pools on the way down, even Hamish (the dog) joined us!

Loch Lomond – Canoeing

Sarah, Susan and I on the home stretch

Sarah, Susan and I on the home stretch

We set of early Saturday morning for Luss on Loch Lomond, it’s an hour and a half drive from Edinburgh, and at 7am it was already 19 degrees!

The plan had been to do a Graham (a Scottish mountain between 2,000 and 2,499 feet) just above Luss, but by the time we got there and walked for an hour in the sun, we decided it was too hot (at about 25 degrees), changed our plan and took a walk along the banks of Loch Lomond, through a quaint little village and around the pilgrimage trail at Luss.  After our walk, we spent the afternoon on the beach at Luss, reading and enjoying the sunshine!

We stayed the night in Garelochhead at Centre 81, which is a outdoor community centre.  The accommodation and facilities were brilliant!  We had dinner at The Anchor Inn, the food was fantastic!

On Sunday morning we headed back to Luss for a canoe trip around the islands on Loch Lomond, with a company called SDAdventures.  Scott was our guide for the day (the owner of SDAdventures), a jovial Glasweegen guy, who was pretty funny, in a cheeky way!  We had a safety briefing and got all our equipment and canoes ready, then hit the water for the short paddle across to an island called Inchtavannach.  We did a bit of zig zagging on our way across as we found our stroke co-ordination.

Our second island was Inchconnachan, where we spent an hour or so wandering about on the hunt for wallabies, yes wallabies… and we saw one (no pictures unfortunately, he was too fast)!  They had been introduced in the 1940s by Lady Colquhoun, and still roam wild.  Scott was great at telling us all about the islands and their histories as we wandered through the tall ferns and forests on Inchconnachan.

Our third quick stop was on Inchmoan, it had a large ruined cottage on it and lovely long beaches, with shallow waters.  This was our last stop before heading back.  The last paddle was the longest and into the wind, but by this point we had our paddling co-ordination sorted and make quick work of the last stretch.

Martin Currie Rob Roy Challenge 2013

Martin Currie Rob Roy Challenge 2013

Marina and I at the finish line!

On June 22 I joined colleagues from work to take part in the 2013 Martin Currie Rob Roy Challenge, all funds we raised went to Alzheimer Scotland, Over The Wall and Water Aid, in total we raised around £4,ooo!

The challenge was 16 miles walking (or running, we walked!) from Drymen to Callander, then 39 miles biking from Callander to Kenmore along part of the Rob Roy Way. The weather was wet, but warm, but the Scottish midges were out in force… The day was very well laid out and supported by crews along the way providing food, drink and encouragement in abundance! The scenery along the route was beautiful and Kenmore was a very picturesque little village at the end.

Checkpoint Time of Day Elapsed Leg Position
Start – Drymen Sat 07:42:58 —– —–
CP1 – Aberfoyle Sat 09:33:58 01:51:00 01:51:00 364th (501)
CP2 – Callander Sat 12:21:35 04:38:37 02:47:37 389th (501)
CP3 – Balquhidder Sat 14:18:18 06:35:20 01:56:43 321st (476)
CP4 – Killin Sat 15:39:48 07:56:50 01:21:30 302nd (473)
Finish – Kenmore Sat 17:41:12 09:58:14 02:01:24 275th (448)

This is the first time I have taken part in an event like this and it won’t be the last.  It was a fantastic day and I finished in 9 hours and 58 minutes! At the finish line there were massages available for all the participants, I took up this offer straight away!  The feast in the evening was very tasty and the ceilidh band sounded great, I was a bit too stiff to do any dancing though!

They even put on breakfast on the Sunday morning for us!

Camping and kayaking on the West Coast of Scotland

I went back to Fort William (a 3 hour drive from Edinburgh) to visit my family for the weekend and we packed up the cars with kayaks, bikes, tents and the BBQ and headed for the Back of Keppock, about an hours drive away from Fort William, which is is just north of Arisaig and south of Morar on the West Coast of Scotland. We pitched our tents at the bottom of a friends croft which led straight onto the beach.  The weather could not have been better, sunshine, blue skies and warm!

On Saturday we got the kayaks out and paddled around in the bay all morning, then we were joined by friends who had a small boat.  My niece and nephew both loved having a shot in the kayak and the boat. My dog Megan didn’t quite know what to do, with all of us out on the water and her still ashore, so she ran along the shore keeping us in sight at at all times. In the afternoon my Dad and I went for a longer paddle out of the bay, it was such a beautiful day, the water was crystal clear and turquoise!  Saturday night was BBQ time, the midges weren’t too bad so we all sat out eating and chatting, till the sunset, which was amazing!

On Sunday when we were all packed up, I went out for another paddle with my Dad and everyone else went for a cycle.  Then we visited the Arisaig Hotel for lunch before heading back to Fort WIlliam and me back to Edinburgh.  It’s great to be able to have a short summer break in Scotland only a few hours drive out of the city!

Modelling for Blacks

Blacks had put the word out around Fort William looking for non-models to model clothes for an upcoming campaign, I sent a picture of myself in and they asked me to be in Roy Bridge today.  Having never done anything like this before I was quite excited (but slightly nervous at the same time)!

They have been in the area for a few days doing a recce with Mick Tighe for todays shoot and also doing a shoot of the Scottish Mountain Heritage Collection (SMHC).  Blacks is celebrating it’s 150th birthday this year, and the SMHC has a number of old historic Blacks items.

Morning call was at Glenspean Lodge at 8am, where I met the other models, the photography crew, make-up artist and the staff from Blacks.  The photographer was Jonathan Blackham and the make-up artist was Sophie Higginson.  We had a campervan for getting changed in and doing hair and make-up.

Our first location was up Glen Roy for some pictures in the woods beside the river.  Second location was further up Glen Roy at the Turret Bridge.  The good old Scottish weather wasn’t playing very fair today, it was very windy with showers, so hair and make-up kept having to be touched up after each shoot.  Third and final location for the day was on the shores of Loch Laggan, it was a lot less windy there.

All in, it was a fun day! I’m looking forward to seeing the pictures when the are published in the campaign!

Copyright © Dandelion by Pexeto