@Snowy, I had a wonderful plastic hip flask which was excellent on the bike as it was a decent size and pretty light. Lost it :(, my nice new one is a social one with cups and stuff but its heavy!
@paddyirish, sounds like a grand weekend.
CityCyclingEdinburgh Forum » Commuting
The "I had a lovely ride today, thankyou" thread
(2697 posts)-
Posted 5 years ago #
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the truth appears t be coming out now...
Posted 5 years ago # -
After today's PY morning drinks I headed for a bit of a jaunt. I decided to head over to North Berwick first. I asked the Google lady to navigate me there, so I followed the coastal path. From North Berwick I went over to Gifford to have some cake. Weather was a bit grim around Traprain Law but I didn't get too wet. In Gifford I got another slice of the lemon and coconut slice.
I returned via Haddington and then along the coast. By the time I headed west the wind picked up so it was a bit of a slog. Overall a very enjoyable ride!
Posted 5 years ago # -
@bill, head wind picked up through the day so good effort
Posted 5 years ago # -
St Mary's loch via West Linton & Talla, back via innerleithen.
Had to do 3 end2ends on George St to bring up the 100.
Saw a lot of road kill and a lovely weasel.
Phew
Posted 5 years ago # -
I seem to have signed up for Veloviewer and was offered a pass for a few hours this afternoon.
What better way to spend it than riding some new roads (Or at least ones Strava doesn't know I have done).
I headed up to Currie and on on Kirkgate then past Harlaw to the top of Bavelaw (Is that the highest tarmaced road in Edinburgh?)
For some reason I then decided to see if Bavelaw Hill Farm was accessible on 25mm slick tyres. It is but only with wet feet and a certain number of cyclocross dis/remounts.
Down to Kirknewton where I got confused and ended up on what locals called the "dirt track to the A71". Although ridable it wasn't a sensible way to cash in my altitude as I dropped like a stone holding the brakes. I got a huge fright as I passed under the railway at the exact moment a train passed overhead.
I returned via Jupiter Artland, Ratho Station and the A8, not because I thought it would be pleasant (it isn't) but because there was a square I hadn't visited.
All in all a lovely ride with some outstanding views and mostly quiet roads.
...
but
...
When I went to turn my tracker off and discovered I hadn't turned it on.
I did however have a road id tracker running so my route went here (I'm sure gembo could tell you the actual names for these places):
Posted 5 years ago # -
Inconsequential, but...
Station
Check the Leith Street nonsense.
Cycle into Old College Quad.
Experience the latest Talbot Rice show.
Bit of Southside shopping.
Enjoy the Meadow’s Festival.
Cruise round the Art College Degree Show (on foot).
Shop on Lothian Road and Princes Street.
Catch a train minute before it leaves.
All (in the time) not possible on foot, by car or PT.
Posted 5 years ago # -
@acsimpson, nice incursion into Buchann-Smith territory on the off road section.
Posted 5 years ago # -
@acsimpson
Nice ride. Bavelaw castle is the highest residential address in Edinburgh, so that may well be the highest tarmac.
The tunnel-train fright is worthy of a novel.
Posted 5 years ago # -
According to OS Bavelaw castle sits at a mighty 320m. making it almost at least 70m higher than Hillend which is in turn about 70m higher than Queens Drive.
I think next time I'll have to ride sea to sky.
@gembo, I'm not familiar with Buchann-Smith although if he is like other landowners in the area (or maybe he owns the land where Fred dissapeared) then I'm not sure I wouldn't have been welcome for tea.
@iwrats, perhaps there's a secret platform with trains to Glenfinnan under their somewhere.
Posted 5 years ago # -
I wonder how high Listonshiels is on the newly gravelled path to carlops. Borders starts near the saddle so Listonshiels maybe in Edinburgh? The farm sits lower down, IWRATS no I were going t nosey as canvassers but neve materialised.
Buck-smith latest gen will make your dinner for a Tenner. (Free Company). West oif Bavelaw castle on your route is all their territory. Pig farm for one.
2 clicks back in the family tree you get Alick the York MP who died very young.
Posted 5 years ago # -
IWRATS no I were going t nosey as canvassers but neve materialised
Back in the heady days of the Fourteen?
Posted 5 years ago # -
Posted 5 years ago #
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"Baron Balerno". We live in actual Gormenghast.
Posted 5 years ago # -
I thought the Baron Balerno was a rugby club joke but turned out true.
Some of them will talk to a commoner like me, esp if I am wearing a tweed suit.
they once came to a ceilidh in the bowling club. They were all very tanned and golden.
Posted 5 years ago # -
I thought the Baron Balerno was a rugby club joke but turned out true.
Some of them will talk to a commoner like me, esp if I am wearing a tweed suit.
they once came to a ceilidh in the bowling club. They were all very tanned and golden.
Posted 5 years ago # -
The Free Company main meal is always pig. Unless like me you are vegetarian
Good food
Nice fire pit
Half the room is old fogeys like me from Balerno the other half bright young things out for a jaunt from Edinburgh.
The link to the Baron is grandpa, son Alick was the MP and grandson Jamie runs the Free Company, I think, or maybe great grandson
Posted 5 years ago # -
As well as a Baron Balerno there should be a Count of Currie and they can hold jousts along the Water of Leith path.
Posted 5 years ago # -
baron was a title you could buy in Scotland that went with the castlerather than blood lines
the biggest of the Buchanan Smith houses is just before the hamlet of Glenbrook.
THey have the pig farm as mentioned which is a loverly farmhouse and various other dwellings.
THey used to deliver my milk in glass bottles but the dairy farm business went bust and was sold to Grahams of Bridge of Allan
Posted 5 years ago # -
"on the newly gravelled path to carlops" Tell me more? I have only known it as bog- and heather-fest
Posted 5 years ago # -
@Iwrats, yeah back in the fourteen, a generation ago
@murun, gravel now up to the saddle, same as before down to carlops
Posted 5 years ago # -
I had my first ever go on an e-bike today. I rode home along the towpath, possibly slightly slower than I usually go, but with considerably less effort. The best bit was the ascent of Craighouse Hill, which was fast and effortless and led me to exclaim in excitement to a woman pedalling up it that it was my first go on such a machine.
Posted 5 years ago # -
I was chatting to a chap on an ebike on WoL path and towpath. I could get any from him on any long empty gust bits but his acceleration after bridges etc was strong. All very jolly even afte he dismounted on the temporary footbridge, nice revers dismount, only to be asked if he could not read. Grumpy ped
Posted 5 years ago # -
@acsimpson: "According to OS Bavelaw castle sits at a mighty 320m. making it almost at least 70m higher than Hillend which is in turn about 70m higher than Queens Drive."
I think your height for Queen's Drive is a fair way out. The OS has the summit of Whinny Hill, which is a brisk climb up from Queen's Drive, shown as 173m. Plotting a route along Queen's Drive in OS Maps gives the highest point as 126m.
There's a spot height of 183m on Oxgangs Road, near the Caiy Stane. Some of the residential roads in Buckstone are a few metres higher. Until the new water treatment works were built near Penicuik that was the only part of the city that had to have its water pumped from the Fairmilehead treatment works - everywhere else was gravity fed. (It all is now, the new water works being at ~200m.)
The paved road up from Flotterstone to the west end of Loganlea Reservoir goes up to 270m - a fair bit higher than the Hillend road which reaches about 230m.
Posted 5 years ago # -
@greenroofer: "I had my first ever go on an e-bike today...led me to exclaim in excitement to a woman pedalling up it that it was my first go on such a machine."
I often apologise to people doing real work going up a hill when I pass them on my eMTB.
Posted 5 years ago # -
@ejstubbs.
You are right I seem to have got the 100 and 150 contours confused on Arthur's Seat and Hill I think I took the chairlift height at Hillend rather than the carpark.
Loganlea might be higher than Hillend but isn't in Edinburgh.
All somewhat academic though as Bavelaw towers above them. You need to get down to the Moorfoots or out the Lammermuirs if you want to get higher on tarmac.
Posted 5 years ago # -
@acsimpson: Loganlea might be higher than Hillend but isn't in Edinburgh.
Good point. But then neither is the Hillend access road and car park:
(Per the City of Edinburgh Council Atlas)
As you say, though, academic anyway given the altitude achievable on tarmac at Bavelaw.
Posted 5 years ago # -
Ah yes. Not sure how I forgot that given that it's official name is Midlothian Snowsports Centre.
Posted 5 years ago # -
Edinburgh Bike Station staff and volunteers ride-out to Crammond yesterday. I had business in Musselburgh so steamed in and out the Innocent to get to the grand depart.
Crammond Inn closed so re-routed to Porty. Back on the Innocent. 'BE CAREFUL, DUCK' spray-painted in pink on the Tarmac at pne point.
Mechanics all trying to find the right mix of behaving at work and showing mad skillz. Much observation of Scottish Beach Culture. I suggest there's a book in it, chapter titles include Regrettable Tats, Gritty Sandwich, and Translucency.
Posted 5 years ago #
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