Cold if glorious and a bit snowy up top of Listonshiels.
Found path up East Cairn finally. And according to some runners, an alternative route down to Carlops. That will need further recon.
CityCyclingEdinburgh Forum » Commuting
The "I had a lovely ride today, thankyou" thread
(2697 posts)-
Posted 3 years ago #
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Innerleithen for social distant layby coffee with parents on Saturday.
Freezing on the way out, boiling on the way back. Hills seem to have got higher over the Christmas period.
Posted 3 years ago # -
Up the east cairn there with the Iwrats. Was a blast
Posted 3 years ago # -
Found and triggered urcaidh’s robocops today genial fog walkers said the cops were there instantly when they triggered them.
Great routes round craigmillar hill with Teh Iwrats and down the ESB then up the Brustane.
Finished off by cucl8ng into the dump unimpeded as was late for my date with Mrs Garto,
Think there was a fracas with driver wanting in without appointment that drew the flak from me just cycling in
Posted 3 years ago # -
Had a great day on Thursday, One of those days where it was forecast to be grey but I had a full sun for most of the ride.
First went for a low tide dawn walk in the Eden Estuary at Coble Shore (South of Leuchars air base) tons of bird life and shells everywhere.
Then parked the car at Leuchars station and rode into Tentsmuir via the Fife Coastal Path. Diverged after a few miles and got onto the beach at the southern end at low tide, found rideable sand right down at the sea and had several miles of coastal riding - only saw 2 other people. Was glorious. Then ducked into the forest for an explore on a mix of 4WD, singletrack and MTB trails, emerging at Tentsmuir point where the wind got up. A fair bit of hike a bike, but again eventually found the hard sand again.
Then made my way to Newport via Tayport and then zigzagged back to Leuchars.
I'll be back to Tentsmuir a lot I think.
Posted 3 years ago # -
I grew up next to Tentsmuir so cycled through it a lot growing up. There's an extensive network of Forestry Commission tracks to the North of the asphalt road to the beach. Some nice spots like Morton Lochs and an interesting history with the Polish WW2 camp.
There is an off road route from Newport to Tentsmuir via Drumoig that's shown on the core paths map. Never tried it but would think it'd require a MTB.
http://arcgisweb.fife.gov.uk/LocalViewEXT/Sites/CorePathNetworkEMB/
Posted 3 years ago # -
On Saturday I cycled round the Pentlands - not a route I do very often, not sure why. Went out via the Lang Wang (spotted Gembo en route). Took a lovely wee back road to cut the corner at Carnwath. Then took the back roads via Walston (there were a couple of Veloviewer tiles I wanted, hence going that way rather than through Dunsyre). That area is lovely farmland rather than the moor of the higher Pentlands. Lots of lambs. Once at Dolphinton I went via Blyth Bridge and Romanobridge to West Linton, and so onto the Moor Road and home.
It was mostly sunny, but cold - I got hailed on between Blyth Bridge and Romanobridge. Before I left, Mr fimm wondered if I was going to be too warm - when I got back I pointed out that I was now wearing more clothes then I had been when I left!
Posted 3 years ago # -
Found and triggered urcaidh’s robocops today
Whats that about gembo?
Posted 3 years ago # -
Kids got the VIP tour treatment of various trails through Craigmillar Castle Park by local celebrity IWRATS..... beautiful day for it too...
Posted 3 years ago # -
@Paddyirish, did you get the square you were after?
Posted 3 years ago # -
@steveo, there is a fly tipping site near the incinerator out Danderhall way. There is a big fence to stop the fly tippers. And security on those things that sit like braziers. 360 degree surveillance. We tripped them as we went in but the dog walkers were helpful. We then went through the gate, all legal. And path down towards Musselburgh.
One small section of road beyond the Craigmillar area is a cut through to get to fort kinnaird. Exceptionally bad driving occurs compared to the rest of the route which is off road mainly. Otherwise the Iwrats would have surely taken the Algo Weans to trip the robots. What larks.
Posted 3 years ago # -
@fimm, the Kaimend cut through is nice. Has raspberries in the summer.
Walton also pretty. It too has a cuthrough just at the post box a road traverses the valley onto the dunsyre road. Not for your RTP but for instance you could go to Biggar via the kaimened cut through and the reverse Walton and then down to Biggar taking great care after Walston as there is a Y junction. Both roads will take you to Biggar though.
Posted 3 years ago # -
Put 40mm tyres on my CX bike to turn it into a more pentland ready machine and rode up lymphoy road and back to Colinton via reservoirs. Lovely afternoon to be out and fantastic fun on the big tyres on that bike.
Definitely impressed with the experience of riding on a bit more cushion. Pentlands a bit too lumpy in general for the old 32mm and the 40mm gave a lot more control and comfort for only a tiny impact on overall speed. Now I just have to index my gears a bit better...
Posted 3 years ago # -
Went exploring in Midlothian which was fun. Lovely views down towards the coast. Best but was sitting in Saltoun Forest in the sun and out of the wind. Also cycled all the way along the Pencaitland Railway Path which is longer than I thought it was. Fine on a road bike just now because it is so dry.
Posted 3 years ago # -
Up the Gowfie in West Linton tonight doing a recce for cycle to Covenanter’s grave. Road stays asphalt for some distance then gravel and not huge climbing.
We did not get as far as medwin water which might be tricky with laden bikes as weather was far from clement.
We observed military, maybe TA erecting a huge tarp. One rabbit and two deer, one bug curlew one big heron.
Gowfie also has other roads to garvald, dolphinton etc
Posted 3 years ago # -
Out to Lammermuirs up hills beyond Gifford. Back via Garvald and avoided Haddington by taking Samuelston Rd. Used Electric Bridge in Musselburgh twice. Saw a horse race going by - impressive sound.
Volume of cars heading into Edinburgh was something to behold. Tranent was jammed up going out and back. Should have gone round. On Milton Rd West the empty bus lane allowed me to get by a huge line of cars. SfP measures ok. Smoothest bike lane was painted one at Gladsmuir - A199 not too bad.
Cars are definitely trending and motoring confidence is back. Only saw a handful of cyclists but was a Friday.Posted 3 years ago # -
Some of my ancestors were Border Reivers, so with lockdown easing today felt a good day to follow their lead and carry out a raid on Berwick upon Tweed McDonalds (I know, I know, the Reivers were the other side of the country, but why spoil a promising intro with pedantry?).
Up at silly o'clock (when it was bloomin' cold) and out via Gifford, Redstone Rig, Longformacus, Duns, Paxton to Berwick. Paid for (rather than stole) stuff from Berwick McDonalds. Discovered that a Millionaire's Donut has lots of sticky stuff inside that is hard to remove if you accidentally get it all over yourself (but it is 250 calories).
Back via NCN 75 (with a minor panic at Pease Bay where there is a Road Closed sign [it's not closed to bikes, but they are fixing the ford at the caravan park]) to Dunbar, then round the coast to North Berwick and home along the coast road through Aberlady.
Pottered along very pleasantly doing the 125 mile trip in an elapsed 10h30m and pleased that my fitness held up. The weather was lovely (apart from being cold at the start), the wind was in the right directions. The views were outstanding.
Low point was an unplanned dismount near Dirleton, when I misjudged the edge of the road while stopping and ended up in a heap on the verge, which was humiliating but harmless.
High points were the large numbers of very old people in East Lothian riding e-bikes very slowly. Utterly wonderful to see the freedom they've got from this technology.
Grand day out.
Posted 3 years ago # -
Westerly on the way to Berwick
easterly on the way Back?Posted 3 years ago # -
@gembo - I think (genuinely) no wind on the way down, but gentle easterly on the homeward run, so irrelevant for the leg to Dunbar then a useful boost from Dunbar home.
Posted 3 years ago # -
Ah still good.
We had westerly out the Whang and on to Biggar and Broughton but by the time we reached the Stobo side of Dreva we had easterly
A travesty
Posted 3 years ago # -
Smile rising vertically from somewhere near the airport about 7 this morning. Then going slightly easterly about an hour later (a snapped gear cable in the group lead to a restart). Then around 10 it felt like a headwind on the Lang Whang but the airfield windsock said it wasn't enough to register.
Posted 3 years ago # -
Started lovely on @urchaidh’s route through dickie Scott’s land. But as @Iwrats pointed out the Covenanter’s Grave was in the other direction. Made good progress once we hit the bonnyrigg railway. Coffee at west linton good but meant more time in the rain. Took the Boston Cottage path to the Covenanter’s grave from west linton Gowfie.
Retraced back along the moor road. Pcook over to Flotty, lot of traffic lights and new hooses. Flotty to Balerno back with a tail wind which was a relief.
I am a bit gubbed,
Posted 3 years ago # -
Mr fimm and I had talked about doing the Capital Trail bikepacking route over 3 days, but the weather forecast led us to decide that one night camping would be sufficient.
On Saturday we went south on a version of the last day of the Capital Trail (but in reverse of the usual direction). Went over the Pentlands from Listonsheils to the Bore Stane and then down for coffee in West Linton. Then picked up the Cross Borders Drove Road for the lovely section between Romamobridge and Peebles. From Peebles I took the valley bottom cycle path to Innerleithen where I got the tent up before the rain started, while mr fimm stayed on the Drove Road to go over Kirkhope Law.
Sunday we took a bit more of the cyclepath to Walkerburn before doing a loop on tracks through the forest above Innerleithen to come out at the golf course. There were lots of mountain bikers going up these tracks - there are informal (but clearly well-known) downhill routes all over the place. We continued up the Granites Road before taking a left where the road goes right and climbing up through the forest to the wind farm. It hailed on the way up. Has no one told the weather that it is May? From there we did a bit of hike-a-bike to get to tracks in the valley of the South Esk and so to Gladhouse. More road riding to Penicuik and ten we picked up various ex railway lines and the like to get home.
Posted 3 years ago # -
From there we did a bit of hike-a-bike to get to tracks in the valley of the South Esk and so to Gladhouse
Strava says that we just missed each other here. I cycled up along the South Esk, and was clambering about on the slopes of Blackhope Scar, but left about an hour before you came through.
Posted 3 years ago # -
We were all close on Saturday, we detoured to the Cloich Woods sort of near romano bridge.
There is an abandoned house on the drove route above Romano
The Meldons at the start has a route straight to Shiplaw comes out at observatory
The drove road shows little farming communities still exist but are in hiding. nether Stewarton being my favourite.
Also trees have ribbons in white to help those cycling in the dark
Posted 3 years ago # -
@Frenchy how strange. I was surprised at the number of Strava segments and the number of people on them out there - I had expected it to be little travelled.
@gembo we went through Cloich Woods the other week. I hope you didn't have to chuck your bikes over a wall like we did!
Posted 3 years ago # -
@fimm no we went up past the observatory and the little green hut, has stove and satellite dish, why go out there to watch telly
But gravel became too intense for road bike tyres
We were in search of way through to La Mancha via Don Coyote outdoor
We did have to Chuck bikes over @urchaidh’s gate into Dalkeith CP
Posted 3 years ago # -
When on the school run, reasons, meant I had the bike carrying trailer in operation as I waited to pick up the kids.
A couple of senior cyclists (possibly octogenarians) did a double take at our set up and doubled back for a chat.
We then had a lovely chat with them as we expressed mutual admiration for each other's exploits. They told us about going cycle touring each year for 2-3 months...
#BeMoreJane&John
Posted 3 years ago # -
I am not saying lovely, actually it was filthy but the Galibier Gabba that @Bill gave me worked well in cold wet conditions. Many thanks.
Posted 3 years ago # -
Found a new hill today, up from Broughton on the west side of the valley you get to a junction that is signposted Biggar to the right and Better to the left. I know the right hand route is a slog so tried the left hand route. It starts flat and passes a large baronial mansion. Starts to ramp up a little but hugs the hill and then it completely takes off way up high and then there is a hidden valley with land rover track. We stayed on the road and descended to Coulter on the A702. Only on that briefly then headed over to the Clyde and home. Fierce headwind for the Currie audaxers going to Moscow and back. Lang Whang was a slog.
Posted 3 years ago #
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