Well my planned escape for a week or two with Steve to explore Northern Scotland hasn't worked out - he just can't handle the weather up here and has decided he wants to go somewhere warmer and sunnier. What with that and the non appearance of my seat sent away for a gel insert, I've given up on the long distance rides.
However, as I live in a great part of the country for empty,winding roads I decided I'll just keep going out for day rides. So yesterday I drove down alongside the River Dee to Ballater, stopped for coffee and chocolate cake then turned off the main road onto a single track road that went up to Glen Gairn, then followed an old military road up and into the Grampian mountains. What a laugh! The single track road was full of crests and dips, with no traffic I was able to get air under the wheels for the first time.
The road went back down towards Braemar; it was just so nice riding along, a different view around every bend, the hills are now turning purple with heather and there's still plenty of wildlife to be seen off the beaten track. Had a great ride and the sun even came out for an hour or two. Stopped beside the hump-backed bridge in the photo and had a laugh watching cars trying to negotiate it; you can't see in the photo but it's single track and its impossible to see who's coming the other way - hours of fun watching cars backing up and down in the sun. Then when I got back to the cottage I decided to ride up the track into the forest and disturbed a couple of deer frolicking around - now that was a great day.
Now today I'm supposed to spend the day in front of this laptop; my final assignment for the course I'm doing is due in 3 weeks and I've about 3 months-worth of work still to do but the sun is shining and I can almost hear the bike whispering ride me, ride me; curse you Bandit!
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