We knew that we were in for a challenge when every Scot asking about today’s route said “oh, that’s a long uphill way”
Anyway we left our very pleasant B&B after breakfast with Haggis and the return of our laundered cycling kit - the only place we had this super service. A long 11 km climb along a green lovely valley in the morning sun took us up to Devil’s Thumbprint at the top, past the source of the River Tweed ( may have added to it myself!) and a 21 km great descent - watching the river swell to a decent stream. We stopped for coffee at Laurel Bank (I guess Hardy failed) and then pressed on via La Mancha (the man was out, presumably chasing windmills) and getting to the busy suburbs of Edinburgh. We passed through Fairmilehead where I used to work at the Princess Marg Rose Orthop Hosp just actoss from Hill End Skislope that provided us with do many injured thumbs! We circled the city and reached Forth Road Bridge (the old new bridge) which we had almost to ourselves. Spectacular views of the old railway bridge. Stopped for rolls and coffee on the norh shore - and what we thought was a flat’ish ride to Perth was rather up up and very little down. Most of the rides were on cycle lanes/tracks, rather gritty and bumpy - our tyres showed great resistance to all assaults from flints and sharps. Rehydration in Kinross ( irn Bru - 24 g of sugar per bottle!!!must be sponsored by Scottish dentists and Danish insulin producers!). We arrived in Perth at around 18 hrs after a long hard day- 155 km and a lot of climbing. A great Nepalese meal (Robin is an expert having visited that country 15 or so times) awaited us - and a couple of beers. Tomorrow will be a dhort 50’ish km ride to Pitlochry. I'm not sure that I’ll do the Etape - having just done close to 500 miles the thought of racing along with nutters who have never ridden in a peleton does not really appeal to me. Closed road races attract a strange dangerous crowd. I think that I have achieved what I wanted to by getting there on two wheels!
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