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Drew says:
In case I did not make it clear last night we are still following our original route and now are slightly ahead of schedule having passed our day's destination at Troon and have reached Kilmarnock. Also last night I incorrectly implied that our chosen route was tougher than following the M74 to Glasgow. In fact our route may be easier. It is just longer as it involves a dog-leg over to Ayr and back to Glasgow. Yesterday my bike computer hit the 600 mile mark almost exactly as we crossed the border into Scotland. Today David's hit the 1000 Km mark (David and his GPS are both metric).
For the geeks - our bikes are Thorn Raven Tours with Rolhoff 14 speed hub gears. The 14 gears are equally spaced and, unlike the case with deraillers, there is no duplication of gear ratios. This makes it very easy to adjust the gearing to your ideal cadence. Over the last two days, unlike most of the days in England when we were often down to first gear, we have frequently been bowling along in fourteenth. The terrain is flatter, we have a following wind, and we are a bit stronger and fitter.
Today was a mixture of some long ascents followed by very fast descents. The surface of the minor road from Moniaive to Carsphairn was as smooth as a billiard table. The surfaces of the more major roads varied from rough to extremely rough. The rougher the surface the harder one has to pedal and to concentrate on avoiding the potholes. Moniaive, by the way, is a very pretty village of painted cottages.
The riding on the A713 into Ayr was not terribly pleasant because of the speed of the traffic. At least there were reasonable long gaps between the tightly bunched groups of cars.
Earlier at Dalmellington We had lunch outside a cafe in a portakabin behind the filling station in the company of a group of bikers returning to England from a weekend trip to Ullapool.
We passed the Dunaskin railway museum, between Dalmellington and Patna, where Danny MacAskill's Channel 4 film, Industrial Revolutions, was filmed.
The seafront at Ayr was unbelievably crowded - just like in the old photographs. A number of policemen were patrolling up and down the esplanade on mountain bikes. We decided that we would rather move on rapidly to Troon. This was also very busy on the beach. We spent some time searching for overnight accommodation without success. We decided to move on to the Premier Inn at Kilmarnock some eight miles further on. This took our total mileage for the day to 74 miles.
David says:
Very hot today as it was yesterday and no doubt tomorrow.
The Morrison's supermarket temperature readout at the entrance was displaying 37C. Total nonsense, of course. It must be positioned in direct sunlight which is weird as I know they get a lot of sunshine in Troon throughout the year.
It was a shame not to stay in Troon. We stayed in a particularly good B&B there last year when we did the NCN7 cycle route from Carlisle to Inverness.
Instead,as Drew has said, we are on the outskirts of Kilmarnock in a Premier Inn. We used my GPS to get a quieter route to the accommodation. The GPS is set to look for minor roads. Unfortunately it took us over a very steep hill to Dundonald - nice run down the other side.
I've been checking the midge forecast for the highlands. They are already at nuisance level around Fort William. Need to get some rest now, though it is 23:30 it is still very warm outside.
Stats:
Distance 122 km, max speed 53.6km/h, moving time 6 hrs 12 min, moving avg 19.7 km/h, ascent 538m
- comments
Kay M Well done - glad you are feeling fit. The midges were bad on the West Highland Way when Dot did her walk a few years ago - that was in May. Hope you have some spray or are able to out-run them!
David Kay we are sitting in restaurant in Arrochar. The waiter has just shut the windows against the midges. We have to walk back to our B&B but have skin so soft and midge hoods.