Escaping Lockdown

After what felt like ages there was an announcement from the government that tourism was allowed in Scotland from the 15th July! A quick plan was cobbled together involving wild camping, a couple of campsites that were able to open to taking tents, and a night or two staying with friends. There was a lot of apprehension surrounding our trip. We’d all seen folk blatantly flaunting the “rules” around Covid 19, bending them to suit themselves. Unfortunately motorcyclists and cyclists, two activities I love doing, were among the worst groups for said flaunting with a few selfish individuals of the opinion that the requests made of everyone didn’t apply to them. We hoped that the behaviour of this small minority wouldn't have a negative impact on our trip.
Aidan and I decided to head off to a wild camping spot we know about. We had decided that if there were lots of folk in the area then we’d need to carry on and find somewhere else. Turns out that our chosen location was indeed pretty popular with most of the spots already containing a tent. Luckily it was a bit quieter along the road and we found a place to pitch away for other folk and any buildings or houses. If you recognise the area, please keep it to yourself, I’ll go into why this has become quite important later in this post.

We got up early (for us) the next day packed up, tidied up and set off heading for Glenshee. As always, we prefer the Glenshee/Braemar/Lecht/Tomintoul route over the A9 between Perth and Inverness. It’s a great run and it was good to see so many bikes out with folk enjoying getting out for a run in the good weather.
We carried on north, riding on what they now call the NC500. I’ve heard lots of folk advising avoiding the east side of the route, which suits me, I'll have the roads to myself! The run from Golspie up to Wick is a cracker. Caithness has so much to offer, especially if you’re a visitor to Scotland or haven’t travelled around the country much. The open, barren landscape, cliffs and sea stacks give a good contrast to the hill and beaches of the west. There’s also loads of historical sites and wee harbours to visit if that’s your thing. I stopped in to visit family while property magnate Aidan went to look at a house for sale before eventually finding my way to Ferg’s place. It was pretty easy to spot which house was his…..

That'll be Ferg's place then,


K KREW!

A run across the north coast took us to our next destination, Altandhu. I'd not been over the top of the mainland for a while, I really enjoyed the solo run I took, stopping for photos and wee bits of video here and there. It seemed much shorter than I remembered for some reason and was surprisingly quiet with only a few other cars and motorhomes kicking about. I was surprised not to see more bikes. One of the only other bikes I saw had been clipped by another tourist, a situation which is unfortunately becoming more common, especially on our single track roads. So if you find yourself on a single track road (even some A class roads are single track) then take care!

When riding the north coast (anticlockwise) you are presented with an option just after Kylesku. The quicker option is to carry on the main road, riding the fast sweepers past Loch Assynt. Option two is to take a left onto the tight, nadgery single track roads through the villages of Drumbeg, Lochinver and Inverkirkaig, riding through what is arguably some of the best scenery we have here in Scotland. I was wanting to get to the site at Altandhu and get my tent pitched so I opted for the faster run. At Altandhu we found the site to be really busy. We managed to get a wee corner away from the masses and had a good night dodging between the busy pub and the quieter campsite. 

We split into two groups the following day with some folk heading to Strontian for the next couple of nights and the rest of us heading for another secret wild camping spot. I had a great run down to Gairloch with Aidan and Bob where we met up with everyone else at Ian's house. Ian has a great knowledge of the area and had offered to show us a few places to wild camp. If you recognise any of the wild camping spots please keep them to yourself and especially don't band it about online. There was a big problem in Scotland with manky bastards leaving shite and rubbish all over the shop after "wild camping." These arseholes could ruin it for everyone so the less places the cunts can find out about the better. Of course we all took our rubbish away with us and didn't have a fire anywhere it could cause damage or burn anything down.

 

Big thanks to Ian.

 

I rode down to Strontian the following day with Bob and Ferg. Once again we had good weather and surprisingly quiet roads. We took the best route, via Gairlochy, Glenfinnan, Lochailort and Salen. It's a really nice run. In Strontian we managed to have our usual visit to the Strontian Hotel. They had set up a big tent with open sides for socially distanced eating and drinking. We were all pretty happy with the measures they'd taken to try and keep everyone safe.

Can you see Bob and Ferg?

It was great to get away. At the time of writing this new Covid regulations have recently came into play here in Scotland. Up to six people from a maximum of two households can meet up anywhere, indoors and out. Obviously this will have a negative impact on bike trips but we need to do what we can to stop the spread of the virus. But fear not! You'll not be bored. I made a feature length film of our trip! Grab a beer and check it out!

More soon hopefully, once again I'm well behind in writing my blog.

Mike

End of Summer in the Alps, Part 3

Continuing from Part 2.

The three days off the bike at Lake Como were braw, but I was ready to get going again. We had been looking at the maps and discussing possible runs and routes to take us homewards. We still had around a week to get back to the ferry, plenty time to visit places. Aidan was keen to do the Alps.

“Eh? We’ve done loads of the Alps”

“You ken what I mean.”

When Aidan says “the Alps” there’s only one place he’s really thinking about. The French Alps. Aidan was keen to show Jess some of the mountains of her home country that she’d not had the chance to visit yet. I was up for it too. I love the French Alps. They have a different feel to the Tyrol Alps where we’d been. They feel more remote, have more variation of landscapes and are all a bit higher and rougher. I figured that a five hour mix of motorway and twisty roads would see us in Valloire, an alpine town tucked between two great passes.

Even with some busy traffic around Milan, the Italian motorway was seen off in good time before we jumped onto the SS24. Fast hairpins, more stunning scenery and an impressive tunnel were enjoyed as we climbed back up into the hills and up to the border. The French border guards were great, having a laugh with us and asking if we had any whisky. We stopped for a bite to eat in Montgenevre, a ski resort that sits on a sort plateau. It was like a ghost town, there was no one around except another couple who were eating outside a restaurant which we were told was closed. the folk there offered us a couple of huge sandwiches and a coffee each, which we enjoyed to the view of the female member of the other couple falling off her chair.
It's OK, she was fine.

We'd expected to see Aidan and Jess ride past at some point, but they must have stopped off a bit earlier. We jumped back on the bike and carried on towards Briancon where we followed the now quite familiar Col du Lautaret up to the stunning Col du Galibier. After riding up through a constant changing grass/moss/whateveritis, the landscape takes on a sort of lunar style at the top. We carried on up to the top, missing the tunnel out. Photos taken, we snaked down to Valloire, riding over all the graffiti on the road from the cycling competitions, which makes the run down even better. We headed straight to the campsite and got pitched up. We were the only people there! Not long after we arrived Aidan and Jess rolled up and a cyclist came in. There were hardly any shops or anything else open. I was amazed as I rode up to the supermarket. I had thought that Valloire would have still been quite busy with mountain biking, but it would seem that at the end of September everything closed. Luckily there was one place remaining open where we could get food. The cyclist from the campsite joined us and the five of us had a good night out.

I was really looking forwards to the ride up the next day. Aidan, Carina and I had ridden the same route previously, for me it’s still one of the best in the Alps, following the Route Des Grande Alps from Valloire up to Bourg Saint Maurice. Leaving Valloire up and over the Col du Telegraphe I made sure and not take a wrong turn at the bottom, following the proper route to the Col de l’Iseran.

Col de l’Iseran is the highest pass in the Alps and one of my favourites due to the various different road surfaces, braw corners, cliff edge drops and stunning scenery. It was riding up the south side of said pass that we had a pretty scary experience. We were riding along one of the narrower sections when suddenly a Jeep Cherokee began to overtake, blasting his horn. The cunt driving was clearly in quite the rush because up ahead the road narrowed a bit. I had two options.

1. Slam on the brakes and get out the way.
2. Stand my ground and possibly get knocked off a cliff and fall 500 to 600 meters.

I don’t think HB would have appreciated option 2, and it might have damaged the bike, so option 1 it was. The guy squeezed past and I set off after him thinking “I better have a strong word with that gentleman.” I caught up with the jeep after a couple of corners and then a big truck appeared only for the lunatic Jeep pilot to overtake it on blind corner. Up the road a bit and another truck was passed in a similar way. I genuinely thought the guy was going to kill someone. By the time we got past the truck the Jeep arsehole was nowhere to be seen. We got a photo at the top and I tried to calm down a bit. HB was also pretty shaken up. This was her first experience of a fuckwit actually nearly killing us on the bike, as opposed to just another proximity arsehole incident.

The ride down to Val d’Isere was much more enjoyable and quite a bit slower. A couple of times I thought I saw Jeep arsehole, but there were quite a few black Jeeps in the area so it could have been anyone. We met up with Aidan and Jess who had bumped into a friend of Jess’ family who she’d not seen for years. We told them about what happened and I tried to show them on the helmet camera, ranting and raving while we also tried to decide where to stay. Val d’Isere’s campsite was closed nipping our accommodation plans in the bud. A wee look online and we’d picked another campsite up the road at Les Saises. On arrival however the site didn’t seem to be great for tents, rocky, rooty ground being the only place available to pitch our tents and there was no one around to advise us otherwise. I was tired, pissed off with Jeep arsehole and far too hot. Everyone else took over and found another site further up the road in Bourg Saint Maurice. A short ride later and they were checking it out. It was huge, pretty empty, had nice grassy pitches and great facilities. It was great to get pitched up and out the bike gear. I nipped to the big supermarket for some beers and snacks and we relaxed on the campsite. We were joined by Steve Keefe, his daughter Alex and their group of English bikers who were also on a tour. Steve recognised me from my infamous C90 which HB found hilarious. We got the craic with them for a bit, sharing biking stories and brexshit despair over a beer before saying our goodbyes and heading for some food.     

I woke up just in time to say goodbye to Steve and his crew as they hit the road. We fumbled around with croissants and cups of tea or coffee while packing the bikes back up. It really was beginning to look like autumn in the Alps, with the ground being a carpet of brown and orange leaves. We carried on northwards. If Col de l’Iseran was my favourite pass, today we’d be riding over Aidan’s favourite, Cornet de Roseland.

Cornet de Roseland takes you from Bourg Saint Maurice over to Beaufort. Heading from south to north, the initially tight, twisty road opens up to wide sweeping hairpins once out of the trees. We narrowly avoided clipping a few gophers (or marmots) which scurried out in front of the bike, reigning in my enthusiastic throttle hand. For the first time ever we avoided stopping in Beaufort, riding on to Flumet before stopping at the top of Col des Aravis for some lunch with a view of Mont Blanc. On the way down we had more animal encounters, this time in the form of a big cow which a passing cyclist encouraged off the road. Clearly the cow didn’t understand my poor French.

Another pass, Col de la Colombiere, took us over more typical twisty alpine roads, still heading north towards Les Gets. It was still roasting and I expected the whole place to be hoaching with mountain bikers. Les Gets however appeared to be closed. And I couldn’t find the campsite we had picked. After a solid inspection on the map, a tantrum (me) and a fluent French phone call (Jess), we got back on the bikes and headed to the campsite, just up the road in Saint Jean d’Aulps. In no time we were pitched up and speaking to a couple of cats and their owners who lived on the site. Aidan and I had a spin to the shop for bits and bobs and we relaxed on the site. We inevitably got hungry and wandered along to the town for some food, finding a wee burger place which suited everyone. There was a pub next door playing live music which Jess went into to ask how long it was going on for, being French she was the best candidate for crossing the language barrier. Jess came back out.

“The woman asked me to speak English! The place is closing soon anyway.”

It appeared that everyone had went up the road to another pub. It also appeared that everyone in the town spoke more English than French. Scottish, Irish and English accents filled the pub which was holding a quiz which we entered, and graciously lost, despite being accused of grassing another team up for cheating. After quickly explaining that we didn’t give two fucks if anyone cheated on the quiz, we got some more beers in and I spoke to a few of the folk in the pub. Everyone said they had moved over to this wee French town, doing a variety of different jobs and living this amazing alpine lifestyle. No one I asked had an interest in any of the typical alpine pastimes such as mountain biking or skiing, but just said how amazing it was to live there. It should have been great, but instead I got a whiff of an atmosphere that reminded me of the ending from the film “The Beach” with the people not speaking like they were as happy as they were trying to appear.

 

We'd decided to revisit Switzerland on our homewards leg of the journey. Switzerland is a stunning country, not far behind Norway in the "Fucking behave yourself, scenery!" stakes. However, it trumps Norway by quite a bit in the "get caught speeding, get fucked beyond recognition" stakes. Speaking to any biker will reveal horror stories. Either personal ones of those accounted for on behalf of a friend or relative. You really need to keep your shit in check there. 

We rode over Col du Corbier, saying goodbye to France and riding down into Switzerland. Before long my persecution fears had vanished. Going slow is easy when everything around you looks as good as Switzerland. 

 

We had chosen Interlaken as our destination. HB and I were a bit further ahead than Aidan and Jess after various photo stops and lunch stops. We were nearly at Interlaken when I spied a sign for a place that I recognised. Lauterbrunnen. I'm sure I'd seen someone's photo on Faceboook somewhere of Lauterbunnen, and I remembered thinking it looked good. Plusit was only a wee bit up the road.

"I'm just nipping up here for a wee look!" I roared at HB as we turned off, once again heading in the completely wrong direction. 

Fifteen minutes later were riding into Lauterbrunnen. Yes, it's fucking awesome. 

"Fuck this, we're staying here!"

We quickly found the campsite, checked out prices for camping and sent Aidan and Jess a message telling them where we were. I think this short notice change of plans was acceptable, Lauterbrunnen is absolutely beautiful. I wandered into town, mistakenly thinking it was a short ten minute walk away. Forty minutes later I was back at the campsite with beers and a few snacky things. Switzerland has a reputation for being really, really expensive, and some bit are. The wee Coop in Lauterbrunnen wasn't too bad but bizarrely only for some things. Beer wasn't too bad price wise, but a large bag of crisps worked out at around four quid. We were only staying the one night, so it was going to be a no expenses spared  meal in the restaurant, or it would have been if it wasn't booked up. Instead we got wired into the four quid crisps before wandering along to the pub. The wee pub was great, the reasonably priced food filled a hole and the punters in were great crack. Like us, many of them were visitors to Lauterbrunnen, nearly half of whom seemed to be BASE jumpers! We had a great night with them, watching their crazy videos, feeding the jukebox and shooting the shit with other travellers. 

 Me, Henry from South Korea and HB in the pub in Lauterbrunnen listening to Queen.

I was getting coffee the next morning when HB phoned me.

"Quickly quickly!! Come along the road, there's folk BASE jumping!!"

I never made it along in time to see the folk jumping, but I bumped into one of the guys from the pub. He was nearly back at the village. He explained that because he used a wingsuit (search on YouTube) he could nearly fly back to the pub!

We packed up and headed north. The route HB and I took went right past Rick and Andrea's place. It felt like weeks since we'd been there. We stopped in for a visit but they must have been out on their pushbikes. We left a mysterious present of two Swiss beers on their doorstep and carried on up the familiar Schwarzwald roads to our friend Wolfgang's place. As always it was great to see Wolfgang, getting the crack over a meal and a beer. With Wolfgang's help we booked into a hotel in Cochem for our last night of the trip, a good idea as it was getting cold at night. I noticed the chill while out taking some photos and in the morning water bottles left on the bikes were frozen.

Uta, Wolfgang's partner, put a great breakfast on for us a short ride away in Freiburg. Well filled, we got on the autobahn and headed north towards the German Moselle Valley. Once off the motorway the roads were really nice, twisting up and down the vally sides in narrow singletracks. even this late on in September the area was busy. Eventually we got into the busy town of Cochem and found our hotel. It's quite distinct as it had a streetfightered blade beside our balcony. We enjoyed our final night out in Cochem. It's a very busy tourist town, but still a nice place to be. Definitely worth a look if you're wanting somewhere within riding distance to the Ijmuiden ferry.

The run from Cochem to Ijmuiden was easy enough, we just managed to stay dry, avoiding the torrential downpours by luck or hiding in petrol stations. I couldn't complain though. We'd had it good for the whole trip, only getting pissed on way back in Austria, which felt like months before. I was well cold by the time we got to Ijmuiden. We had plenty time till we had to board the ferry so we warmed up with some chips in one of the wee cafes just beside the port.

After that it was plain sailing home.

Mike

Winton Massif - Back over the top.

Way back in 2009 while on the Wrong Way Round tour we met a big German named Wolfgang. Wolfgang became the first international member of the Winton Massif and over the following years visits were made between Scotland and Germany, but we'd been unable to sort a proper Massif Scotland trip out..... til now!
Wolfgang rode over from Germany with his girlfriend Uta's son Moritz. I'd met Moritz back when I'd ridden the ZZR back from Germany, back then he'd been on a wee 125, but he'd now got a Yamaha MT07, tricked out with a few bits and bobs including a great sounding pipe. Uta and her daughter Nina had flown over and hired a car. Wolfgang and Moritz joined them visiting some of the Edinburgh tourist attractions for a few days before it was time for us to leave.

Glenlivet was the evening's destination. A quick blast up the motorway saw us to Perth where we headed north via Blairgowrie and Braemar. I really don't need to mention this anymore, but if you're heading north in Scotland, avoid the A9 between Perth and Inverness, just like we did.
At Braemar we stopped in at the Hungry Highlander for a bite to eat. Wolfgang, Moritz and myself had ridden up the road with Aidan and Faithir, at the Hungry Highlander we met up with A-Mac, Dave and Murray. The Winton Massif rarely ride as one big group, this time being no different with dribs and drabs pooling together for photo stops or to look at something. The route up through Glenshee and over the Lecht is a firm favorite of mine, I could ride it every week and still never get bored.

We got set up at Glenlivet Hall, with some folk staying in the hall and others setting their tents up outside. The hall has a big kitchen so I suggested we cook a load of fajitas. Aidan, Wolfgang, Moritz and I took the bikes into Grantown Upon Spey for ingredients and beers. On the way back up the enjoyable, twisty road we bumped into Snake and Tex who had came down from Caithness for the night. Fed and watered, we sat outside talking bikes and bullshit for a while. Liam and Euan turned up and we bleathered away till it got dark.

The following day we set off once more in small groups. I had to drop the key for the hall off so it was a solo run for me till I met up with the guys at Tiso Inverness. There’s a great wee café upstairs in Tiso that we like to visit for a coffee or a bowl of soup. From there it’s the relatively dull run to Golspie before the twisties take you over the Berriedale Braes and into Caithness. We stopped off at Snake's place to see his bike collection then I nipped into Lybster to visit family and get a photo at the harbour before another solo run through Wick and up to John O’ Groats. Groats gets a hard time from folk for being boring and barren. I think this is unfair, the campsite gives great views over to Stroma, Swona and Orkney and the high barren cliffs give a great contrast to Sutherlands hills and beaches in the west. Tents up, we ate at the wee cabin by the harbour before heading up to the Seaview pub for a few beers.

 

We said our Goodbyes to A-Mac, Dave, Murray and Liam the following day. Liam headed south for home while A-Mac, Dave and Murray headed off to Ullapool. Durness was our destination. Despite the damp conditions the run over the north coast road was enjoyable as always, with a wee detour to see Dunnet Head, the most northerly point of the Scottish mainland. We had just arrived at Durness when it started to absolutely pish it down torrentially. Tents were hurriedly erected and everyone hid inside reading or having a snooze.  

 

Durness campsite is a stunning place to visit. I was a little bit disappointed for Wolfgang and Moritz that the weather wasn’t better, keeping us off the beaches the area is famous for. The shelter of the tents was traded for the shelter of the pub where faces were fed and pool balls potted.

Luckily the weather had improved the next day. We got packed up and carried on round the coast after helping bump start a stricken GS rider who had accidentally left his Bluetooth headset charging on the bike, flattening the battery. Shoving it around the campsite several times proved to be useless so the big beemer was wheeled out to the main road. It fired up easily after getting up to speed down the hill beside the campsite and a sweaty Winton Massif headed off to Achiltibuie.

 

The previous two day’s rides from Inverness to Groats and on to Durness were part of the famous North Coast 500 or NC500. Our route from Durness continued along the NC500 before we turned off to Achiltibuie at Lochinver. There’s lots of people ranting on the internet that the NC500 has ruined the roads and the place is now swamped by caravans and campervans. Sure, there’s a little bit more traffic than there used to be, but it’s hardly hoaching with folk. A few extra overtakes or friendly beeps of the horn to remind visitors to let faster traffic pass is all that’s needed. Remember to keep an eye on your mirrors too, while you may be riding along taking in the scenery there could be local person behind you trying to get somewhere.  The fast, open roads from Durness turn steep, tight and twisty at Kylesku, following the coast round to Lochinver through Drumbeg and over to Achiltibuie. This is my favourite area of Scotland. The dramatic scenery of Assynt and Coigach is sensational, unfortunately for us though, some thick cloud obscured our views of the famous hills in the area. I was disappointed but Wolfgang was grinning away. He said he liked the rain and the cloud! At Altandu, just round from Achiltibuie, we met up with Egor on his F800GSA and our usual evening of food beers followed along with half of us getting roped into a pool competition which the local guy who set it up won. Every think you've been conned?

Conned or not, it was a great laugh and a good night was had by all. The following day we said our goodbyes to Euan, who headed home while the rest of us headed off in small groups to Applecross. I rode for the first part of the day with Aidan. All was going well until we stopped at Laide to refuel the bikes. It turned out my hairy backed friend had lost his phone and bank card. After a few phone calls and some panicking both the phone and the card were found safe and well in the campsite's wee building. Aidan set off back the way we'd came to retrieve his stuff while I carried on in the Gairloch direction on my todd. It's a brilliant run around the coast to Kinlochewe which I really enjoyed despite the damp conditions. By the time I arrived at Kinlochewe I had one in the bomb bay, while I was in the bog I heard some bikes pulling up. Wolfgang, Moritz and Egor welcomed me on my toilet exit and the four of us rode round to Shieldaig where I split from the group to ride over the Bealach Na Ba while the other three took the coast road to Applecross.  At Applecross we met Carina and Maw. Aidan arrived a bit later, his calamity prone day carrying on with a jar of jam bursting open over his top box. Never mind, he said he'd had a perfectly dry run and even a jam spillage didn't dampen spirits, we had our usual enjoyable evening in the Applecross Inn where Wolfgang and Moritz samples some proper Scottish produce. As usual, we followed our evening in the Applecross Inn with a morning at the Waterside Cafe in Lochcarron where a few of us attempted the Challenge Breakfast.

A great run down Glen Garry on the A87 took us south. We were heading to another Winton Massif favorite, Sunart Camping at Strontian. Rather than cross the Corran Ferry, Aidan and I rode around Loch Eil and down the A861, a nice wee singletrack road.

We met up with Smillie at Strontian and had a great evening with a barbecue on the campsite. Tim who owns Sunart Camping rode with us to Ardnamurchan Lighthouse, another cracker of a run. It's only around 35 miles but the twisty narrow singletrack road means it can take over an hour to get along it. We had a wee look around the lighthouse before getting the ferry over to Mull from Kilchoan. It really started to chuck it doon while we were sailing over, Luckily we were staying at the Tobermory Hostel that evening, only a few hundred meters from the ferry. 

As always, Tobermory was a good night out. Unfortunately the Oban ferry the following day was fully booked apart from the 7 am sailing. Aidan and I decided to get the later ferry over to Lochaline but everyone else opted for the early Oban boat. Still, a great night was had by all. The weather had been a bit crap, but that's not unusual for June and it didn't get anyone down. Everyone had a great trip, especially Wolfgang and Mortitz. We'll just have to do another trip next year and book some sunshine.

More soon.......

Mike.