I left Inverness at around 9:25 and met up with Grant at the Old North Inn near Kirkhill at 10am. The plan was then to meet Keith at Lovatt Bridge around 10:30 but Keith, being as keen as mustard (really, what's that supposed to mean!?) cycled down to meet us about halfway between Beauly and Kirkhill.
From here, we turned Southwards onto the A833. See the elevation guide below. This part of the trip was pretty hilly (on the chart below, this is the climb(s) between 15 and 22 mile mark.) It was a gruelling climb but at the top we were rewarded with a 3/4 mile 'extreme' downhill which was actually not that easy given that it was a 15% gradient and there weren't really any long stretches, lots of corners so fingers on the brake levers pretty much all the way!
Once we got to be bottom of the hill, we took a right and cycled the 10 miles towards Cannich. About 2 miles into this leg, it began to rain very heavily. My fingerless gloves were clearly not the right idea! I was absolutely freezing, numb feet and fingers. Eventually, the rain subsided and the sun came out to warm us up. The second peak you see in the graph above is the climb into and the subsequent free-wheel down to Cannich. We didn't go straight there though - we agreed to add another 4 miles onto our course by going up and around Fasnakyle Power Station.
I should mention that we faced a headwind all the way from Inverness to the Power Station at Fasnakyle (perhaps with a little break in between, when we were just climbing hills instead!)
We stopped for some refreshments in Cannich - the Spar shop providing us with a great cup of tea/coffee (thanks Keith :)) and some chocolate!
From here we left and travelled down the A831 back down towards Beauly (Cannich to Beauly is around 17 miles on this road). It was a very uneventful cycle back and seemed to be mostly slightly downhill but with a lovely tailwind). Only a couple of small inclines - notably at the Aigas Golf Course.
At Beauly, Keith left us and went back home to Muir of Ord. Myself and Grant carried on along the A832 for a few miles before he peeled off and back up to Kirkhill. I continued along the main road through Bunchrew and Clachnaharry and got home around 3pm.
Tough old cycle today - knees feeling it a bit! But thankfully no 'Horizontal Cycling' incidents to be added to the list :)
Total distance today: 67 miles
John
No comments:
Post a Comment