The Highlands, West Coast & Glens July 2016,

[Jack_P]

Finished at 6pm today. Group of 3 riders in before me including Dean who didnt stop at the bunkhouse. Would be suprised if more than 20 complete from group 1. So cold and wet that i just never stopped wed and rode from the bunkhouse in 1 go, via fort william last night. Brain not clear enough to say anymore, time for sleep. Some great rides out there.
Jack

[iddu]

Comments removed, Windy's right, FAIL on excellence test...

[iddu]

(anyway, snipped subsection)

I'm sorry we stole all the sunshine...NOT.  Such extended grimness does raise the bar, and to those that came, Chapeau - you've all got cojones.

GO Christine...

[Jack_P]

I abandoned at Ullapool borderline hyperthermic! Whoever finishes this in those conditions is seriously Audacious.

Not me then, I'd had enough rain by just before Durness, happy to turn round and get blown back to Inverness. Enjoyed my hotel there, and now enjoying a pleasant ride through the Great Glen.

Again,  super well done to those persevering. The thing with Audax is, even if you don't complete, it's still the impetus to get to places and it's nice anyhow to ease up, and ride back slowly.

Are you coming back to Oban Ricki, im here all day.

[Bus Shelter Bertie]

I may have packed just before Durness, but  I reckon if I get the last info at the Bridge of Orchy I can probably persuade Mark that I did the rest. Whatever, I'll have had 550 miles seeing the best of Scotland, and I think that's a success. Hope to see some of you still for the last 100 km run in.

[Humpdoc]

https://www.strava.com/activities/657641464

Luke my Sheffrec CC colleagues ride

[Dave_C]

I rode to Trantlebeg by 9pm Tues after having a full day of double tooth ache, and a wet kip in the campsite in Dingwall.
The North coast hasn't got any easier and carrying too mush gear didn't help. Good grub at a pub in Melvich.
Set off at 1am Weds down to Helmsdale and back to Lairg via Brora and Golspie.
7am at Lairg so we had an hour on a bench until the Spar opened. Food and off again towards Lochinver.
Sadly around 5km past Oykel bridge hotel into the headwind, rain and climbing we had had enough.
We rode back to Ardguy and waited 2.5 hours for the train, only to have a jobsworth ticket bod turn us away. So at 4pm we rode back to Dingwall and found a train to Kyle of Lochalsh.
Booked into the last 2 beds in Kyleakin we rode down for the 10:35 Mallaig ferry and met us with James who had dnf'd at Laxford Bridge.
Then we had pretty good weather on the ride to Fort Bill for 3pm and were back in Oban via the new cycle path. Back at 7:30pm.
Total 960km. So far I've binned a 600 at 420 and a 1200 at ~600 so feeling pretty sh*t at the mo.
This means I still have to complete a 300 & 600 for my SR. :-(

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[Pingu]

This means I still have to complete a 300 & 600 for my SR. :-(

Or two 600s 

[Dave_C]

This means I still have to complete a 300 & 600 for my SR. :-(

Or two 600s 

Errrrr naw!!!

Thinking of a DIY from home. JSB's Deeside Lass combo from home, kipping at home overnight might be a plan.

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[doctorafternoon]

That was bloody amazing! Got in about 9.45pm Thursday in an Audax Ecosse pair with Neil Milton. I was DM on the tracker.

Day 3 (just beyond Lairg to Armadale for me, 365k) was the toughest day of riding I've ever done, but there were enough changes of direction to make it doable. Horrendous into Lochinver but then chanced on an award winning pie shop, and had the most marvellous second breakfast venison and cranberry pie. Probably saved the day, and then the gorgeous road south. Chip butty in Ullapool before the very tough haul over to Gairloch. Hypothermic descent in blasting rain and headwind saved again by coffee and cake in Dungallen Hotel. Proper hallucinations before Broadford.

Front brake was getting a bit iffy, but no punctures. Bivvied three times, at Ardross (just north of Evanton), just beyond Lairg, and Armadale. A luxurious nine hours sleep in total. Midges annoying but bearable.

I love it! Met some brilliant folk, including the SW London lot. Massive thanks to Blacksheep for getting us all to indulge such madness.

https://www.strava.com/activities/657684593

[Feanor]

This means I still have to complete a 300 & 600 for my SR. :-(

Fortunately, Lucy has put on a Last Chance Salon 600 for anyone in need of an emergency late-season 600...

http://www.aukweb.net/events/detail/16-788/

[Rumps]

great fun and a real feeling of achievement.
I was one of the SWRC group and we all finished at 10.40pm . That finish was a bit bizarre and I could not really compare it with any other finish  I have experienced.
Down largely to the planning mastery of the Sloth we had worked out a plan and stuck to it and it worked for us -excluding for these purposes Parky. The essence being to ride at a good pace, a relative term on this event of course, and to sleep in a bed in pre-arranged accom each night.
Dingwall on night one, Lairg on night two -after spending only about an hour at Trantelbeg and then the SCYA on the Wednesday night. Even tho in the first two I had the pleasure of sharing a double bed with the Sloth -but in Lairg the kind ladies  had put pillows down the middle to protect our modesty- this plan worked.
Sticking to it meant we had a 22 hour day from bed to bed to get to Broadford but that was worth it . We ended up with 14.5 hours sleep so reasonable for an event like this.
Achieved by sleeping from 4am to 8am at Broadford and taking the 10.35am ferry.
We admired all of those riding through the night and bivvying . Definitely in the spirit of the event but Paul , Matt and I as southern softies were happy with nightly showers and beds.
Parky took another approach and rode through in one go to Trantelbeg .  Then after only 3 hours sleep he rode on and we met up with him and Chris ( Orange bike man) at Gairloch so we could all enjoy the stretch up "those" hills on the way to Kyle of L. That gave us one of the most amusing moments when Alan started hallucinating and asking where am I in a metaphysical way , not in a Garmin is malfunctioning way.....

it has already been said by DoctorAfternoon and many others but that stretch to Lochinver was pretty brutal. But the combination of those pies -the power of hand made pastry - and it stopping raining as we left the cafe -meant a swift recovery.
Thanks to all the great people we rode with, Neil -including on Mull on the Sunday , Duncan aka Doctor Afternoon, , James and Gavin the man on the 30 year old bike, Chris, Luke and Darryl who gave us some new and very welcome conversation on the remote stretch from Trantelbeg before they stopped to sleep , Sian and Sarah on the way up to Durness and Eamon demolishing his Chicken balls and noodles in the Chinese at Gairloch and then Michel at the Ferry at Armadale on the way home. Apologies to all the others I am missing.

My final thanks to my club mates, Matt , Paul and Alan who really made the whole trip for me -wonderful , supportive company, and mobile and very calm , mechanics when my gear cable snapped outside Ullapool.

Finally and not least -all gratitude to Mark and all of his wonderful helpers. If you did not organise and assist on these events -they would not exist for the rest of us to enjoy and feast on the memories of .
And now back to the pantry.

[thesloth]

great fun and a real feeling of achievement.

^^^this

The harder you have to work for something the more you'll end up appreciating it. What a fantastic ride. I've been wanting to do a tour of North West Scotland for many years.
It was a fair bit tougher than expected which put the schedule under a bit of pressure, but we ended up managing to see most the route in daylight. The weather played nice to give us some great views through Glencoe. Treated to an amazing sunset as we summited the final climb before the arrivée.

Many thanks to Blacksheep and the other helpers. It must have been a huge effort to plan and manage all of that, especially considering that it's a long way from your usual patch.
As Rumps said great company, good spirits and lot of laughs (especially when the going got tough).

I've took a fair number of photos. I'll process them and put them up in the next couple of days. In the mean time here's something to bring back memories of that Lochinver stretch:
https://youtu.be/TfbaZUtiL0o

[Dave_C]

Thanks for putting up the clip thesloth, this pretty much summed up Monday, 1st half Tues and Weds morning for me!

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[Phil W]

Looking forward to reading fuller accounts with some nice pictures in the Autumn Arrivee, DNF or not.

[Clemo]

What a epic adventure, it had everything, joy, pain, sorrow, soreness, cold chips and midgies, poo's in the woods, expensive Beer, no pubs, crap weather, stunning scenery, wonderful cycle paths,  it was flippin awesome. 


I'll try and finish next time 

ended my ride at Lairg the 2nd time as I wasnt going to reach the next control in time so had a meal in the Pier Cafe caught the early train the following morning to Inverness had a awesome 10 item full scottish and then trundled back to Oban via Loch Ness, Fort Augustus and the Great Glen Way.

[Bus Shelter Bertie]

and then trundled back to Oban via Loch Ness, Fort Augustus and the Great Glen Way.

That's all very well and I much enjoyed the Great Glen too, but that sounds very much like you didn't catch the Mallaig Ferry..

Commiserations anyhow Mr. Clemo, I think on this particular ride finishers and non finishers alike derived huge satisfaction from the taking part.

[vistaed]

Well, I'm finally back on wifi. My ride ended outside Mallaig on Tuesday when a bus driver caused the two German cyclists I was with to crash. This resulted in one of the guys having to go to Fort William in an ambulance, police statements and figuring out how to get the other German and two busted bikes back to Oban. By the time this was all sorted I was nearly four hours behind schedule. Has anyone heard how they both are? It was nearly 9pm by the time I arrived in Braodford, I had a lot of time to make up over night and the weather was turning bad. So with my schedule blown and still shaken by the earlier incident I decided not to continue. Instead I headed to Ullapool via Applecross and took the ferry to Stornoway. I then traveled down the length of the outer Hebrides to Barra and crossed back to Oban. Not what I had spent seven months planning for but I had a great time, and the more relaxed pace (only 120 miles a day) allowed time to meet loads of great people along the way. Thanks Mark for organising the event, just wish I could have finished. Congratulations to everyone that finished, and to those that didn't I hope you all had your own adventures.

[SR Steve]

I think on this particular ride finishers and non finishers alike derived huge satisfaction from the taking part.

Non-starters like myself also derived a certain amount of satisfaction, especially when horizontal stair rods were mentioned up-thread!

It wasn't that it was blowing a Miss Hoolie that stopped me from going to Balamory, but trouble with my PC Plums following the Mersey Roads 24 Hour last weekend. I've not ridden a bike since, but have enjoyed following the event here and on twitter, facebook and strava, in between painting all my fences and sheds.

Congratulations to the finishers and commiserations to the non-finishers, although it seems that most still enjoyed themselves. I also hope the German riders are ok.

[Grampa]

W

w

Ullapool via Applecross and then

Hearing about all the guys who did and didn't finish makes me realise that I would need a cyclist-avatar if I wanted to co-exist on their planet!

[Phil W]

I was nearly four hours behind schedule.

I'm sure Mark would have been able to make allowance for your delays in helping the other riders following their accident. Allowances are made on PBP for just such eventualities. So making up the full 4 hours probably wasn't required. Well done on stopping and helping after the accident as you did.

[marcusjb]

Gosh, sorry to hear of the German riders and I hope the injuries sustained were not too serious. Heal well.

[Smeth]

I'm doing a full thing sometime, but here's a bit that says a lot about the ride:

Smashed exhausted bits of the field are passing each other around Broadford at 3am after day three. They are pointing out the Co-op ATM and mumbling incoherently to the local police patrol car, whose response is "Oh yeah, of course. Righto then". I have almost been eaten by monsters in the forest after Loch Carron, but desperately want to get in range of the 0715 Armadale ferry and have a less brutal day tomorrow. I exchange grunts or cheery yoohalloos at different points with Niel, Doctorafternoon, Rumpy, thesloth, orange bike Chris and others as we apply different strategies to the same objective. If I bivvy in the heath I may not (ever) wake up, so I grind on down to the small beach next to the ferry. I throw the bag out on the sand and carefully lift the bike onto a nearby rock. I wriggle into the allegedly breathable coffin and zip up the midge net mouth. Jungle formula is ready inside in case the b*****s are biting after the meagre hour I have. The clanking of the ferry will wake me.

S**T!!  It doesn't. I hear a voice shout "shall I send the bike down now? That isn't me. The ferry's about to go. The next 30 seconds include:
Unzip bag, instant massive midge attack - they have been waiting, lose spray down bag, curse, fall over in sand, leap up, throw shoes 20 yards to road edge, fall over, curse, pick up bivvy and whirl whole thing around head to disperse midges while dragging bike through sand by the bars. Fall over, curse, clamber over rocks in sock feet carrying bike and dragging bag. Cause gasps among handful of previously tittering observers as I fight for balance like a tightrope walker and nearly fall off the rocks. Roll bivvy up from the open end trapping air then attempt to strap the resulting massive balloon to saddlebag while shoving sandy feet into shoes. Hear comforting voice of ferry man's soft highland brogue "Don't worry sir, we'll wait, there's no hurry. Have you got a ticket?"    Er......

Just one other bike on that ferry - the team captain of the Belgians - we shared an hour-long breakfast in Mallaig Mission cafe. It was a great last day in glorious sunshine.

Mark and team - thanks.

[Rumps]

Great Smeth. That made me laugh.
I only wish I had been able to see it.
Shame we did not really get to ride together but at least we did see each other at regular intervals.
Midge bites gone down by now?

[BlackSheep]

Commiserations to those that completed the course outside the validation time, but big respect.

Congrats and equal respect to those that completed within the 90 hours,

We have a new King of the Highlands, and although it might not please the Campbell clan,  it's a MacGregor. Having conquered this ride and the 2014 version

My thanks to Keith & Sue for unselfishly fitting-in final control duties into their holiday schedule. To iddu (also fitting-in control duties into a touring holiday), Grampa  and Hannah for sterling work at the Cornmill bunkhouse.