DIY 400 from home to the flat in Embra, and back.
Not hassle-free.
400k is often regarded as the hardest distance; because you ride it straight through. Longer rides will usually have sleep stops. This was no exception.
The outbound section down to Edinburgh was unremarkable enough, an early start with a bitingly cold wind initially. I was almost 100k in at Kirrie before the day warmed up. But warm up it did, and the remainder of the ride was pleasant, enough even for some Isotonic Refreshment in Perth!
Crossing the Cowie Water on the Swanley road, you come across some old WW2 tank defences, and wonder what they are all about. They were part of the Cowie Stop Line, a defensive line against invasion from occupied Norway onto the poorly defended beaches of NE Scotland. A defensive line was drawn up along the mountain barrier, all the way from Glenshee, the CoM, and the Slug road to slow advances south into the rest of the UK. The coastal section where the hills peter out was defended by a line along the modest Cowie Water, which is steeply-banked in many places. Plans were in place to blow up the bridges in case of an invasion!
The return was marred with a series of technical problems.
Firstly, a puncture about 5k short of Coupar Angus. Failed to spot a massive pot-hole till too late, and my bunny-hop was too feeble for the rear wheel to clear it. These are new 28mm tyres, and corresponding tubes. In a schoolboy error, I'd packed the new replacement tubes on the bike without nipping up the valve cores. This means that my Leyzene screw-on pump and CO2 inflators simply unscrew the core when you attempt to remove them. Bodge-around is to leave the CO2 inflator attached to the wheel, don't even attempt to remove it. However, this arrangement was leaking slowly, and I was rumbling on a very soft tyre into Coupar Angus. Fortunately, I know a (former) Audaxer in Coupar Angus, and was able to borrow a proper pump to get everything back in order. I'm considering retiring the Lezeyne stuff now.
Then the Garmin started playing up. I keep it topped up with electrons from a USB battery pack on longer rides. It started taking umbridge at this, with a variety of errors about 'unsupported device', and crashing. On one occasion, it re-booted into a diagnostics mode which I've never seen before, and it took about 15 mins to re-start it in normal mode. At least it picked up from where it left off each time. This is a 10-year old Edge 800, perhaps it needs retired too. Google suggests the cause of this is drowning, and it certainly did get very wet on Tuesday's 200k.
All this delayed proceedings muchly, and it was after 4am before I got home.
However, you get to experience the dawn of a new day: the world transitioning from monochrome through subdued under-saturated colours to full colour. The dawn chorus, each of the birds waking up at slightly different times. And that, in part, makes up for the hassly ride.
https://www.strava.com/activities/7219955630