Glen Almond Cycle – 10/9/2007

The last day of our long weekend, I was feeling more spry and the weather was feeling more conducive to cycling, so Brian and I headed north to Perthshire again. The little red book offered a nice venue – a loop through Glen Almond starting and finishing at Pitcairngreen. Technically, the ride started at Perth train station in the book, but we decided to skip those boring bits.

The great big fireball in the sky was doing its job and then some, which had me down to a mere two layers despite the breeze. We headed north with NCN 77 and then hung a left onto another B road that took us west through Glen Almond to the town of Buchanty (which my brain misremembered as sounding closer to Bacardi) where we followed a couple more B roads back to the village green.

I think the little red book called the track mostly level, but in reality it was gently to not-so-gently rolling hills throughout. Either I’m getting fitter or Brian is getting better at slowing down for me, but I managed to keep up better than any ride previously, and although he may not realize it, I made up some of the gaps between us on the uphills. Shhh!

Rolling countryside meant we had views of bigger hills to the north and south of us. I remember thinking The Last Gasp Saloon was placed improperly on the outbound ride. It should have been atop a steep hill, not a gently rising hill across from some not-so-ferocious sheep. The road was well-treed on the outbound leg of the cycle, so the bigger payoffs of pretty views were on the return trip. The zoomy downhills were there, too. Water flows downhill. Bicycles go faster on downhills. Zoom!

We found a nice spot near a wee burn for lunch and lounging. Sweet potato crisps did not impress Brian, much to my amusement. After lunch, Brian went exploring while I did my back homework.

We crossed the River Almond for the second time just outside of Almondbank, which sort of makes sense. I tried the patience of a motorist because I was too busy checking out the river as I rolled across the bridge to notice him waiting patiently for me to be out of his way. We arrived back to the village green at Pitcairngreen more or less just in time to be hitting rush hour traffic, so a stop at the Pitcairn Green Inn seemed a better plan. We made another stop at Kinross to see the castle and island at Loch Leven that I won’t buy Brian and were surprised to find a huge play park with all kinds of toys. My favourite was the zip line, but the rope swing merry-go-round was a close second.

Our second attempt at pub quiz found us in a more competitive environment. Neil and Fraser were fun companions but our wealth of useless knowledge overlapped too much. Sport and music were our downfall topics. We placed 2nd to last, but it was an everybody gets a prize quiz, so each of us got a malt of the month (Glen Garioch). Er, actually, Fraser and Brian got doubles of the malt of the month and Neil and I chose different poisons. We brainstormed possibilities for sport and musically inclined teammates, but couldn’t come up with suitable people who lived in this country. We’ll figure it out!