Round the Bend 2007 - Richard’s Story with apologies for the length and lack of photos
Part 2 - Round the Bend for sure
3.30am at Silverburn near Pollok, It’s just getting light when Jim and I meet up with our departure witness, Charlie Levine. It's unexpectedly closed so we rush down to Ibrox and the all-night Esso garagee, fill up get our start receipts and away we go. It's just before 4 am and 12 miles later we’re on the A82 and that’s all the motorway we see for the next 1,000 miles.
Along Loch Lomondside again to Tarbet and Arrochar and we’re immediately on the pace. Past Ardgarten (site of the Argyle Forest Challenge) and the roads are single carriageway with a reasonable surface but you have to be very careful of rough edges and mad locals cutting bends at warp factor 7 in 15 year old Peugeots which not a problem at 4.30am. Up and over the hills, into the mist and gazing at the early morning sun breaking through to light up the hills is almost enough to make us stop but the internal pressure is on.
Next ‘stop’ is Inverary where we hit some traffic lights over a narrow bridge and we get a 30 second breather. Lights go to green and we’re off again, testing the radios and hand signals as we go. It’s very early yet, so we keep the gear high and speed low as we pass through the village. Out the other side, Jim takes the lead past Lochgilphead and heading to Oban, This is a part of the route I know quite well and is a very tricky run with some nasty over-the-crest off camber corners with only barbed wire as a run off. Jim’s bike is a bit of a barge and on the twisty stuff I come into my own with huge ground clearance and lack of good sense whilst Jim has to destroy £150 of new boots on the tarmac to keep up.
Into Oban, we fill up and then on we go along the Loch Linnhe coast heading for the Ballachulish bridge. The roads have opened up as the topography flattens and a pattern is emerging: Jim is fastest on the sweeping A roads going faster than I am happy with, but I’m quicker on the tight twisty and bumpy stuff so we lead where we are strongest forcing the other to keep up but giving warning of the nastier bits as we go. It’s a style that works really well and we enter the zone.
By now the sun is up, the mist has cleared and the views are outstanding. The sea is a bright blue and the hills are pre-spring barren but with the promise of heather to come. It’s only on the straights we can risk admiring the scenery unless we want to become part of it. Over the Ballachulish Bridge, past Onich and left to the Corran Ferry which takes us over the water to the Ardnamurchan Peninsula. We are in time for the first ferry of the day (06.30), I empty 10 litres of unleaded into Jim’s bike whilst he cleans the visors and gets the juice out. We hop onto the ferry, off the other side and offski. Turning left at Salen we have a 42 minute, 25 mile roller-coaster ride to our first Tour landmark Ardnamurchan Point Lighthouse. It takes slightly less to come back resulting in Jim heading for the verge a few times as we ride roads that have grass, gravel and sheep shit running up the middle. Left at Salen, round to Lochairlort with me narrowly missing a railway bridge. 9am sees us filling with fuel and tea at Fort William, 210 miles in.
The run to Applecross is exactly as before but we don’t stop, instead turning right towards Shieldaig. There’s a half mile straight with a left hand bend it was here I made a classic mistake: the GPS was bleating “Turn left” but IU knew there was no turn, Jim was talking to me on the radio and I was singing to my MP3 player so I scoped out for a vital second or 2. I headed up someone’s driveway (well the first 100m) completely locking the front wheel as I tried to stop. Off with the brakes, back on, stop, turn and back with Jim looking a bit ashen. “Shit, are you OK?” “Aye, it wasn’t that bad a skid.”. I looked back to see 25m of gashed gravel. I shrugged and carried on. I’ll crap myself later, we’ve got a timetable to keep.
The run over the ‘cowards road’ is one of fantastic sea views, , a single track roller-coaster sweeping up, over and down the landscape. A real pleasure to ride especially as, this far North, drivers see you catching up and pull over to allow a pass, whilst those facing you judge the gaps between lay-bys perfectly moving into the passing places with a cheery nod and a wave. Last time I did this (yes, I did 1000 miles in 18hr 41min around Scotland in 2005 on my own) I cane round a corner to find a blue-rinser in her Honda Civic speeding towards me. We both headed for the verge missing by mere inches ending up side by side. She wound down her window and said “you’ve got a lovely day for it, son! Are ye here on holiday?” I explained about the charity ride and she gave me a fiver! “You’re not in the City now, boychik” I thought.
The road gets tighter as it heads to Shieldaig heading inland through patches of forest before the last blast into Kinlochewe and the left turn north again. Now we reached the Lock Maree run which is, for my money, the best fast sweeping run in Scotland if not the UK. Wide (well, wid-er), smooth, sweeping bends and good straights egg you on through high, round topped, heather covered mountains. The isolation is becoming apparent now as we pass Gruinard Island which has only recently been declared free of anthrax after WWII and now Ullapool and lunch is in our sights. We have stopped for less than 40 minutes so far in over 6 hours of riding and 10 of them were back at the Corran Ferry which now feels almost like pre-history. The round topped hills, the rivers, forests and rocky screes are now insufficient to mask the pain and fatigue that is setting in and all we can think about is stopping. We can’t break our stride without ruining the plan and with bladders bursting, brains barely working we count down the miles to Ullapool, supposedly the UK’s most romantic town.
10 miles to go and we catch a band of foreign riders and by force of habit we buzz them probably way too close, but we get a wave anyway and all of a sudden we’re flying into Ullapool just after 1.15pm. The GPS says 497 miles in 9 ½ hours and we fill the bikes, grab some grub and find a toilet. This is our longest break and we phone home to say we’re not dead and leave a message for Alan to see if we’re catching him up. The shop assistant asks where we’ve come from and when we say “Glasgow, this morning!” she doesn’t believe us and who would! Our minds are less numb than when we stopped but the physical side is now telling. Neither of us slept well the night before and even though it is June it was a chilly start. We’ve been sat on the bikes for hours and the work we’ve had to do to muscle these large machines around some very tight bends has been considerable. We’ve been keep up a thumping pace covering more miles in a morning than any sane rider would do in 2 days on these roads. We’ve given no quarter to the other road users and even though we’ve had very few ‘moments’ we’ve had to ride at 8 or 9 tenths just in case we have a problem that slows us down. My back is aching despite the kidney belt and my legs and shoulders are still throbbing when, after 25 minutes, we saddle up and ride off. We trickle through the town and within minutes we are alone in wilderness. The chat has stopped as we take the chances on the straights to gaze around and I promise myself that the next time I’ll be going slowly so I can stop.
The zone beckons and despite the real pain I know we’ve done the hardest part of the riding and now we’ve got the run almost directly North to our next Landmark, Durness at the top left hand corner of Britain. It’s almost 70 miles and we’re still in danger of running out of fuel miles from everywhere and until we reach Thurso 140 miles away I carry our emergency 10 litre can of petrol filled to the brim.. This trip is made up of 3 things, roads, scenery and pain. For me the riding is everything. I don’t want to stop, I don’t want to be held up and even my normal food obsession disappears. I started riding looking for some skills, developing a need for speed, finally realising I am on a never ending hunt not just for the perfect corner or series of corners but for hour upon hours of carving turns as perfectly as possible. This is endurance racing with only one competitor. I get really annoyed with every mistake, however small and I drive myself on to make every corner inch perfect. I’m stitching together hundreds of miles of kissed apexes, rigidly keeping to my side of the roads, the mantra of slow in, power out practised to the highest degree. Body position, head position and observation are key as I balance over 350kg of bike, bags and body at 90mph+ on roads strewn with gravel and sheep shit. I love to lean the bike and punch out the sharper bends on the twin cylinder’s torque. I’m less happy at the head weave at higher speeds as I try to keep up with Jim but I can’t afford to fall back. It is now becoming ever bleaker with mountains devoid of trees or even grass. This is Assynt and these hills have been whipped by Atlantic winds for eons. We’ve left the lush coast with trees, heather and sheep far behind. There is nothing here, a green desert with a ribbon of grey tarmac that stutters between sweeping swooping bends wide enough for 4 lanes and stretches of single track with rutted and broken blacktop linking the potholes. We hit a 5 mile stretch on which repairs had been started years before and left with the top scarified so we shimmied and weaved slowing only by a smidgeon. Over a rise and we see roadworks! A long queue on gravel tracks and no idea of length. We scoot past the line of traffic, as is our Right, and find the hold up is for heavy plant crossing. I dive through at 50, spitting the loose surface (20mph max!) backwards with the confidence of a Dakar racer and shimmy along stood on the pegs.
With the Summer Isles and the oddly named Kylesku the roads slip by and we arrive at Durness where we turn right from flat barren, almost moor and see the 300 foot cliffs that form the North Coast. It’s a shock to see sheep and houses again and we have to stop to take a photo. Away again, Jim leading, we stop going North and head East and for a confusing 8 miles South. This is possibly the most amazing place and defies description by me (but I’ll have a go anyway). 4 miles east of Durness you turn south into Loch Eriboll for 8 miles and whilst you know you’re going the wrong way, so long as the sea is on your left you know you’re safe. In front you can see lush green mountains either side of a valley. After 150 miles and over 3 hours of increasingly barren views you suddenly crave those hills and just as you think you’re going to ride straight between them the road turn north and then east again and you actually feel tears well up as you are forced away from such beauty. It wasn’t the emotion of fatigue, I’ve been there 5 or 6 times and my feelings were identical even after once stopping for an hour in the silence of summer to soak it in. Back on track we pass along the edge of the world looking right at stumps of mountains isolated and lonely in the distance and I know that the next shock is just around the bend.
Just 60 miles out of Durness and there is an instant change in the landscape and the wilderness ends. We pass over a hill, round a bend or two and we see cultivated grass fields and cows! The land flattens, the coastal cliffs shorten and the traffic increases as we spot the golf ball of Dounreay followed by Thurso. The real riding is over which is fine. We are exhausted as we fill up yet again and try not to think that we still have 375 miles to go. Luckily we are on big roads, much more forgiving of mistakes but then again we have lots of stops to make. The journey is unremarkable with Dunnet Head (UK’s most Northerly) and John O’Groats (Scotland’s least attractive) ticked off with photos taken by strangers (£20 collected!) by 5pm and now we’re heading south. Alan has left a message warning of speed traps in Inverness and it’s not long before we’re there. We have ridden over 600 miles trying to keep at 50mph and failing and now we can cruise at 95 so we’re making up time on our schedule. Wick sees another fill up of fuel and fish suppers and greased up we’re raring to go.
The long run along the Moray coast is busy as evening falls and we make a straight run to Fraserburgh for the next fill (with a slight loss of direction from me) and we leave there at 8.50pm with wet weather and night coming in. We get to Peterhead fishmarket (Scotland’s most easterly point) in the misty, damp coldness of the Northern night and looking like ghosts we gobble down a mars bar and desperately tired we head off. It is hard to express the level of fatigue. Everything aches, shoulders are like lead, my right hand has lost its grip and my eyes itch. It is fully dark only because the sky is cloudy and we’re on dual carriageway through Aberdeen and on very familiar roads which makes things worse. I know the Aberdeen – Dundee road like it’s my own because I do frequent drug runs to the heliport. I leave home at 3am arrive at 6, handover and am at my desk by 9.30am. This is worse. I am starting to hallucinate. My hands have turned inside out and I am gripping the bars with the inside of the backs of my hands. I panic as I think my eyes have stuck open and I go even faster to force my brain to work. I open my visor to get a blast of cold air and I breathe deeply. I turn off the heated grips and jacket until I’m freezing then switch them on again. I yell, I stand, I drag my legs. I try to calculate if we need to go inland to make up the last 50 miles as the computer mapping program said. Without warning I see the first sign for Dundee and look at the GPS, we’ve done 995 miles, we don’t need to head inland at all. I’m back! I give Jim the good news as we hit Dundee and we thread our way through the suburbs and over the Tay Bridge. As we enter Fife we complete 1,000 miles and 11 damp, chilled dark miles later we roll into St Andrews and we’re done. 1011.4 miles in 19:21 hrs. We reach the flat, sort ourselves out to find Alan has been there only an hour or two. We get pizza and a beer and we’re buzzing. 1am and we’re asleep. Jim leaves at 7am to head back to Glasgow and a day’s work teaching people to ride motorbikes and Alan & I make a leisurely start for Skegness and beyond; 6 more days and 2,500 miles to go. This truly is biking heaven.
