Whatever your position on its relation to Great Britain or Ireland, and whether you call it a country or a region or a province, Northern Ireland has its own football team, which is enough to justify it for me as a standalone End to End country. I did it with my chum Nigel, on a…
Category: End to Ends
Britain 21: Melvich to John o’Groats
From Melvich I passed Dounreay, site of the famous fast breeder (picture). Obviously, I wore a radiation suit for cycling. After all, can’t do any harm, and cycling is DANGEROUS, and the fact that the suit split after I passed the reactor PROVES IT SAVED MY LIFE. I think radiation suits for cyclists should be…
Britain 20: Lairg to Melvich
A wonderful day of cycling experiences, stories, and pleasant encounters – plus a panic with a happy ending. The A836 north from Lairg (picture) is a great cycling experience: narrow tarmac, gentle gradients if any, little traffic, and going 20 miles across scenic uninhabited landscape. It’s more like a Sustrans railtrail than an A road….
Britain 19: Drumnadrochit to Lairg
After the scenic overload of the previous two days, today was consolidation: drizzly and grey progress, over brooding moorlands and along plains. There were two spectacular sights to thrill the heart though. The first was the semi-panorama over Dornoch Firth before the final descent to Bonar Bridge (picture); the second, the line-up of marked-down sandwiches…
Britain 18: Glencoe to Drumnadrochit
A day of perfect weather and endlessly wonderful scenery along the Great Glen, starting with Loch Linnhe (picture). It was like cycling through a Highland Views Calendar stuck on early summer. All very well, but stopping every five minutes to take another photo plays havoc with your schedule. After a stop in Fort William Wetherspoons…
Britain 17: Loch Lomond to Glencoe
A day of sun and jaw-dropping scenery, which will be further concern to my NHS dentist back in York. It started with a beautiful cloudless dawn over my wildcamp on the shores of Loch Lomond (picture). The only sound was the mallards gang-mating, which made me think the jet-skiers weren’t so bad after all. There’s…
Britain 16: Ayr to Loch Lomond
The pleasant Sustrans route north out of Ayr on this sunny morning took me right through a golf course in Troon. A notice (picture) warns you that you may get hit by golf balls. I didn’t know that cyclist-hating golfers had such a good aim. Following Sustrans’s suggestions to get to Glasgow from Ayr was…
Britain 15: Stranraer to Ayr
With heavy rain forecast and time in hand – but also strong tailwinds – I wasn’t sure whether to get some wet miles in, or sit out the deluge for a day. Eventually – after about five seconds actually – the prospect of 24 more hours in Stranraer, and inevitable mania in consequence, was enough…
Britain 14: Stranraer to Kirkmaiden to Stranraer
With most of my stuff in the tent in Stranraer, I could enjoy a single-pannier day, biking light down to the Mull of Galloway and back, to start the Scottish and final leg of the trip. Without camping stuff, clothes, Argos catalogues etc, the bike felt ever so light and twitchy. The Mull of Galloway…
Britain 10: Holy Island to Marshall Meadows to Dunbar
I cycled the handful of miles from Holy Island to Berwick, with its characteristic rust-coloured ancient bridge over the Tweed (picture), at dawn. The ancient walled city changed hands over a dozen times between England and Scotland over the last few centuries, presumably as both sides were trying to get rid of it. I didn’t…