"Hi Ian
As you picked up there were 3 of us yesterday - Les , Jeff and myself . The superb weather on Deeside continues and we had around 19 degrees and full sun.
We agreed to cruise out to the east and headed along the Deeside way and up to Crathes castle through the west gate .
Out through the back of the castle then turned right and out towards Drum castle via the farm track . On a head down session up the last hill to Drum 2 of us missed the castle turn off left and were brought back down from the top of the hill by Jeff - I think Les blamed myself .
We then went into the Drum castle tea room ( a Freewheelers first ?) for fine scones , cake and coffee .
After that it was a fairly straightforward down the hill to the Deeside way and home - or so we thought.
On the final straight Deeside way stretch from Drumoak to Crathes we were approaching the wooden fence and 2 sharp bends with Les in front setting a brisk pace and myself on Jeff's back wheel.
Jeff took the first bend left fine then on the right hand bend his front wheel seemed to kick on a bump or rock and he was launched upwards making a passable impression of the Danny MacAskill fence jump stunt but unfortunately collecting the top rail of the barbed wire fence with his arm . One of the photos shows the location of the crash .
Jeff suffered some nasty looking cuts on the arm but was otherwise ok and bike was intact so after some patching up we went on .
Les was waiting a bit further on and produced the magic spray to further revive Jeff .
Jeff headed home for more medical attention .
Apart from that incident it was an excellent ride in great weather . 35.6k and 222 m
Cheers
John"
It is the first time this year, John, that the Drum Castle cafe has been visited - but some of us did try it out last year, but it wasn't hugely popular.
Robin added this further comment on his recent holiday:
"Hi Ian
Just sitting in last hotel on Austrian cycle route waiting for taxi to take us to Vienna Airport .
Interested to read John's report on Headwater holiday in France . We have been with them a few times and they are excellent.
This time Bryonie and I and 2 other couples went with Cycle Breaks who are much smaller but equally good.
In 7 days we did exactly 400km down the Mur river on the Murradweg (eg The Mur Way) from the source of the river in the mountains to the flatter plains on the south of the country where the Mur carries on thru Slovenia and eventually out to sea in Croatia.
It was a brilliant ride thru great countryside and with a different hotel and food experience every night . Weather followed a pattern of very warm and sunny (28.6 yesterday) till mid afternoon and then major thunder and lightning storms. We spent hour long periods on 2 days sheltering in road underpasses to let the storms pass.
We finished yesterday afternoon in a spa town with great swimming facilities and had the only puncture of the week just as we arrived at the hotel. As you may imagine in true Freewheelers style no repair was effected !
Finally it has to be said that the Deeside Way has a long way to go to compete with the Murradweg which was smoothly tarmacced for almost the whole 400 km.
Hope all well with you in Oregon.
Thanks for your valued work on the blog.
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