Lost Loch

Fun day out yesterday on our cycle to Deeside Activity Park and the tasting experience at Lost Loch Distillery. It was a hot and sunny afternoon, as witnessed by the post-tasting team photo:

It had been hard to find a date that suited everyone who had expressed an interest in attending (19 in all) but, in the end, 9 of us (including Drew who was just along for the ride) met up at the start at Burnett Park, the last of whom was Hugh who had discovered when he went in to his garage that the battery on his e-bike wasn't charged. Taking his "analogue" bike, worse was to follow when his front tyre was virtually flat when he joined the rest of us. John Meaden sorted that issue and we set off, heading first of all across the old 3rd and 4th holes at the former Inchmarlo golf club, where we discovered the usual trails were pretty overgrown - hard to find at times. There were a few moans about nettles too and I was threatened with an early red card. It was too much for Hugh and he turned around and headed home. The remaining 8 carried on, meeting Jeff at Craiglash and then across to DAP with Ali leading us via a new (to me) forest trail. Here's some of the photos from the tour and tasting:

The route back was up and over the hill and down into Kincar then along to Potarch, where we had planned to stop for a beer, only to find it closed. Up past Slewdrum and down to the quarry where we met up again with Drew who had some chain issues which were sorted pretty quickly. Back in Banchory, 4 of us - Dick, Drew, Nigel and me - made a beeline for the balcony at the golf club for a much-needed beer:

Here's the Strava route:

There was even talk of doing it again next year!