I'm sure it was warm in Mallorca but Deeside was also glorious today, getting up to 23C by noon, when we were heading back from one of Robin's Magical Mystery Tours - this time consisting of three separate loops, all starting and finishing at the Square in Tarland. You'll soon see why it was dubbed the Cloverleaf run when you look at the map - https://www.strava.com/activities/323150059.
We were 8 in number this morning, including debutant Peter Renwick, fresh from captaining Peterculter Seniors to victory at Banchory on Monday. Jeb, Scott, Robin, Peter, Dick and John P all showed up with cars with bike racks so we all managed to get to Tarland safely not long after 9 am.
Scott had to be back home by 11:30 am so he only joined us for the first of the three loops - and, of course, our coffee break, held in the Pharmacy in Tarland of all places.
We headed west to Migvie and our first photo call was held in a little church out in the wilds:
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| Back row l-r: Scott Hunter, Jeb Tyrie & Les Gray Front row l-r: John Perry, Robin Brodie, Dick Taylor, Peter Renwick & Ian Stewart |
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| Recognise any of these villains? |
We took another team photo out in the graveyard:
Waving Scott farewell after our coffee stop, the rest of us set off on the second loop, but, still not satisfied after that, we went on a third one. The views on all the loops were terrific, especially of Lochnagar and Mount Keen. I attempted to take another team photo, with the camera propped up high on a road sign, but the sign itself affected the autofocus, leaving only this rather blurry image:
Just to prove Lochnagar was still there, I took one without people:
We covered "only" 29kms, mostly on tarmac, and it was pretty up and down so the total climbed was almost 1,300 feet. Dick did get his excitement level up a bit with an offroad fix on the last stage - including some genuine mud. We were true Mountain Bikers after all. Check the stats here - https://www.strava.com/activities/323150059.
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