Ride of the Valkaries

We started the ride late, having travelled 60 miles in the morning starting at 8 o’clock, to get to the start. The start was a McDonalds, we were 15 minutes past the start time, but luckily we were still able to start, instead of jumping on our bikes and rushing off we stood under the umbrellas for 5 minutes to wait out a down pour.

I’d cycled through the Scotish Borders this summer when doing the Coast and Casles route. But todays ride we were constantly surprised by the beauty of the scenary, and not just because the mist and rain hide it from use until we were on top of it.

We exited Galasheils up hill along a leafy tree covered road, at around a few bends and we were treated to a view across a valley with mist rising out of the woodland. This is about when the wind began.

The next 40km were hard work, with a near constant headwind. The views were still there and still enjoyed, but above all the emptiness, we seemed to go for miles and only saw the odd isolated house. Part of me thinks it would be wonderful to live in such isolation, a bigger part of me enjoys a short 1 mile ride to the supermarket.

The midway point I’d been most looking forward too was a control at a cafe, but it was a ride out along a loch edge to reach it. The headwind was brutal, but for the first time we saw fellow audaxers coming the other way after visting the control and setting off to the next.

We arrived at the cafe, hungry, very hungry, we had not planned our fueling well and had been surviving on 1 gel, and a flapjack so far. It was now 15:30. We were minutes away from the cut off time at the control, and very thankful the cafe was still open. Normally it would shut at 15:00 but they were hosting a wreath making course, so they were still open. No bacon baps though 😢, we fueled up on a packet of crisps, a scone, a cake, and a cup of tea each before setting off, nevous of the time we had spent there and how close we were to the cut off.

Leaving the cafe we discussed how happy we were that the cafe was still open and how many tears there would have been if it was closed.

We needn’t have been nervous about time, from here our route turned leaving us with a fantastic tailwind, the route to the cafe we covered in the opposite direction in a third of the time.

As we rolled into Innerleithen we could see lots of mountain bikers around, it turns out we were there at the same time as the Scottish Enduro Series. No time to take our gravelish road bike for a spin of the slopes though, we were pressing on to our finish, via the Co-op for a recipt. With only a minor detour/wrong turn, we picked up some drinks and a snack and headed out.

We were now on vaguely familiar roads from our Coast and Castles tour here, so we knew what to expect. The light was fading though, and I started shouting out obstacles until I was laughed at and asked what I was doing. At this point I took my sunglasses off, and the fallen tree which was blocking part of the road which I could barely see became very visible 😎.

At the finishing McDonalds we were the last to arrive back, but that doesn’t matter, we were back and a full hour before the cut off. We recieved a nice badge and patch for finishing, and devoured a McDonalds dinner before setting off home.

Things which went well:

• Pacing, we seem to have paced ourselve well never getting too tired on the bike
• Clothing, we both kept warm and dry with out overheating, nor drowning in our own sweat.

Things which could have been better:

• Fuelling, moar food!
• Arriving on time, we needed to set off maybe 10 minutes earlier.

Things which are uncertain:

• Is Galashiels too far to go for an audax? A 2 hour drive.