Day out at Culross and other places

 Will split this into more than one post...there is so much to see!

I sold two small boxes of vintage bike bits to our Dundee friend...the one with the same initials as Pirate, VP!!  Our midway meeting point was Culross in Fife we met at a cafe by the palace...and chatted for two hours!! Then he went on a bike ride from there as there is a really good shared path along the coast, and I headed for the Palace. It is a sixteenth century house, with a seventeenth century extension....they did end up with eight children and I think moved to another house there..but kept this for business...as the owner extended the coal mines, used the coal to evaporate salt water making salt, and eventually, when the town was awarded the status of Royal Burgh by James VI, was allowed to export salt and coal and other goods...bringing back pantiles as useful ballast.

It is now maintained by the National Trust, and has been owned by them since 1932, so quite an early acquisition.

Please excuse the light quality of the photos...the light levels are low not just to give you a feel of how it would have been, but to conserve things, especially fabrics and paintings..mainly the walls and ceilings.

I wandered around the house and garden for well over an hour....and could have stayed longer...then had a little stroll around the cobbled streets. I didn't stop to draw as it was a little chilly and damp.

On tho Kincardine where part of the 1930s bridge used to swing open...but only until 1969 ...that is also an old port town...I missed the café..and was too early for the chip shop (worth a visit if you are there after 4pm....) but the bakery was open!!

Heading for home the motorway got busier...and slower.....so I turned off and cut across country along the foot of the Campsite Fells to the best wheel builder out..Big Al at Wheelcraft..at Milton of Campsie...I did need handlebar tape....but I accepted a good cup of coffee and we chatted as he worked.

No point dashing back through Glasgow at rush hour.....and we both enjoyed the discussion! 

I left there just before 6....it is an easy route down to the Clyde Tunnel, one we have done many times on the way home from there! Then across to Ibrox Park, the home of Rangers football club, and across to the M77...three junctions and I'm off again...hitting the reduced items in Waitrose this time....cancelled out by the purchase of the latest Terry Pratchett book..The Lost Stories written under a pseudonym in the 70s and 80s.....

And back home on normal roads, now in the dark.

The coffee made sure I was awake for the drive.....I was still well awake for nany hours.....and I fell jet lagged today!!

But it was very nice coffee Indeed.....

Velodroming

 Much catching up over the past two days..and another to come..I hope to miss out on Sunday!

Helping my clubmate race as well...one bronze and one silver so far.

Pirate's elder daughter came over from Bristol..I had photos and papers and clothes for the three of them..we had a good couple of hours chatting.

Repeated again with a friend who used to be joint secretary of the allotment society in Cwmcarn, with me.

Then up to see son #3...and got fed supper and invited to stay overnight. Their son was staying over at his girlfriend's home, so there was a bed spare!

Son #1 came over this afternoon to the Velodrome and saw a lot of his contemporaries racing....he needs to do a lot more riding to get that fit!!

He fitted a new rear wiper on my car , then we went for a walk before I faced the traffic back to Somerset. That took an hour more than usual with traffic backed up over ten miles going down from Bristol, as a campervan had broken down in the middle lane of the motorway .

Rest and repeat tomorrow..and I am going to check the map for less congested roads....the main culprit is the roadworks on the new Severn bridge....

Potfest in the Park

 Up early-ish today and off to Hutton in the Forest, just Northwest of Penrith.

It was 105 miles... Auntie Goggle said 2 hours 12 minutes.....which would have been very close, without a cloudburst just before Dumfries, and another longer section of torrential rain while on the motorway . The sort that has you down to 40 mph , wipers on fast, fog lights on fire and aft and beginning to wonder if you are going a smidgin too fast....and still there were grey cars without lights on passing at speed.....I was glad that I'd had a break after an hour and 38 miles at Thornhill , the usual stop.

It is Potfest in the Park weekend...105 potters /ceramists/artists in clay....there were only 90 when we went a few years ago, but it has obviously slowly and steadily increased!

I met up with a few friends, chatted to others and treated myself to chips and mushy peas for lunch !!

Musical entertainment...a string quartet 

The house...I didn't have a wander around the gardens this time as it started raining again!!

I even had a nap in the car after lunch...and went back for a second look...there was every sort of work, every type of clay, every size you could imagine!  Inspiring yet mind blowing.

I did the return trip in one hit.. although ready to stop for a break at any time...in nice dry and sunny weather. I did the first 20 miles on ordinary roads to get back into driving mode... luckily there is a 15 mile stretch of the A 6 that is almost parallel to the motorway and it is a nice clear rolling road.....then a quick 10  motorway miles over the border to Scotland and on the B roads through villages to Dumfries, avoiding the traffic on the A75 heading for the ferry to Ireland. Up the A76 to New Cumnock, then on the back roads for a quieter shorter last 15 miles to home....

Now to put my feet up... until tomorrow!!

Pen y Ghent

 We stayed in a roadside hotel outside Skipton on the way home....I wish it had been a lot further from the road!! Still, had it been, it would have been much more than £55.....

This was just over halfway home, and a chance to see a little of where pirate raced nine times, in the Three Peaks Cyclo-cross race.

Through Settle to Horton in Ribblesdale, where the cyclists start up towards Pen y Ghent mountain, after doing Ingleborough and Whernside (including going past the Ribblehead viaduct) . We walked up nearly the first half...1½ miles....the second half..1¾miles...would have been too much!! As it was the three miles took nearly three hours.

A wooden footbridge...the road bridges are narrow, and the quarry lorries wait for nobody!!

Along the road to where the riders leave the road and head up a track.

An apt name...seeing the view...

Onwards and upwards....

Looking back

I don't know how they do it!!....and in three or four hours as well. Just crazy.

Sandwiches and cake from Kirby Lonsdale...then on the road again. 

A much needed stop at Gretna Green....then home shopping in Thornhill...one hour of travelling to go, as it gradually turned to night.

We were very glad indeed to arrive home. The car was emptied ...cleaning it can wait!!

Today has been catching up time...doing the laundry, packing two fleabay sales and taking them to the post office by bike. Relaxing, then clearing the polytunnel of tomatoes...a washing up bowl full! I must clear and clean the greenhouse tomorrow morning.

Busy as ever!

 Yesterday we had an early start and headed for Dundee again, not quite missing the traffic congestion through Glasgow.

Showers were forecast, but we didn't expect a hail shower as we were unpacking our bikes!

Thus time I rode the track session, just steady riding for me for about 45 minutes, then the hail started again! The other three ride a little faster most of the time and longer. Then a takeaway cuppa..and the craic lasted as long as the riding!

We decided not to come straight back down the main roads, and had a little detour round small roads and lanes, via Cupar Angus and coming into Perth at Scone.

Down the main road nearly to Stirling, then across via Doune to Fintry. There we had intended going over the Crow Road to Lennoxtown to see a friend in his bikeshop...road closed for three weeks..so we had to go around the end of the big hill not over it! But....road closed signs....but again...traffic coming towards us..ok, carry on....

We weren't supposed to go that way....a quarter of the width of the road had been washed out ! It was safe enough to go through.

Fresh coffee and biscuits were very welcome when we arrived...and more talk and buying tyres for me passed the time to avoid the evening rush hour!

With more long driving coming in the future I need to get back in practice to stay safe...we were both well tired...but it was good to see the landscape for real and to see friends too.

Today was a late start..catch up on housework after yesterday, and get plants out in the new bed at last...just broad beans and parsnip, and thinking where the beans and peas will go.

I managed to finish a small linoblock...of a sunset...

And then we had a magenta and peach sunset....not that this tablet sees it as that!